Consolidate: 65 decision records to 23

Every remaining cluster merged. Each was one design that had been split across
several records because it was worked out over days rather than at once.

  the node host          8 -> 1    applies not decides, depends on nothing,
                                   per operating system, root service, the
                                   launcher, episodic, what a declaration is,
                                   actions from the bundle only
  a node and how it joins 4 -> 1   what a node is, joining, the link as
                                   security boundary, the enrolment token
  modules and the graph   7 -> 1   everything is a module, no domain modules,
                                   three edges, provisioning, the core library
  substrate and control   6 -> 1   the test, seven contexts, one control plane,
    plane                          the authority is not a database, the named
                                   products, the pinned bundle
  connectivity            3 -> 1   a route is a grant, reachability declared,
                                   filter rules
  delivery                5 -> 1   reconciliation not a pipeline, artifacts,
                                   the three silos, a failed step, the verdict
  the lab                 5 -> 1   (earlier)
  how this repository     10 -> 1  (earlier)
    works

Nothing was dropped. Each consolidated record carries the reasoning of the ones
it absorbs -- the measurements, the incidents, the alternatives rejected --
because that reasoning is the only reason to keep a record at all. What is gone
is the fragmentation: eight files to read to understand tier 0, when tier 0 is
one component.

The four superseded records went too. They existed to point at their
successors, and the successors now contain what they said.

The checker made this safe. Each merge left dangling links -- 38 files after
the host merge alone -- and it named every one. Nothing was found by reading,
and a manual pass would certainly have missed some, including references inside
AGENTS.md which every session loads.
This commit is contained in:
2026-08-28 20:03:24 +02:00
parent 5e83ac2c22
commit 77f3a4cea7
90 changed files with 1041 additions and 4187 deletions
@@ -2,7 +2,7 @@
status: active
initiated: 2026-08-26
touches:
- 02-DECISIONS/0043-a-declaration-is-an-ordered-list-of-owned-resources.md
- 02-DECISIONS/0037-the-node-host.md
- 02-DECISIONS/0004-managed-files-are-generated-never-edited.md
- 03-DESIGN/01-to-be/05-the-node-host.md
- 03-DESIGN/00-as-is/05-runtime-and-installation.md
@@ -34,7 +34,7 @@ carry everything in the bundle, download at apply time, or have something push t
first. Downloading fails on the first node, which cannot fetch the image registry from the image
registry it is trying to start.
> **Qualified by [ADR 0046](../../02-DECISIONS/0046-the-installer-fetches-what-it-pins.md).** The
> **Qualified by [ADR 0048](../../02-DECISIONS/0048-the-substrate-and-the-control-plane.md).** The
> reframing below still holds for what a *tailored installer* contains — the missing pieces for a
> given machine. It does **not** have to hold for container images: the installer fetches those
> by digest, because a real machine has a network and the sealed case is the lab.
@@ -77,7 +77,7 @@ starts applying. Three states, and the middle one is new:
> unmanaged → **adopted once** → generated
**And it crosses a boundary just drawn.** [ADR 0043](../../02-DECISIONS/0043-a-declaration-is-an-ordered-list-of-owned-resources.md)
**And it crosses a boundary just drawn.** [ADR 0037](../../02-DECISIONS/0037-the-node-host.md)
says the host never touches what it did not create — the rule that stops a converger deleting
what the mesh never put there. Adoption is the deliberate act of taking ownership of exactly
that. The rule needs a companion rather than an exception: *never, unless adoption made it the