jschoubben
10365f2eae
Jochen: a jungle of specs that slightly contradict or patch each other, and what matters is a working state rather than history. Both are fair and both are mine. Measured rather than assumed. 05-the-node-host and 09-the-node-lifecycle both covered enrolment, the install commands, the unit file, the launcher and reconcile -- I wrote 09 without taking anything out of 05, so the same things were said twice and could drift apart. Split by what each document IS. 05 is the component: what the host is, its parts, the declaration vocabulary, the build order, how it is verified. 09 is what happens to it: install, enrol, run, upgrade, retire. The whole "The process" section left 05, and the unit file moved to 09 where installing is described. 05 goes from 338 lines to 245 and now points at 09 rather than restating it. 09 also carried a 105-line "Resolved" section -- six mechanisms framed as "these were open and here is the answer". The content is needed; the framing is history, and history is what makes a document read as a changelog rather than a description. Renamed to what it actually is and the was-open phrasing removed. Also added 10-delivery.md, which did not exist: four accepted decisions -- 0054, 0063, 0064, 0065 -- had no design document at all, which is the specific reason the delivery picture felt scattered. It is now one document covering modules, the three edges, the core library, and how a change becomes a running thing, with a table of what each property is designed against and what must exist before it can be built.
02-DECISIONS
Architecture decision records — the "why" trail behind the rules in
00-META and the specifications in 03-DESIGN.
Numbered 02 because a decision precedes the design it authorises. Research concludes,
the decision is recorded here, and only then is the design written. Following the folder
numbers walks the process in the order it happens.
One file per decision, numbered, never deleted. A superseded record has its status: changed
and gains a pointer to what replaced it — its text is never edited. The reasoning that was
rejected is the expensive half to rediscover.
The records run in the order the decisions were taken, oldest first.
Every decision is a record. There is no ledger and no index file — if a decision is worth
recording it is worth a record, and if it is not worth a record it is not recorded
(ADR 0026). A "decision" small enough to be one line is
almost always a rule, and a rule belongs in
00-META/how-we-build.md, where it is enforced and keeps the
incident that earned it.
Frontmatter
---
status: proposed | accepted | superseded
date: YYYY-MM-DD # when the decision was taken, not when it was written down
deciders: name
reconstructed: true|false # true when the record was written after the fact from evidence
superseded-by: # 02-DECISIONS/NNNN-....md, when status is superseded
extends: # 02-DECISIONS/NNNN-....md, when this record widens an earlier one
---
Body
# N. Title in plain language
## Context what was true, with evidence
## Considered Options numbered, each with why it was rejected
## Decision what was decided
## Consequences what follows, including what got harder
## References commits, pull requests, knowledge-base entries, prior art
State evidence, not assertion. "Zero of 124 modules declare brain as a dependency"
outranks "the dependency rule is not followed".
Reconstructed records
Records 0001–0014 were written on 2026-08-23, after the decisions they describe. Records 0015 onward were taken as records. Those
decisions were taken in implementation rather than in a document; the records state what was
decided and the evidence it was decided from, and each carries reconstructed: true and says
so in its first lines.
A reconstructed record is not a transcript. Where the deliberation is not recoverable, the options section states what the alternatives were and why the chosen one won on the evidence available — not a discussion that did not happen. Where a date is not establishable it says so rather than guessing.
Index
The index is generated, not maintained — run the hq-status skill, which reads the
frontmatter of every record. A hand-written index drifts from the folder it describes, and
this one had already done so after a single addition.