@sabaiway/agent-workflow-kit 14.29.0 → 14.30.0

package/CHANGELOG.md

@@ -4,6 +4,77 @@ Semantically versioned ([semver](https://semver.org)), newest first. The `versio
 is the current release. `upgrade` mode reads a project's `docs/ai/.workflow-version` and applies
 every `migrations/<version>-<slug>.md` newer than it, in semver order.
 
+## 14.30.0 — the upgrade brings the docs navigator back to green past 80 lines: one yes replaces every edited spec-layer script, and a navigator write the project's own checker rejects is put back (AD-182)
+
+**`/agent-workflow-kit upgrade` now leaves a project with more docs than the navigator's old cap on a navigator its
+own docs check accepts — behind an edited spec-layer file, once the user says yes to replacing it.** Before, the bundled checker stamped `maxLines: 80` into `docs/ai/index.md` whatever its
+length, the navigator step wrote it whatever checker the project's hook runs, and the spec-layer step told the user to
+copy the scripts by hand when one was edited.
+
+- **The bundled checker stamps a cap it honours.** `references/scripts/check-docs-size.mjs` is byte-identical to memory
+  8.2.0's: `maxLines: 80` while the navigator fits, its own line count past that.
+- **An unedited older checker refreshes.** The prior catalog gains the memory 7.0.0–8.1.5 checker body, so the
+  spec-layer step refreshes a deployed checker still on it (`refreshed`, or `seeded` when the run also seeds), unless
+  an edited file of either pair holds it back until the replace run.
+- **One yes replaces every edited file.** While a file of the reader or checker pair carries a body this kit did not
+  ship, the spec-layer step names each such file, the store-root line names them as the reason it waits, and ONE line
+  states its condition and prints the command: `node <kit>/tools/ensure-configs.mjs --reconcile --replace-custom
+  <digest> --cwd <project>`, both paths shell-quoted. The digest binds the set of edited files and their bytes. The
+  upgrade asks one yes naming those files and saying their edits are overwritten, even on a non-zero exit.
+- **The replace run overwrites no edited file the yes did not name.** `--replace-custom <digest>` re-surveys first:
+  while an edited file remains, another set or other bytes is `failed` / `race-unresolved` with nothing written and a
+  fresh replace line; with no edited file left it runs the ordinary step, so a second run of the same line changes
+  nothing. On a match it rewrites each
+  edited file to the bundled body (`carried an edited body — replaced by the bundled one on the user's yes`), refreshes
+  and seeds as the step always does, then runs the navigator step, only after a spec-layer step that did not fail;
+  otherwise its line ends `the navigator step did not run: …`. It is a usage error (exit 2, nothing run) with `--only`,
+  with `--dry-run`, with an empty value or passed twice. No backup copy is written.
+- **The project's own checker judges the navigator.** Where the project deploys `scripts/check-docs-size.mjs` and it,
+  or the `scripts/spec-schema.mjs` it imports, is not the bundled body, the navigator step runs that checker's
+  `--check-index` (30 s, then killed): accepted means exit 0 and a navigator within the `maxLines` it stamps. A
+  navigator accepted as found is `already-current` with nothing written. Otherwise the bundled generator writes and the
+  checker judges again: accepted is `regenerated`; rejected puts the navigator back byte for byte (removed again if it
+  was absent) and reports `customized-preserved`, the run still exiting 0, its line naming the checker's exit and
+  output and the route. A later failure puts back first and keeps its own cause; a put-back that fails is `failed` /
+  `write-refused`, saying a navigator the project's checker rejects may stand; a checker that cannot start or does not
+  answer in time is `failed` / `index-probe-failed`. The dry run runs no project code and says that, unless the
+  spec-layer step first refreshes every such module, the real run judges by the project's checker. With no
+  `scripts/check-docs-size.mjs`, or both modules on the bundled body, the step is unchanged; where it exists, a hook
+  module that is not a regular file is `failed` / `wrong-node-kind` and one that cannot be read `failed` /
+  `unexpected-error`, nothing written.
+- **No shipped instruction says to copy an edited spec-layer script over by hand; past CHANGELOG entries are history.**
+  `upgrade.md` row 3 carries the consent sentence and the `configs` block's STOP waits for that ask; the navigator
+  token list gains `customized-preserved`; the `spec-adoption` example names the replace line's own yes, and its risk
+  text the prior refresh and that yes; the help and header of `ensure-configs.mjs` and
+  the comments of the ensure modules say the same. No outcome token or failure cause is added.
+- Known limits: rules a custom checker's default run adds beyond the cap are outside the judgement; after the yes the
+  upgrade report still relays the first spec-layer line (queued as `UPGRADE-REPORT-RELAYS-THE-PRE-REPLACE-SPECS-LINE`).
+
+## 14.29.1 — an upgrade keeps the sandbox-masks block byte for byte and names every non-blank line it takes out (AD-181)
+
+**On a hidden deployment, the footprint step of `/agent-workflow-kit upgrade` (`hide-footprint --reconcile`) now leaves
+the sandbox-masks block in `.git/info/exclude` byte-identical.** Before, the step read every line outside its own
+managed block as its own: it could take `/.claude/skills` out of the masks block and re-encode the block's line
+endings while it reported `+0/−0 — the hidden set is unchanged`, and the masks lane then read its block as drifted.
+
+- **Another kit lane's block is kept whole.** A block opened by a `# >>> agent-workflow…` line and closed by its own
+  lane's `# <<< agent-workflow… <<<` line keeps every line, its order and its own line endings, a last line with no
+  line ending included; none of its lines is folded into the hidden-mode block. A hidden-mode block the run creates
+  goes at the end of the file, or right before such a block when that block ends the file with no line ending.
+- **A malformed marker stops the step with nothing written.** A damaged hidden-mode marker, a block opened inside
+  another, a closer with no open block, a closer of another block, a block never closed or a repeated marker refuse
+  with exit 1 and `refusing to edit a malformed managed block in <file>: …`, naming the line at fault; the exclude
+  file is unchanged, on a dry run and under `--unhide` alike.
+- **Every non-blank line taken out is named.** The report lists each non-blank line the run takes out outside the hidden-mode block,
+  verbatim and in file order, one per line: `[hide-footprint] removed=<line>` after an apply,
+  `[hide-footprint] would-remove=<line>` on a dry run. A run that takes out nothing prints none.
+- **The apply ask rule is named by its purpose.** The velocity help, `references/modes/velocity.md`, the README
+  velocity row and the advisor's `velocity-core` texts now say why the rule exists: so all work can stay in auto mode.
+  Without it auto mode refuses a harness apply and you must leave auto mode for it; with it the harness shows its
+  usual dialog. The rule and what it seeds are unchanged.
+- Known limits: the file is read and written as UTF-8, so a byte that is not UTF-8 is not kept, as before; a stop
+  after the file has changed can leave a removed line unreported.
+
 ## 14.29.0 — in auto mode the chat yes applies a harness item through the harness's own dialog: one seeded ask rule (AD-179)
 
 **In a session the harness runs in its auto mode, once the apply ask rule is seeded (every velocity-core, kit-tools-tier or bridge-tier apply seeds it), the

package/README.md

@@ -261,7 +261,7 @@ file), or run the guarded `/agent-workflow-kit uninstall`.
 | `/agent-workflow-kit dispatch` | any time | **the delegation engine** — makes "how much does delegating a sub-task actually buy?" a measured number instead of a feeling. `check <file>` validates a sub-task brief's contract block and exits 0/1 naming the first violated field — **form only**: whether the task is genuinely bounded, its design decided and its acceptance adequate stays your judgment, and a well-formed absurdity passes here by construction. `advise --step-class <c>` answers the question that comes BEFORE that one — which vehicle should carry this kind of sub-task, whether it is even present on this machine, and what the ledger has already recorded for threads of that class (finished, failed, closed without a fold, and still open — counted separately) — and it decides nothing: it refuses no dispatch, gates no verb, and a choice that diverges from the advice is noted rather than blocked. It reads the filesystem only: nothing is launched to find out what is installed, an absent ledger prints "no recorded history", an unreadable one prints the store's own words, and either way the advice still prints. The same block appears as a footer under a form-valid `check` — never under a refusal, so it can never hide one. `register` pre-registers an acceptance wave (step classes, pairing key, minimum observations per class, the mean and first-pass thresholds) so the bar can never be chosen after the results it judges — immutable per wave. `observe` records ONE hand-written observation (`solo-construction`, the baseline whose ratio is 1 by construction — except over a scope measuring zero bytes, which has no ratio at all and is recorded ineligible by name — or `self-reported`) — delegated numbers are never hand-written, they are derived. The writer verbs are where that derivation happens: `open` puts a delegated thread on the record with every mint-time field copied from the brief's own header, refusing a deadline the wrapper's cap plus its kill grace would not fit inside, and recording whether the tree it started from was clean against the thread's base — HEAD by default, or the tree `--checkpoint <oid>` names, so the second task of a story is measured over the first one's uncommitted work instead of opening dirty (a dirty one makes the result honestly unmeasurable rather than quietly counted), while `--task <brief>` also records which task brief the thread carries out and the files that brief lists, refusing, since the last commit, a task thread whose files overlap by path prefix those of an open task thread or of a folded thread of another brief (`files-overlap`), and a mix of the two kinds — an untasked open beside an open task thread or, for a `code` open of backend `codex`, after a task fold, and a task open beside an open untasked thread (`mixed-open`), refusing at open a Files path the snapshot scope can never hold (`task-files-scope`), and measuring a task thread over its files alone, so `return` and `fold` refuse a changed path that no open or folded task thread on the same base claims (`out-of-files`); `await` waits for that one dispatch to answer and writes nothing — only the finished receipt satisfies it, a run still holding the nonce means keep waiting, and a wait that runs out says so with its own exit code, names whether the deadline or your own timeout ended it, and authorizes nothing: a wait that ended without an answer is a question for you, never permission to dispatch again; `return` absorbs the receipt the wrapper minted — only a finished one, checked against the contract it actually ran, its deadline and its own report, and refused outright when the tree hides changes from git or moves while the return is being computed — and derives the bytes from git rather than from anyone's claim; `fold` is the acceptance, and it refuses if the tree moved since the return — precisely, it re-confirms **equality of the visible canonical payload**, which is a change detector rather than a cryptographic identity of the tree: under the default head base that payload's untracked section is unframed and carries no file mode, so a content or symlink target that imitates the marker opening the next entry can alias two trees, and making an untracked file executable moves nothing (both named as residuals in the mode doc, with the fix queued); under a checkpoint base it is one indexed diff that carries modes. A change set carrying a binary, a non-regular path, a submodule, or a symlink whose target is not valid UTF-8 is **refused** at `return` and `fold` — CONSERVATIVELY, rather than promise what the default head payload may not be able to follow — and the same refusals hold for a checkpoint thread. `degrade` closes a thread that never earned a fold, on the record and with its reason. `aggregate` prints one wave: the registered thresholds, every observation as context, and per step class the finished threads — a folded success with git-provable bytes contributes its ratio, one whose bytes are unprovable is excluded from the mean but still counts in the first-pass rate, and a failed thread, a degrade-closed one, or one folded after failing acceptance each count as a real zero. Below the registered minimum nothing is computed (insufficient); at or above it is computed and labeled PILOT evidence. It REFUSES rather than guessing: no pre-registration, an unfinished thread in scope, a recorded refusal-to-delegate that never opened a thread, or an ambiguous wave each stop the computation by name. `handoff-return --slug <s>` closes the worktree loop after `land --prepare`: it re-attests that main still holds exactly the prepared tree under the same HEAD (both recorded in the handoff at prepare time), prints the satellite handoff's user-owned content byte for byte with its boundaries, byte lengths and the main-owned destinations each part folds into, prints the handoff digest and both OIDs as its proof, states the after-the-fold order (a fold landed after the gates leaves them stale), and records ONE self-reported worktree-stream observation only when the whole prepared change set is measurable — a deletion, a rename, a symlink, a submodule or a mode-only change ends with a named NOT RECORDED instead, never a partial number. Appends only to its own ledger inside the git dir (never committable); it also writes `handoff-return`'s `write-tree` tree object and, for a checkpoint measurement, the leaf's OWN temporary index file and the blobs its forced adds store — never a ref, never the real index; never commits, never runs a subscription CLI. |
 | `/agent-workflow-kit worktrees` | any time | **parallel feature worktrees** — run several features in DIFFERENT agent sessions on one repo, zero interference on working-tree files (the ONE exception is the dependency cache, below): `provision <slug> --plan <file>` creates a sibling git worktree on branch `aw/<slug>` and populates it (registry-derived footprint copy-if-missing — a tracked file is never overwritten; EXACTLY ONE seeded feature plan; the `handoff-<slug>.md` record from minute zero; `node_modules` symlinked where the link stays ignored — a shared MUTABLE dependency cache: writes through it hit MAIN's node_modules; for isolation run the printed isolated-install command (`--install` only PRINTS it; on `--resume` run the printed unlink-first recovery first — printed only for a link whose RAW TARGET is MAIN's `node_modules`, since a foreign or unreadable link is reported as such with no removal advised); absolute root-pinned gate commands rebased on untracked copies only, and only while their bytes equal the MAIN source or its rebased form — user-modified copies stay untouched); `list` is read-only (slug, branch, base, dirty, handoff); `prompt <slug>` is read-only too and re-prints the satellite's cold-start prompt — the same text `provision` ends its report with: where the worktree is, its ONE seeded plan, the handoff as the one channel back, MAIN's orientation (shared series index, landing) and, under its own heading because it is probed on the satellite, that checkout's install posture — every value derived LIVE rather than replayed from the frozen provision record, a recorded value that no longer matches NAMED as a divergence (with the cause its source makes likely) instead of printed as the runnable one, every offered command marked with WHO runs it (`MAIN $ …` for the landing, `HERE $ …` for this checkout's own install, a posture with nothing to run staying prose), and a control character in any rendered value a typed STOP rather than a forged prompt line; `land <slug> --prepare` locks the common git dir, fail-closes on divergence or incomplete satellite state, transfers the complete accepted satellite diff onto a CLEAN main, runs sync plus the declared gates, and reports HEAD/TRANSFER/PREPARED OIDs — the commit ALWAYS stays a dialogue ask; `cleanup <slug>` takes the same lock and removes a LANDED worktree only after live landed-verification against main HEAD, while `--abandon` is the ONE destructive arm (destroys unlanded work; **no preview step** on any writer). The parent dir is the `docs/ai/worktrees.json` `parentDir` setting (default: the repo's sibling parent); an unwritable parent degrades to printed maintainer-pasted commands, and the one-time host consent that makes it promptless surfaces via `recommendations`. Never commits, never pushes, never runs a subscription CLI. |
 | `/agent-workflow-kit uninstall` | opt-in, any time | **guarded teardown** — the inverse of `init` / `setup`. Removes only what's **provably ours** (managed skill dirs + bridge wrappers; in a project, the hidden-mode git-ignore block it added + the pre-commit hook it installed); **never deletes** your `docs/ai` / `AGENTS.md` (prints the exact `rm` to run by hand) or your `.claude/settings.json` (prints an **edit** — remove the attribution key, review any velocity `permissions.*` — never an `rm`). Always `--dry-run` first; preflight-then-mutate; never commits. |
-| `/agent-workflow-kit velocity` | Claude Code · opt-in | **onboarding velocity profile** — seeds a fixed, audited **read-only** allowlist into `.claude/settings.json` so routine read-only commands stop idling on approval prompts while you're away; every allowlist apply (flagless, `--kit-tools`, `--bridge-tier`) also seeds one `permissions.ask` rule, so the harness asks before every harness apply (the `apply:` line of each harness item the upgrade advisor renders) instead of judging it in its auto mode — a question added, it removes no prompt; opt-in `acceptEdits`; plus a **read-only advisory** of likely project gate commands to add by hand. Writes **only** `.claude/settings.json` — **never** allowlists commit/push/publish, never writes `settings.local.json`, never commits. A seeded entry is a **trust posture, not a sandbox** (a runtime residual remains at the settings level — its guard ships as the opt-in `hook` command); a direct commit/push/publish still asks. `--dry-run` first. |
+| `/agent-workflow-kit velocity` | Claude Code · opt-in | **onboarding velocity profile** — seeds a fixed, audited **read-only** allowlist into `.claude/settings.json` so routine read-only commands stop idling on approval prompts while you're away; every allowlist apply (flagless, `--kit-tools`, `--bridge-tier`) also seeds one `permissions.ask` rule, so all work can stay in auto mode: without it auto mode refuses a harness apply (the `apply:` line of each harness item the upgrade advisor renders) and you must leave auto mode for it; with it the harness shows its usual dialog — the rule allows nothing; opt-in `acceptEdits`; plus a **read-only advisory** of likely project gate commands to add by hand. Writes **only** `.claude/settings.json` — **never** allowlists commit/push/publish, never writes `settings.local.json`, never commits. A seeded entry is a **trust posture, not a sandbox** (a runtime residual remains at the settings level — its guard ships as the opt-in `hook` command); a direct commit/push/publish still asks. `--dry-run` first. |
 | `/agent-workflow-kit agents` | Claude Code · opt-in | **subagent vehicles** — places the five bundled subagent definitions into `.claude/agents/`: **four read-only vehicles + one full-tool `executor`**. **No read-only vehicle gets `Bash`**, and that is the load-bearing property: a read-only fan-out on a full-tool subagent shells out for facts it could have read, and every shelled command is an approval prompt you never needed to see. Three of the four ride a **cheap model** (haiku, low effort) for mechanical work — extraction sweeps, changelog fact-skeletons, gate-failure triage; the fourth, **`review-lens`**, is an ADDITIONAL independent read-only review opinion on code your configured backends have already seen (never a replacement for your plan or diff review recipe, advisory like every review; an epic is reviewed by the lens alone, whatever `epic.review` resolves to). The fifth, **`executor`** (all tools; model and effort from `docs/ai/vehicles.json`), is the ONE vehicle with a shell and the instrument behind the **Subagent** recipe: dispatched only for a bounded, file-disjoint execution / authoring / routine slice you verify afterwards — never for read-only work, never as a review backend, and it never commits. Its state (`placed` / `customized` / `unusable` / `missing`) is what a `subagent` slot's readiness resolves from. Writing code and running gates stay off the four read-only vehicles; the executor carries a bounded slice you re-verify on your main lane, and every vehicle's output is verified. Preview by default (`--apply` writes); an existing customized read-only vehicle or lens is **preserved, never overwritten**; the executor's body is re-derived from `docs/ai/vehicles.json` (a hand edit is replaced); never touches `settings*.json`, never commits. |
 | `/agent-workflow-kit hook` | Claude Code · opt-in | **gate-approval hook** — places a self-contained PreToolUse hook (`.claude/hooks/`) and wires it into `.claude/settings.json`: a Bash command **byte-identical** to a gate you declared in `docs/ai/gates.json` (run from the project root) is auto-approved — no prompt, no idle; a seeded read-only command carrying a runtime residual (output redirection, command substitution, `--output` writes) now **asks** even where an allow rule would have silently passed it (proven live — hook `ask` overrides an allow rule). Detection is a conservative string scan, so it over-asks on a byte that is ordinary text — searching for `=>`, or a read wearing `2>/dev/null`, prompts. That is a documented open limit: 4.1.0 built three mechanisms to narrow it and removed all three in review, each counterexample kept as a test (see Mode: hook). Exact matches only, never patterns; never `deny`; a broken `gates.json` only disables auto-approval, never the guard. An opt-in **read-lane** (`--read-lane` → `docs/ai/lanes.json`, a **separate** file from `gates.json`) additionally auto-approves *compounds* of seeded read-only commands carrying no shell metaprogramming; `--apply --read-lane` verifies the placed hook is current first (delete-to-reseed otherwise). Preview by default; never writes `settings.local.json`; never commits. |
 | `/agent-workflow-kit state-block-guard` | Claude Code · opt-in | **closing-block detector** — a `Stop` hook that reads the turn's final assistant message and warns when the closing state block is defective: the «what I need from you» slot answering *nothing* (a turn that ENDS always needs a resume, so the answer is false, not merely unhelpful), or a first-person promise of imminent work in a turn that is over. Judged on the slot's first clause, so a real ask followed by a clause break and "nothing else" passes, and a promise gated on something named passes; matching is word-bounded and Unicode-aware, quoted and fenced examples are stripped, and the last STARTED block decides — an incomplete tail counts as no block rather than falling back to an earlier one. A message carrying no block at all is silent unless you pass `--require-block` — this kit does not mandate the block, and a hook that runs every turn must not warn every turn. The judgement is lexical and the mode doc names every residual it leaves. **Detection, never prevention** — a `Stop` hook cannot un-send the message it judges; what it buys is that a silent recurrence becomes a visible one. Warns via `systemMessage` and **exits 0 on every path**: never `deny`, never blocks the stop, never re-enters the model. Reads nothing but the message, makes no network call, approves nothing. This mode is **read-only and has no writer** — it ships the self-contained hook and a paste-ready wiring block you merge into `.claude/settings.json` yourself. |

package/SKILL.md

@@ -3,7 +3,7 @@ name: agent-workflow-kit
 description: Deploy or upgrade a portable AI-agent memory-and-workflow system in any project. Use when the user wants to bootstrap `docs/ai/` + an entry-point `AGENTS.md` (+ `CLAUDE.md` alias) + cap/archive/index enforcement in a new or existing repo, set up the Memory Map and session protocols, install the docs-rotation pre-commit hook, or run `/agent-workflow-kit` / `/agent-workflow-kit upgrade`. Triggers on phrases like "set up the memory system", "deploy the AI workflow here", "bootstrap docs/ai", "upgrade the workflow". New to the epic, story and task tier? Run `/agent-workflow-kit tier`. A typed decision with a confidence from Jev? Run `/agent-workflow-kit jev`.
 disable-model-invocation: true
 metadata:
-  version: '14.29.0'
+  version: '14.30.0'
 ---
 
 # agent-workflow-kit

package/capability.json

@@ -3,7 +3,7 @@
   "schema": 1,
   "name": "agent-workflow-kit",
   "kind": "composition-root",
-  "version": "14.29.0",
+  "version": "14.30.0",
   "provides": [],
   "roles": {},
   "detect": {

package/package.json

@@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
 {
   "name": "@sabaiway/agent-workflow-kit",
-  "version": "14.29.0",
+  "version": "14.30.0",
   "description": "Portable, cross-agent memory & workflow for AI coding agents — Claude Code, Codex, Cursor, Devin Desktop. One command deploys an AGENTS.md entry point + docs/ai context with cap/archive/index enforcement into any repo.",
   "keywords": [
     "ai-agents",

package/references/modes/recommendations.md

@@ -17,7 +17,7 @@ Run `node ${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/tools/recommendations.mjs --cwd <project-root> [--
 
 1. **`--cwd` is REQUIRED** — the target project is explicit, never inferred from the shell's current directory (a subdirectory invocation still advises on the named root).
 2. **Verdict first (present-even-when-empty, opening at the `## Recommendations (agent-workflow)` header).** With everything optimal the body is exactly `no recommendations — flow optimal.` — the empty-state line ALONE is the verdict, zero added lines. Every other state opens the body with ONE verdict line composed from the frozen templates: `{K} item(s) need attention` leads when any item's severity is `attention` (a CONFIGURED declaration that is broken, drifted, degrading or invalid — the deployment needs review); `{N} optional recommendation(s), apply any you want` covers the `optional` class (offers to enable an unconfigured capability), led by `nothing is broken` ONLY when no item needs attention AND no probe check was skipped (a skipped probe could hide an attention-class problem — the claim never overreaches); `optimality NOT attested — {M} probe check(s) skipped` is appended last whenever probe checks were skipped. (The `(s)` invariant form IS the pinned pluralization — no singular/plural branching.) Items render attention-first, each tagged `needs attention:` / `optional:`. A failed probe renders as a stated `⚠ skipped item …` line — never a crash, never a fabricated item.
-3. **The apply-through-agent lane — an explicit informed-consent checkpoint:** the agent applies chat and harness items on the chat yes, harness items by the consent route below. A chat item is never retried outside the sandbox and every failure of a chat step is a STOP. A user item, and any apply slot that opens with HAND-APPLY whatever its lane, is the user's own step, handed over as worded. After presenting, OFFER to apply; the user selects items in plain language; for each selected item you **surface its posture note inline** where one exists (the per-item notes below cover exactly the risk-marked keys). For a chat item: the user **explicitly confirms**, and **only then** — **no command runs before confirmation** — do you run the rendered command. Do NOT infer safety from the presence or absence of an `--apply` flag: most chat items' rendered command IS the mutation and completes on that one run, **including a no-`--apply` mutation** such as `spec-adoption`'s `ensure-configs --reconcile --only specs`. Some items instead render a **dry-run preview** that changes nothing and prints an explicit follow-up `--apply`/mutating command to run NEXT (e.g. the `gates-declaration` seeder): after the SAME confirmation you run that printed follow-up command — no second ask, no improvisation (each writer keeps its own consent semantics: previews, `--apply` flags, refusals). An item marked **HAND-APPLY** (e.g. `enforcement` or `read-lane.stale`) is **the user's own step** — hand the user its rendered line together with its posture note; HAND-APPLY is **maintainer territory wherever it renders** — the apply slot or the `recipe:` line. For `worktrees-dir` the two classes COMPOSE in one item and the ORDER is part of the contract: its `recipe:` line is the HAND-APPLY grant advice, its apply one-liner is the dry-run ack preview, and you **wait for the maintainer to confirm the grant is applied (or the terminal fallback chosen)** before running that preview and the exact `--apply` command it prints — the ack RECORDS a choice that must already have been made, and against a trusted host NO the item renders no ack at all.
+3. **The apply-through-agent lane — an explicit informed-consent checkpoint:** the agent applies chat and harness items on the chat yes, harness items by the consent route below. A chat item is never retried outside the sandbox and every failure of a chat step is a STOP. A user item, and any apply slot that opens with HAND-APPLY whatever its lane, is the user's own step, handed over as worded. After presenting, OFFER to apply; the user selects items in plain language; for each selected item you **surface its posture note inline** where one exists (the per-item notes below cover exactly the risk-marked keys). For a chat item: the user **explicitly confirms**, and **only then** — **no command runs before confirmation** — do you run the rendered command. Do NOT infer safety from the presence or absence of an `--apply` flag: most chat items' rendered command IS the mutation and completes on that one run, **including a no-`--apply` mutation** such as `spec-adoption`'s `ensure-configs --reconcile --only specs` (behind an edited file it prints a replace line that takes its own yes). Some items instead render a **dry-run preview** that changes nothing and prints an explicit follow-up `--apply`/mutating command to run NEXT (e.g. the `gates-declaration` seeder): after the SAME confirmation you run that printed follow-up command — no second ask, no improvisation (each writer keeps its own consent semantics: previews, `--apply` flags, refusals). An item marked **HAND-APPLY** (e.g. `enforcement` or `read-lane.stale`) is **the user's own step** — hand the user its rendered line together with its posture note; HAND-APPLY is **maintainer territory wherever it renders** — the apply slot or the `recipe:` line. For `worktrees-dir` the two classes COMPOSE in one item and the ORDER is part of the contract: its `recipe:` line is the HAND-APPLY grant advice, its apply one-liner is the dry-run ack preview, and you **wait for the maintainer to confirm the grant is applied (or the terminal fallback chosen)** before running that preview and the exact `--apply` command it prints — the ack RECORDS a choice that must already have been made, and against a trusted host NO the item renders no ack at all.
 4. Registry strings (benefits + item texts) are frozen tool data, fact-true, ONE line under the pinned shape cap — posture/risk detail lives in the notes below at the consent moment, never inline in the overview. The dual velocity+security wording (`safer — blast radius bounded by the OS sandbox, not human attention`) rides ONLY the items with a real security delta (the autonomy render, the sandbox provisioning); the bridge-wrappers item claims **velocity only**.
 
 The **consent route** for a harness item: run its `check:` line in the sandbox and show its result. On the check's `masked:` line, say so and run that same check line once more outside the sandbox, so it re-judges in the apply's own environment; the yes is taken on the outside result. Take the user's yes on that result and run its `apply:` line with that result's digest once, outside the sandbox at once, so the harness asks at the point of action (with the apply ask rule seeded, its own dialog); never another line, never unseen. When velocity-core, kit-tools-tier or bridge-tier is among the user's picks (velocity-core preferred), check, confirm and apply it, or leave it pending, before any other pick's check runs, so its apply seeds the ask rule before the other harness applies. When the harness's auto mode refuses the check or the apply, say so and give the one plain step: leave auto mode for this one action (Shift+Tab in the terminal, the mode indicator in an editor) and say yes, or run `npx @sabaiway/agent-workflow-kit@latest init` in a terminal of your own. On the user's word, run the same line once more when they left auto mode, never another, never unseen; when they ran `init` instead, run the advisor again and offer only what is still pending, each through this route from its check (after a restart `init` asked for, the next session's upgrade does it). When that refusal hits the velocity-core, kit-tools-tier or bridge-tier pick taken first, run no other pick's check until the user answers the plain step. A check that refuses (exit 1) leaves the item unapplied and pending, its result shown; a changed digest (exit 5) applies nothing, shows the new result and asks a new yes. A no, a harness refusal and any other failure of a harness apply leave the item pending with its output shown, and the agent continues. `init`, run in a console from the project's folder, is the route the user may take instead.
@@ -40,7 +40,7 @@ A variant's posture note, where its key has one, is printed by `init` from this
 - `enforcement` — copies the bundled `references/scripts/*.mjs` runnable scripts and their tests, then installs the pre-commit hook. It is HAND-APPLY, the user's own step; the offer renders only when `scripts/` is absent or a plain directory contains no bundled basename, so the copy never clobbers an existing file and never follows a link. The hook invokes `node` directly, so a committer without it on PATH gets a loud failure. The installer refuses to overwrite a pre-commit hook it did not write — on that refusal stop and merge the hook by hand (bootstrap step 9); the copied scripts stay in place. Risk profile: local tooling and a Git hook are added only when the maintainer applies the shown command.
 - `mcp-channel` — the offer is to REGISTER the kit's read-only stdio MCP server in this project on the harness lane: a registration is a command your MCP client will RUN. The agent applies it on the chat yes after the check; `init` previews the exact entry and applies it on the terminal y as the route the user may take instead. What the registration buys: path questions and literal searches become typed tool calls whose arguments are named JSON fields instead of a string handed to a shell, so a pipe, a redirect or a quote inside a pattern or a path stays DATA and is never interpreted — they are perfectly legal bytes to search for, there is simply no shell to read them as operators. Posture: the server is a **read-only child of your client** (path/type/size/line facts and literal search over this project root; no write and no exec API), and like the client itself it runs **outside the Bash sandbox** — the sandbox is not what bounds it, the server's own root containment is. The two allow rules it adds make those two tools promptless and nothing else. The **`.differing`** arm is also a harness item: an `agent-workflow` entry already stands in `.mcp.json` and **structurally differs** from what this kit copy would write (another kit copy, a hand-edited path, an added `env`; the comparison ignores key order, so re-serialized identical bytes are the same registration). The check shows the entry standing in `.mcp.json` and the entry it would write; the chat yes confirms the replacement. `init` previews `mcp --replace` and replaces only on the terminal y. Stated limit: this item does **not** detect a `disabledMcpjsonServers` veto, so a converged `mcp-channel` means *what the mode writes is in place*, not *the client will load it* — see `${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/references/modes/mcp.md` for why that check was subtracted rather than half-built. Risk profile: a new read-only channel your client will launch; no write or exec exposure; a differing registration is replaced only on the checked chat yes or the terminal y and every other declaration is kept.
 - ADDITIONAL `gates-inert` arms (the third outcomes) — two further arms, and they differ in whether anything is BROKEN. **`producer-unrecognized`** — a checker with no producer anywhere in the declaration, on a tracked tree the changed-line coverage domain cannot reach (`.ts`/`.tsx`/`.jsx`/`.mts`/`.cts` strictly outnumber `.mjs`/`.cjs`/`.js`): the dead pair is real, so this arm is **HAND-APPLY** and the two remedies are marking the real producer with `"lcovProducer": true` or dropping the checker. Never a `node --test` prescription over a project that has no such suite, never the fill preview, and never an acknowledgement — a dead pair is broken, not narrow, and removing a producer after an acknowledgement lands right back in this arm. **`coverage-domain-narrow`** — the producer/checker pair IS live and the tree is still dominated by what the domain excludes: nothing is broken, and the honest sentence is that certification covers the assessable minority. Its apply is the consent-gated **ack writer** preview (a NEUTRAL fingerprint into `docs/ai/acks.json` as `coverageDomainAck`, never a security key); after the SAME confirmation you run the `--apply` it prints. The fingerprint binds the FACT — the verdict plus the unsupported extensions present, never the file counts — so an acknowledged project stays quiet as it grows and re-fires when a new unsupported language arrives or the verdict flips. The census reads the TRACKED tree with a read-only `git ls-files`; a tree it cannot read (a non-git deployment) becomes a stated skip, so optimality is withheld rather than assumed. Risk profile: no enforcement change of any kind — one acknowledgement recorded in a family-owned file, and one hand edit that stays the maintainer's.
-- `spec-adoption` — the feature-spec layer's ADOPTION STATE, judged from `docs/ai/specs/` alone through the same census `spec-check --all` runs, so a store the checker would refuse to observe is never counted here either. Both arms are OFFERS (`optional`) — the layer is opt-in, and `attention` stays reserved for a configured declaration that is broken. **`not-adopted`** (no store): every plan then cites zero governing specs by default and nothing says adoption never started; its apply is the spec-layer ensure one-liner (`ensure-configs --reconcile --only specs`, the same seed `upgrade` runs — it writes the reader/checker pairs and the store root, create-only, and skips with a stated reason where no Node evidence exists), and its `recipe:` line carries a NAMED **HAND-APPLY alternative** — the DECLINE preview (`ack-write --lane spec-adoption`, a dry-run that prints the exact `--apply`), which records `specAdoptionAck` in the family-owned `docs/ai/acks.json`. **The two are exclusive, and the order is part of the contract:** ask which the maintainer wants BEFORE the confirmation; on "seed" run the apply; on "decline" run NOTHING — hand over the preview line and let them run it and its printed `--apply`; never run the seed after a decline was chosen, and never run the decline preview for them. **`adopting`** (a store with no live contract): an optional item naming the draft count; its apply is that same decline preview (a dry-run; after the SAME confirmation you run the `--apply` it prints), and the honest remedy is authoring a contract from the skill's `SPEC_TEMPLATE.md`. A recorded decline silences BOTH arms and shows on `status` as ` — declined`; one live contract makes the decline moot. An unreadable store is a stated skip, never `flow optimal`. Risk profile: the seed writes only create-only files under `scripts/` and `docs/ai/specs/`; the decline writes one key into the ack store; nothing here authors a spec or blocks a plan.
+- `spec-adoption` — the feature-spec layer's ADOPTION STATE, judged from `docs/ai/specs/` alone through the same census `spec-check --all` runs, so a store the checker would refuse to observe is never counted here either. Both arms are OFFERS (`optional`) — the layer is opt-in, and `attention` stays reserved for a configured declaration that is broken. **`not-adopted`** (no store): every plan then cites zero governing specs by default and nothing says adoption never started; its apply is the spec-layer ensure one-liner (`ensure-configs --reconcile --only specs`, the same seed `upgrade` runs — it seeds the reader/checker pairs and the store root, and skips with a stated reason where no Node evidence exists), and its `recipe:` line carries a NAMED **HAND-APPLY alternative** — the DECLINE preview (`ack-write --lane spec-adoption`, a dry-run that prints the exact `--apply`), which records `specAdoptionAck` in the family-owned `docs/ai/acks.json`. **The two are exclusive, and the order is part of the contract:** ask which the maintainer wants BEFORE the confirmation; on "seed" run the apply; on "decline" run NOTHING — hand over the preview line and let them run it and its printed `--apply`; never run the seed after a decline was chosen, and never run the decline preview for them. **`adopting`** (a store with no live contract): an optional item naming the draft count; its apply is that same decline preview (a dry-run; after the SAME confirmation you run the `--apply` it prints), and the honest remedy is authoring a contract from the skill's `SPEC_TEMPLATE.md`. A recorded decline silences BOTH arms and shows on `status` as ` — declined`; one live contract makes the decline moot. An unreadable store is a stated skip, never `flow optimal`. Risk profile: the seed writes create-only files under `scripts/` and `docs/ai/specs/` and refreshes a script body a release shipped; behind an edited file it prints a replace line that takes its own yes; the decline writes one key into the ack store; nothing here authors a spec or blocks a plan.
 - `profile-gap` — each item's apply is a PREVIEW that writes nothing, and consent takes two steps: the confirmed pick runs the preview and you relay every line it prints (the environment-resolved slot values, each checker `entry:` line with its trust-chain disclosure, a Communication region the insert plans in the same run); the same line with ` --apply` appended runs only on a SECOND yes over those lines, never carried by the first. Items whose apply lines are byte-equal are one writer and take one answer: the tier preview's `--apply` writes the absent slots, the store seed and the queue seed together; the checker verb writes only its own entries; the insert writes every region it plans, all or nothing, so a `communication-absent` skip beside a declined `story-sessions-section` gets its own ask after the insert's full preview. A no records nothing and the item stays on the screen. A DECLINE is asked apart from later, before anything runs, and runs `node ${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/tools/tier-preview.mjs --decline --cwd <project-root>` only when the user refuses EVERY item the tier preview then reports offered: it records each of them at the shipped lineage, and a declined item leaves the screen until a lineage step changes the profile. An undecidable entry is a stated skip naming its reason, the remedy by reason: a prior → the upgrade's `lens` reconcile; an absent region → the insert; a customized region → a hand edit only (the lens preserves it), so that skip stands and withholds `flow optimal`. Risk profile: the tier preview's `--apply` rewrites `docs/ai/orchestration.json` in canonical form with the `_README` note and creates `docs/ai/epics/.gitkeep` and `docs/plans/queue.md` create-only; the insert adds regions to `docs/ai/agent_rules.md`; the checker verb adds entries to the PRIVILEGED `docs/ai/gates.json`; the decline writes `docs/ai/profile-declines.json`; nothing here commits.
 - `jev-connect` — the lane is user and env-dependent: the connect command is the user's own step in a terminal of their own, where it asks for the key; the key never reaches the agent or the chat (the command refuses without a terminal, and a terminal is not consent). When the recipe line opens with `run the apply in <place>`, that place is the terminal to run it in; `init`, run there, offers the command on its own consent line. The command reads the key with no echo, makes one network call to api.typesafe.ai with the vendor's sample text only on the user's own run, and writes the key in plain text — as managed export lines in the shell's startup files (bash: ~/.bashrc and the login file, created as ~/.bash_profile when none exists; zsh: ~/.zshrc), as the kit's own file ~/.config/fish/conf.d/typesafe-api-key.fish for fish, or on Windows as the user environment variable TYPESAFE_API_KEY, stored in the Windows user environment; a process already running at the save can keep its old environment and hand it to what it starts — the guide's key mark confirms the agent sees it (a file is readable by any process running as that user, and by other local accounts when one is world-readable in a traversable home); the vendor keeps data under its processing agreement and offers zero retention only to enterprise accounts. The item reads the environment the agent's commands run in: a host setting that filters it shows the item while the key is set in the user's shell. The decline is the HAND-APPLY alternative on the recipe line, asked apart BEFORE the confirmation (the `spec-adoption` order): on "connect" hand over the apply line, on "decline" run nothing and hand over the recipe line; the decline is recorded per project as `jevConnectAck` in `docs/ai/acks.json`. Risk profile: a plain-text key in the user's startup files or the Windows user environment, written by a command the user runs; one network call from that run.
 - `jev-skill` — the lane is harness; both `jev-skill` and `jev-skill.earlier` are env-dependent: the agent applies the item on the chat yes after the check, showing the files it would write; it changes no harness setting. `init` applies it on the batch terminal yes as the route the user may take instead. When the recipe line opens with `run the apply in <place>`, that place is where a user who prefers their own terminal runs it. The skill is third-party text — the vendor's, MIT — that the kit ships pinned and installs as a verified copy into three agent skill roots: `~/.agents/skills`, the Claude Code skills dir (`CLAUDE_CONFIG_DIR` or `~/.claude`) and `~/.gemini/config/skills`. It is never updated silently: a copy at an earlier pin is replaced only by that command, and a foreign copy is left untouched and named on the recipe line. A copy the vendor's `skills` CLI wrote with the same bytes reads current, and a later pin move replaces it like a kit copy; a vendor plugin install is invisible to the file check, so the Claude Code root may read absent while the plugin serves it. Only when the user asks to see the plan does the agent run the command without `--apply` (a read-only dry run). The decline is the HAND-APPLY alternative on the recipe line, asked apart BEFORE the confirmation: on "install" run the check line and, on the yes given on its result, the apply line by the consent route, on "decline" run nothing and hand over the recipe line; the decline is recorded per project as `jevSkillAck` in `docs/ai/acks.json`. Risk profile: third-party text written into the user's agent skill roots by the kit's skill command; no network.

package/references/modes/upgrade.md

@@ -12,7 +12,7 @@ Requires: ${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/references/shared/report-footer.md · ${CLAUDE_SKI
 
    1. `pointers` — `node ${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/tools/inject-methodology.mjs reconcile <project>/AGENTS.md` → per pointer: added · already present · skipped (reported) · a hard STOP.
    2. `footprint` — `node ${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/tools/hide-footprint.mjs --dir <project> --reconcile --dry-run` → visibility: visible · ambiguous · hidden — consent (conditional): ambiguous → ask which it is BEFORE anything; hidden → the conditional re-run without `--dry-run` (its surfaced paths ask per bootstrap step 9).
-   3. `configs` — `node ${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/tools/ensure-configs.mjs --reconcile --cwd <project>` → one line per ensure: `seeded` / `note-refreshed` / `refreshed` / `regenerated` / `re-derived` / `already-current` / `customized-preserved` / `malformed-preserved` / `already-present` / `not-placed` / `skipped-no-node-evidence` / `old-adr-layout-migration-instructed` / `failed`.
+   3. `configs` — `node ${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/tools/ensure-configs.mjs --reconcile --cwd <project>` → one line per ensure: `seeded` / `note-refreshed` / `refreshed` / `regenerated` / `re-derived` / `already-current` / `customized-preserved` / `malformed-preserved` / `already-present` / `not-placed` / `skipped-no-node-evidence` / `old-adr-layout-migration-instructed` / `failed` — consent (conditional): a specs replace line → ONE yes naming every file the custom lines name and saying their edits are overwritten, asked even on a non-zero exit; on the yes run the printed line, then STOP if that run fails or an op it does not re-run failed; on a no STOP on any failed op.
    4. `gates-migration` — `node ${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/references/scripts/migrate-gates.mjs --kit-tools ${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/tools --cwd <project>` → the preview plan · INERT checker · CUSTOMIZED entries, each named — consent: apply only on an explicit yes, re-run with `--apply`.
    5. `bridges` — `node ${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/tools/setup-backends.mjs --refresh-placed` → per-bridge lines: refreshed · already current · skipped — with its stated reason (not placed / newer than the bundle / unsupported host) · `skipped-readonly` · could not refresh.
    6. `lens` — `node ${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/tools/lens-region.mjs reconcile <project>/docs/ai/agent_rules.md` → per section: refreshed · already current · custom edit preserved · file absent / engine too old — skipped · over the line cap — refused · section absent — noted · a fully absent/invalid engine → hard STOP.
@@ -33,7 +33,7 @@ Requires: ${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/references/shared/report-footer.md · ${CLAUDE_SKI
 
    **`footprint` — hidden-mode footprint reconcile (D9 / AD-014).** A deployment does not record whether it chose `hidden`, so first **infer visibility** — the dry-run writes **zero bytes** and reports one of — **visible** (the entry point is tracked) → nothing to do; **ambiguous** (untracked but not ignored — could be a fresh uncommitted repo, or a hide that broke) → **ASK** the user which it is, never guess; **hidden** → re-run without `--dry-run` to migrate any older **machine-global** hide to the **project-local** `.git/info/exclude` (one managed block; folds in the legacy `.claude/skills/` line), idempotently (a clean re-run is zero-diff). Handle its surfaced paths exactly as bootstrap step 9 (`${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/references/modes/bootstrap.md`) (already-committed → show `git rm --cached`, ask before `--include`; generic-name present file → ask; **leftover machine-wide ignore block → ASK before `--remove-global`**, default keep + report). No Node on the agent host / Windows → as bootstrap step 9 (`${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/references/modes/bootstrap.md`). This runs on **every** hidden upgrade, like the methodology slot — no lineage-head bump, no migration file.
 
-   **`configs` — the project-configuration ensures, ONE run.** The ONE command performs **all eight** ensures — orchestration config · gate declaration · autonomy declaration · vehicles declaration · executor re-derivation · enforcement scripts · spec layer · navigator index — in a fixed order, and prints **one outcome line per ensure**: paste those lines into the step 4 / step 8 success report. Every SEED is **create-only** (an existing file is preserved byte-for-byte); a refresh-class op rewrites only what it owns — the outcome tokens by ensure, below, name each arm, the executor's re-derivation among them. One ensure failing **never** skips the others: each reports its own outcome and the run exits non-zero when any of them `failed`. The outcome tokens, by ensure: orchestration → `seeded` / `note-refreshed` / `already-current` / `customized-preserved` / `malformed-preserved`; gates, autonomy and vehicles → `seeded` / `already-present`; executor → `not-placed` / `already-current` / `re-derived`; scripts → `seeded` / `already-present` / `old-adr-layout-migration-instructed` / `skipped-no-node-evidence`; specs → `seeded` / `refreshed` / `already-present` / `customized-preserved` / `skipped-no-node-evidence`; index → `regenerated` / `already-current`; and any ensure may report `failed`, whose line OPENS with the cause (relay it with that cause — never soften it into a skip; an op that copies file by file also states when it stopped partway). The cause vocabulary is CLOSED — one of `race-unresolved`, `template-unreadable`, `bundle-unreadable`, `adr-layout-unverifiable`, `node-evidence-unverifiable`, `wrong-node-kind`, `vehicle-settings-unreadable`, `write-refused`, `unexpected-error`, `generator-unlaunchable`, `generator-failed`, `index-probe-failed`, `index-stale-after-write` — and every cause that can only arise AFTER the generator ran (`generator-failed`, and `index-probe-failed` / `index-stale-after-write` when they follow a reported regeneration) DISCLOSES in its own line that a write may already have landed. **A non-zero exit STOPs this upgrade** — report the failed line and stop there, before the equal-head exit, the migrations and the re-stamp. Add `--dry-run` to preview without writing a byte. Like the pointer slots + the footprint reconcile, all eight reach an equal-head deployment **without a lineage-head bump or a migration file** (all inherently outside the docs cap-validator).
+   **`configs` — the project-configuration ensures, ONE run.** The ONE command performs **all eight** ensures — orchestration config · gate declaration · autonomy declaration · vehicles declaration · executor re-derivation · enforcement scripts · spec layer · navigator index — in a fixed order, and prints **one outcome line per ensure**: paste those lines into the step 4 / step 8 success report. Every SEED is **create-only** (an existing file is preserved byte-for-byte); a refresh-class op rewrites only what it owns — the outcome tokens by ensure, below, name each arm, the executor's re-derivation among them. One ensure failing **never** skips the others: each reports its own outcome and the run exits non-zero when any of them `failed`. The outcome tokens, by ensure: orchestration → `seeded` / `note-refreshed` / `already-current` / `customized-preserved` / `malformed-preserved`; gates, autonomy and vehicles → `seeded` / `already-present`; executor → `not-placed` / `already-current` / `re-derived`; scripts → `seeded` / `already-present` / `old-adr-layout-migration-instructed` / `skipped-no-node-evidence`; specs → `seeded` / `refreshed` / `already-present` / `customized-preserved` / `skipped-no-node-evidence`; index → `regenerated` / `already-current` / `customized-preserved`; and any ensure may report `failed`, whose line OPENS with the cause (relay it with that cause — never soften it into a skip; an op that copies file by file also states when it stopped partway). The cause vocabulary is CLOSED — one of `race-unresolved`, `template-unreadable`, `bundle-unreadable`, `adr-layout-unverifiable`, `node-evidence-unverifiable`, `wrong-node-kind`, `vehicle-settings-unreadable`, `write-refused`, `unexpected-error`, `generator-unlaunchable`, `generator-failed`, `index-probe-failed`, `index-stale-after-write` — and every cause that can only arise AFTER the generator ran (`generator-failed`, and `index-probe-failed` / `index-stale-after-write` when they follow a reported regeneration) DISCLOSES in its own line that a write may already have landed. **A non-zero exit STOPs this upgrade — once row 3's replace ask is answered when a specs replace line printed, then as that ask says** — before the equal-head exit, the migrations and the re-stamp. Add `--dry-run` to preview without writing a byte. Like the pointer slots + the footprint reconcile, all eight reach an equal-head deployment **without a lineage-head bump or a migration file** (all inherently outside the docs cap-validator).
 
    **What the orchestration-config ensure does.** `docs/ai/orchestration.json` must exist **and its onboarding note must be current**: created from the canonical seed if missing; if it already exists, **every activity/slot the user set is preserved** and ONLY the `_README` note is refreshed, and only when the existing one still matches a known prior canonical — the tested `refreshIfCanonical` / `refreshReadme` in `tools/orchestration-config.mjs` is the source of truth for that decision (it normalizes CRLF/whitespace before comparing; a *customized* `_README` is preserved verbatim → `customized-preserved`; a *malformed* existing config is **preserved untouched + LOUD** → `malformed-preserved`, never clobbered and never silently skipped). The current note points at `/agent-workflow-kit set-recipe`. **Kit-owned:** in the **delegated** path memory only seeds/preserves the file (memory upgrade step 2) and this ensure applies the `_README` refresh; in the **fallback** path it does both. (Memory stays standalone.)
 
@@ -45,9 +45,9 @@ Requires: ${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/references/shared/report-footer.md · ${CLAUDE_SKI
 
    **What the enforcement-script ensure does.** A deployment older than the ADR-cascade feature has no `scripts/archive-decisions.mjs`, and an equal-head exit would otherwise never deliver it. The pairs must exist in the project's `scripts/`: `archive-decisions.mjs` + `archive-decisions.test.mjs` and `markdown-blocks.mjs` + `markdown-blocks.test.mjs`, copied from `${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/references/scripts/` if missing; **an existing file is preserved, never overwritten** (drift repair belongs to a lineage migration). Nothing else is seeded — the other tokenizer-era tests red beside OLD archivers. **OLD ADR-store layout — DETECTED FIRST, never auto-migrated (AD-051, Decision 13):** on a `docs/ai/history/decisions-archive*.md` monolith (`old`), or no monolith but a deployed rotator predating the store (`old-unrotated`), the project is on the RETIRED 3-tier cascade, so the ensure writes NOTHING and reports `old-adr-layout-migration-instructed` (the new `archive-decisions.mjs` beside un-migrated monoliths would red their ADR gate). Relay it as the LOUD instruct it is: the fix is the opt-in **`/agent-workflow-kit migrate-adr-store`** (consent-gated; previews first, never commits), and the seed lands on the next upgrade. A layout the ensure cannot READ is `failed`, not a seed — it never writes on an unverifiable tree. The seed applies ONLY to a clean layout (neither signal). **Whether Node runs here is PROVEN, never proxied:** the ensure seeds on a regular `package.json` at the root OR on any kit-seeded `scripts/*.mjs` already deployed (a bootstrap places them into projects that never carry a `package.json`); only when every probe answers absent does it report `skipped-no-node-evidence`, a line naming every probe it checked, while the config ensures still run; a probe that cannot be read is `failed` with the cause `node-evidence-unverifiable`, nothing written. **A `skipped-*` outcome whose stated reason this tool could itself disprove may not exist** — the retired `skipped-no-node` was exactly that, printed beside twenty deployed Node scripts. The deployed pre-commit hook gains the `archive-decisions.mjs --check` line only when the hook itself is next refreshed (re-run `node scripts/install-git-hooks.mjs` after the ensure and it will refuse a non-marker hook as always); an OLD hook without the line stays consistent-safe — the decisions gate is simply not enforced yet, never a broken hook.
 
-   **What the navigator ensure does.** `docs/ai/index.md` is the always-loaded navigator the entry point declares, and it is GENERATED — no template ships it, so a deployment that never ran the generator boots from a broken entry point (and, on a Node project, carries a pre-commit hook that fails its own index check). The ensure runs the bundled generator's finalizer and reports `regenerated` (it was missing or stale — it was written) or `already-current` (nothing written). It never skips a No-Node project: the generator runs from `${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/references/scripts/` on the agent host, not from the project's `scripts/`. **Its position in the run-list is EARLY and therefore NOT authoritative** — `lens` (and, on the migrated path, steps 6–7) still change `docs/ai` afterwards — so the authoritative run is the LATE `--only index` rung documented at both exits; the early one is idempotent and costs at most an `already-current` line.
+   **What the navigator ensure does.** `docs/ai/index.md` is the always-loaded navigator the entry point declares, and it is GENERATED — no template ships it, so a deployment that never ran the generator boots from a broken entry point (and, on a Node project, carries a pre-commit hook that fails its own index check). The ensure runs the bundled generator's finalizer and reports `regenerated` (it was missing or stale — it was written) or `already-current` (nothing written); under a hook module that is not the bundled one, a write the project's own checker rejects is put back → `customized-preserved`. It never skips a No-Node project: the generator runs from `${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/references/scripts/` on the agent host, not from the project's `scripts/`. **Its position in the run-list is EARLY and therefore NOT authoritative** — `lens` (and, on the migrated path, steps 6–7) still change `docs/ai` afterwards — so the authoritative run is the LATE `--only index` rung documented at both exits; the early one is idempotent: an untouched tree changes nothing.
 
-   **What the spec-layer ensure does.** A deployment older than the feature-spec layer lacks `scripts/spec-schema.mjs` and `docs/ai/specs/index.md`, and its deployed `check-docs-size.mjs` predates the store collapse. In ONE order: the reader pair, then the checker pair — each seeded when absent and REFRESHED only while a file's bytes are a body a release shipped (an append-only digest catalog → `refreshed`; an edited body is preserved verbatim and withholds the writes that depend on it, the checker lane waiting on a byte-current reader pair); the store root is seeded from the bundled template, date rendered, ONLY behind a checker pair current after the run — an older or edited checker renders the store row by row and reds the hook's `--check-index`, so behind a custom checker the store root is NOT seeded and the line names the remedy (copy the pair from `${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/references/scripts/` by hand, re-run). One token by precedence: `seeded` > `refreshed` > `customized-preserved` (an edited pair, and this run wrote nothing) > `already-present`; `skipped-no-node-evidence` only when neither a root `package.json` nor any kit-seeded `scripts/*.mjs` is present (the same Node-evidence probe the enforcement-script ensure uses; an unreadable probe is `failed` / `node-evidence-unverifiable`); every line states what this run did, and a write that stops partway names what landed. The legacy-ADR instruct never withholds it. **The adoption state this seed leaves behind is reported, never assumed:** the Recommendations section (step 4 / 8) carries the `spec-adoption` item — `not adopted` (the store is absent: the seed offered, the decline a named hand-apply alternative), `adopting` (a store with no live contract: the decline offered), silenced by a recorded decline (`ack-write --lane spec-adoption`), and a store the probe cannot read is a stated skip — and `status` prints the same state on its own line.
+   **What the spec-layer ensure does.** A deployment older than the feature-spec layer lacks `scripts/spec-schema.mjs` and `docs/ai/specs/index.md`, and its deployed `check-docs-size.mjs` predates the store collapse. In ONE order: the reader pair, then the checker pair — each seeded when absent and REFRESHED only while a file's bytes are a body a release shipped (an append-only digest catalog → `refreshed`; an edited body is preserved verbatim and withholds the writes that depend on it, the checker lane waiting on a byte-current reader pair); the store root is seeded from the bundled template, date rendered, ONLY behind a checker pair current after the run — an older or edited checker renders the store row by row and reds the hook's `--check-index`; edited files are replaced only on row 3's yes. One token by precedence: `seeded` > `refreshed` > `customized-preserved` (an edited pair, and this run wrote nothing) > `already-present`; `skipped-no-node-evidence` only when neither a root `package.json` nor any kit-seeded `scripts/*.mjs` is present (the same Node-evidence probe the enforcement-script ensure uses; an unreadable probe is `failed` / `node-evidence-unverifiable`); every line states what this run did, and a write that stops partway names what landed. The legacy-ADR instruct never withholds it. **The adoption state this seed leaves behind is reported, never assumed:** the Recommendations section (step 4 / 8) carries the `spec-adoption` item — `not adopted` (the store is absent: the seed offered, the decline a named hand-apply alternative), `adopting` (a store with no live contract: the decline offered), silenced by a recorded decline (`ack-write --lane spec-adoption`), and a store the probe cannot read is a stated skip — and `status` prints the same state on its own line.
 
    **`gates-migration` — legacy gates.json migration (consented preview — D8).** An EXISTING declaration may still carry the retired review-ledger / fold-completeness checks. Run the preview (dry-run — writes NOTHING), show the user the exact plan, and only on an explicit yes re-run it with `--apply`: canonical legacy entries (matched by their documented single-invocation cmd forms) are REMOVED, the canonical `unit-tests` cmd gains the built-in lcov reporters, and the coverage-check gate is ADDED last — atomic and COMPLETE, so the migrated declaration satisfies `run-gates --final`. **The checker rides a PRODUCER or is not declared at all** (`${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/references/modes/gates.md`): with no gate producing the lcov it reads, the migration does NOT add it, an already-declared one is reported INERT, the result is not called final-run-capable, and the preview prints the paste-ready suite cmd to declare by hand — nothing is ever removed for you. CUSTOMIZED entries are NEVER auto-touched: the preview names each with a paste-ready recovery, and the commit guard must NOT be installed until they are resolved. Of step 3's run-list, only this migration and `tools/checker-gates.mjs` under the `tier` ask change an existing gates.json (the FILL preview runs at init).
 
@@ -108,7 +108,7 @@ Requires: ${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/references/shared/report-footer.md · ${CLAUDE_SKI
    verbatim**: it validates the deployed host settings file's keys against the bundled manifests and
    **NEVER writes** it (the file lives outside every kit tree — D2), so an unknown/retired key is
    flagged + preserved, never edited. Runs on **every** upgrade; exit 0 covers every outcome.
-   **The LATE navigator finalizer — the AUTHORITATIVE run, after the last `docs/ai` mutation.** `lens` above rewrites `docs/ai/agent_rules.md`, so the step-3 index ensure is already behind by the time the run-list ends. Re-run that ONE op here, before the step-4 report: `node ${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/tools/ensure-configs.mjs --reconcile --only index --cwd <project>`. Relay **this** line in the report (it supersedes the early one; an untouched tree reports `already-current`, a failure STOPs the upgrade like any other ensure). On the migrated path the same rung runs again at the END of step 7 — after the migrations, before the step-8 re-stamp.
+   **The LATE navigator finalizer — the AUTHORITATIVE run, after the last `docs/ai` mutation.** `lens` above rewrites `docs/ai/agent_rules.md`, so the step-3 index ensure is already behind by the time the run-list ends. Re-run that ONE op here, before the step-4 report: `node ${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/tools/ensure-configs.mjs --reconcile --only index --cwd <project>`. Relay **this** line in the report (it supersedes the early one; an untouched tree changes nothing, a failure STOPs the upgrade like any other ensure). On the migrated path the same rung runs again at the END of step 7 — after the migrations, before the step-8 re-stamp.
 4. **Equal-head exit — a real successful-exit report, not a bare stop.** If the stamp **equals** the head, the lineage is up to date — but step 3 (the stamp-independent reconciles) ran first and may have changed things, so this is a proper exit report, not a no-op:
    - **A skip line that contradicts the observed tree is a FINDING, never pasted as neutral.** Every ensure skip names the fact it proved (the probes that answered absent, the layout it read); if the tree you can see disproves that reason — a "no Node" skip beside deployed Node scripts, a "not deployed" skip beside a stamped `docs/ai` — do not relay the line as an outcome: raise it in the report as a defect of the tool, with the contradicting fact named, and stop short of any step that would build on the skip.
    - **Report step 3's outcome in plain language** — for **each** `pointers` slot (workflow-methodology, orchestration-recipes and autonomy-policy) whether it was *added*, was *already present* (nothing changed), or was *skipped* (the soft-skip from step 3, with its reason — over the line limit / engine too old / the autonomy pointer's anchor absent); the **eight project-configuration ensure** (`configs`) lines exactly as the one ensure run composed them (the ensures and their outcome tokens are enumerated in step 3), each rendered in plain language: what was created, what was left exactly as the user wrote it, and — for a `failed` line — what stopped it; for the navigator, relay the **late** `--only index` line, not the early one; the **`gates-migration`** result — *nothing to migrate*, the shown plan *applied* on your explicit yes, or the plan *left unapplied* (consent not given), with any INERT checker or CUSTOMIZED entries named; the **placed-bridge refresh** (`bridges`) outcome — paste the tool's per-bridge lines verbatim (they are already plain: *refreshed* / *already current* / *skipped — not placed* / `skipped-readonly` with its re-scan verdict / *could not refresh* + recovery); the **agent-rules lens** (`lens`) outcome (*refreshed* / *already current* / *custom edit preserved + note* / *file absent* / *engine too old* / *over the line cap*) and the **Communication-section** outcome (its own set: refreshed / already current / custom preserved + note / section absent — noted / over the cap — refused) and the **story-sessions section** outcome (its own set: refreshed / already current / custom edit preserved + note / section absent — noted / over the file's line cap — refused); the **full-flow offer** (`tier`) lines; the **bridge-settings reconcile** (`bridge-settings`) outcome (paste the tool's line(s) verbatim); and, for a hidden deployment, whether the hidden-mode footprint (`footprint`) was *moved to project-local*, was *already project-local* (nothing changed), or needed a question (ambiguous visibility / a leftover machine-wide block). Plain wording only — never the reconcile/slot/anchor/marker terms (the never-leak-kit-internals Gotcha — `${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/references/shared/deploy-tail.md`).
@@ -120,5 +120,5 @@ Requires: ${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/references/shared/report-footer.md · ${CLAUDE_SKI
    - **Then ask before committing — never auto-commit.** If step 3 added the slot (or anything else changed), report it and ask. If step 3 was a pure zero-diff no-op and nothing else changed, give the plain **settings already current — no update needed** message (the *Success state* contract in `${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/references/shared/report-footer.md`) and still print the read-only version block (installed package versions) + backend line — but **no `docs/ai` structure version and no two-axes note** (nothing changed, so the number is inert here).
 5. Show the relevant `${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/CHANGELOG.md` diff (entries newer than the project's stamp).
 6. **Collect the migration answers FIRST, then apply.** Run `node ${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/tools/migration-notes.mjs --cwd <project>` and relay its stdout lines verbatim, in order; a non-zero exit relays its one named line and STOPs, except `stamp-absent`, which routes back to step 1. Then run the preview `node ${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/tools/migration-blocks.mjs --cwd <project>`. If its lines say both blocks are missing (pre-1.1.0), ask the two questions as ONE structured multi-question prompt; record each answer individually, write nothing until ALL are answered, and carry the answers into the migrations below: a migration whose answer was already collected never re-asks; a single missing block keeps its single ask (step 7). Then apply exactly the notes the tool listed, in its order ("only those newer than the project's stamp" is why, never a second selection). Migrations are **idempotent** — safe to re-run.
-7. Reconcile drift: add any kernel files/scripts the project is missing; never clobber project-authored content (their `decisions.md`, `known_issues.md`, page specs stay). Any user question a migration raises follows the same rule as bootstrap — **structured multiple-choice where supported** (`AskUserQuestion` in Claude Code), otherwise prose. For a block the preview names as needing its answer, **ask the user their conversational language** (`--language`) or **whether the agent may attribute work to itself / AI** (`--attribution`, defaulting to `off`), never re-asking a step-6 answer; then re-run the preview with `--apply` and the answers, relaying its lines. Exit 1 `answer-missing`: ask exactly what its lines name and re-run `--apply` once; a second one STOPs. Any other exit 1 is a named refusal: relay it with its recovery (`cap`: trim `AGENTS.md`, re-run) and STOP before the finalizer and the stamp. **Then, before the stamp, re-run the LATE navigator finalizer:** the migrations of steps 6–7 may have changed `docs/ai` files, so run the one op again — `node ${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/tools/ensure-configs.mjs --reconcile --only index --cwd <project>` — and relay THAT line in the step-8 report (idempotent: an untouched tree reports `already-current`; a failure STOPs this upgrade like any other ensure).
+7. Reconcile drift: add any kernel files/scripts the project is missing; never clobber project-authored content (their `decisions.md`, `known_issues.md`, page specs stay). Any user question a migration raises follows the same rule as bootstrap — **structured multiple-choice where supported** (`AskUserQuestion` in Claude Code), otherwise prose. For a block the preview names as needing its answer, **ask the user their conversational language** (`--language`) or **whether the agent may attribute work to itself / AI** (`--attribution`, defaulting to `off`), never re-asking a step-6 answer; then re-run the preview with `--apply` and the answers, relaying its lines. Exit 1 `answer-missing`: ask exactly what its lines name and re-run `--apply` once; a second one STOPs. Any other exit 1 is a named refusal: relay it with its recovery (`cap`: trim `AGENTS.md`, re-run) and STOP before the finalizer and the stamp. **Then, before the stamp, re-run the LATE navigator finalizer:** the migrations of steps 6–7 may have changed `docs/ai` files, so run the one op again — `node ${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/tools/ensure-configs.mjs --reconcile --only index --cwd <project>` — and relay THAT line in the step-8 report (idempotent: an untouched tree changes nothing; a failure STOPs this upgrade like any other ensure).
 8. Re-stamp `docs/ai/.workflow-version` to the **deployment-lineage head** (`4.0.0`, not the package version — mechanics unchanged: the atomic write to the stamp file). In the report, **describe what the upgrade changed in plain human terms** — which parts of their `docs/ai` are now different (the migrations that ran), plus the step-3 run-list outcomes, each as step 4 words it: the `pointers` slots, the `footprint` visibility verdict (and what a consented re-run migrated), the **eight project-configuration ensure** (`configs`) lines (enumerated in step 3) — the navigator one being the late `--only index` run at the end of step 7, the **`gates-migration`** result, the **placed-bridge refresh** (`bridges`) lines (pasted verbatim), the **agent-rules lens** (`lens`) + **Communication-section** + **story-sessions section** outcomes (same outcome sets as step 4), the **full-flow offer** (`tier`) outcome, and the **bridge-settings reconcile** (`bridge-settings`) outcome (line(s) pasted verbatim) — rather than reciting a version number; **omit the raw structure number**, and do **not** print the two-axes note here (it belongs to *Version disclosure* in `${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/references/shared/report-footer.md`, on demand only). Then **render the mandatory Recommendations section**: run `node ${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/tools/recommendations.mjs --cwd <project-root>` and PRESENT its output — from the `## Recommendations (agent-workflow)` header — in the user's conversational language (every fact, count and item, nothing added or dropped; commands, paths, hosts and rule strings byte-exact; raw tool block on request; present-even-when-empty: `no recommendations — flow optimal.`), then OFFER the consent route (per picked item: posture note → explicit confirm → chat: the one-liner; harness: the check line, then on the yes to its result the apply line; user: the user's own step — `${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/references/modes/recommendations.md`). **Every current host/session claim in this report is tool-composed only** — prompts fired, sandbox scope, whether a bypass was needed, network reachability and approval counts must trace to **live tool output** from **this session**, a memory/handover snapshot is **context, never report facts**, and an unbacked claim is **omitted or explicitly marked unverified** (full clause: *Live host/session facts* in `${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/references/shared/report-footer.md`). Then **print the report footer** in the canonical order (version block → one-line backend-status line → welcome mat — the shared contracts in `${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/references/shared/report-footer.md`; rendered from the helpers, same host-can't-run skip-with-reason; the welcome mat closes on one caveat-aware next step). Then **ask before committing** — the pinned order on this exit is: Recommendations block → optional applies → report footer → the commit ask.

package/references/modes/velocity.md

@@ -18,7 +18,7 @@ Run `node ${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/tools/velocity-profile.mjs [--dry-run | --apply] [
 2. **Ask the opt-ins** via **`AskUserQuestion` where supported** — two separate choices, the safe option FIRST in each. First the **`--kit-tools` tier** (separate from `acceptEdits`; **"core only" remains the default answer** — seed the tier only on an explicit yes, then add `--kit-tools` to the `--apply` re-run). Then the `acceptEdits` opt-in:
    - **"Keep per-edit approval prompts (recommended)"** — seed only the read-only allowlist; file edits still prompt.
    - **"Auto-accept file edits (`defaultMode: acceptEdits`)"** — present the honest FULL posture: it auto-applies Edit/Write AND auto-runs `mkdir`/`touch`/`mv`/`cp` in the working dir, is paired with the read-only allowlist, and — stated plainly — a settings-level allow rule is a **trust posture, not a sandbox**: a read-only entry can still write a file via output redirection, and (Claude Code's allow rules do not inspect command substitution) could in principle run another command via `cmd $(…)`. velocity **never adds `commit`/`push`/`publish` as allow rules** — so a direct `git push` still ASKs — and the residual guard for the seeded core ships as the opt-in PreToolUse hook (`${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/references/modes/hook.md`; probe-proven on the `--output` family — current engine builds already intercept redirection/substitution upstream). The approval **floor** (never auto-approved, with or without the tier): every writer `--apply`/`--write`/`--yes` still prompts; clobber-protection STOPs still stop; the three release asks (commit/push/publish) stay maintainer-owned. Note also that a `defaultMode` in `settings.local.json` would override this project-level write (local > project), since velocity writes only `.claude/settings.json`.
-3. **Only on an explicit yes**, re-run with `--apply` (add `--accept-edits` only if they chose the second option). It merges-don't-clobber (preserves `includeCoAuthoredBy`, every key, and existing allow entries) and writes **only** `.claude/settings.json`. Every apply — flagless, `--kit-tools`, `--bridge-tier` — also appends one ask rule, `Bash(node *apply-danger-check.mjs*--apply*)`, to `permissions.ask` once, beside any ask entries already there: the harness then asks before every harness apply (the `apply:` line of each harness item the advisor renders) instead of judging it in its auto mode. It is a question added, never an allow, and it removes no prompt; `--autonomy` leaves it in place.
+3. **Only on an explicit yes**, re-run with `--apply` (add `--accept-edits` only if they chose the second option). It merges-don't-clobber (preserves `includeCoAuthoredBy`, every key, and existing allow entries) and writes **only** `.claude/settings.json`. Every apply — flagless, `--kit-tools`, `--bridge-tier` — also appends one ask rule, `Bash(node *apply-danger-check.mjs*--apply*)`, to `permissions.ask` once, beside any ask entries already there: the rule exists so all work can stay in auto mode: without it auto mode refuses a harness apply (the `apply:` line of each harness item the advisor renders) and the user must leave auto mode for it; with it the harness shows its usual dialog. The rule allows nothing, and `--autonomy` leaves it in place. When you name the rule to the user, lead with this purpose.
 4. **Surface delegation-readiness, read-only.** If they want a step run Delegated, set it with `/agent-workflow-kit set-recipe --set plan-execution.execute=delegated` (`${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/references/modes/set-recipe.md`) or by hand-editing `docs/ai/orchestration.json`; **velocity itself never writes the orchestration config.**
 
 **The `--kit-tools` tier (opt-in).** On top of the read-only core, `--kit-tools` seeds an audited kit-tool tier — every path **resolved absolute from the running skill at seed time**, so the posture is **fail-safe**: a moved or reinstalled skill leaves a stale rule that simply **prompts again** (re-run velocity to reseed; nothing widens silently). A seeded entry equals its covered dispatch line below with `${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}` replaced by the resolved skill dir and `${PROJECT_ROOT}` by this project's resolved root, **UNQUOTED** — a quoted path is a different byte string and will still prompt (a dead rule, not a hole). The covered dispatch lines (this list IS the documented-invocation source):

package/references/scripts/check-docs-size-cli.test.mjs

@@ -58,6 +58,51 @@ maxLines: 80
 | [\`a.md\`](./a.md) | state | 10/10 | 2026-07-18 | never |
 `;
 
+describe('spec:docs-navigator/S1 the navigator stamps a cap it honours', () => {
+  const createNames = (count) => Array.from({ length: count }, (_, index) => `n${String(index + 1).padStart(2, '0')}`);
+  const buildDocs = (names) => ({ docs }) => {
+    for (const name of names) writeFileSync(join(docs, `${name}.md`), DOC(name));
+  };
+  const countLines = (text) => text.split('\n').length - (text.endsWith('\n') ? 1 : 0);
+
+  it("a tree whose navigator renders exactly 80 lines stamps maxLines 80, byte-identical to today's render", async () => {
+    const names = createNames(57);
+    await withRoot(buildDocs(names), async ({ root }) => {
+      assert.equal((await cli(['--write-index', `--root=${root}`, '--today=2026-07-18'])).code, 0);
+      const index = indexOf(root);
+      const rows = names.map((name) => `| [\`${name}.md\`](./${name}.md) | state | 10/10 | 2026-07-18 | never |\n`);
+      assert.equal(countLines(index), 80);
+      assert.equal(index, EXPECTED_INDEX + rows.join(''));
+    });
+  });
+
+  it('a tree of 81 lines stamps maxLines 81 and both checker runs exit 0', async () => {
+    await withRoot(buildDocs(createNames(58)), async ({ root }) => {
+      assert.equal((await cli(['--write-index', `--root=${root}`, '--today=2026-07-18'])).code, 0);
+      const index = indexOf(root);
+      const checked = await runCli([`--root=${root}`]);
+      const fresh = await runCli(['--check-index', `--root=${root}`]);
+      assert.equal(countLines(index), 81);
+      assert.equal(index.match(/^maxLines: \d+$/m)?.[0], 'maxLines: 81', `default: ${checked.code}, --check-index: ${fresh.code}`);
+      assert.equal(checked.code, 0, checked.stdout + checked.stderr);
+      assert.equal(fresh.code, 0, fresh.stdout + fresh.stderr);
+    });
+  });
+
+  it('a hand-edited cap line is stale under --check-index', async () => {
+    await withRoot(buildDocs(createNames(58)), async ({ root, docs }) => {
+      assert.equal((await cli(['--write-index', `--root=${root}`, '--today=2026-07-18'])).code, 0);
+      const index = indexOf(root);
+      const edited = index.replace(/^maxLines: \d+$/m, 'maxLines: 90');
+      assert.notEqual(edited, index);
+      writeFileSync(join(docs, 'index.md'), edited);
+      const { code, stdout, stderr } = await runCli(['--check-index', `--root=${root}`]);
+      assert.equal(code, 1);
+      assert.match(stdout + stderr, /is stale/);
+    });
+  });
+});
+
 describe('check-docs-size runCli — refusal branches', () => {
   it('an unknown argument exits 2 naming it', async () => {
     const { code, stderr } = await cli(['--bogus']);

package/references/scripts/check-docs-size-ensure.test.mjs

@@ -11,6 +11,9 @@ import { runCli } from './check-docs-size.mjs';
 const DOC = (title) =>
   `---\ntype: state\nlastUpdated: 2026-08-15\nscope: session\nstaleAfter: never\nowner: none\nmaxLines: 10\n---\n\n# ${title}\n`;
 
+const NAVIGATOR_LINE_FLOOR = 80;
+const EXTRA_DOC_COUNT = 85;
+
 const makeTree = (prefix) => {
   const dir = mkdtempSync(join(tmpdir(), prefix));
   mkdirSync(join(dir, 'docs', 'ai'), { recursive: true });
@@ -330,3 +333,28 @@ describe('check-docs-size --ensure-index', () => {
     }
   });
 });
+
+describe('spec:docs-navigator/S2 --ensure-index past the 80-line floor', () => {
+  it('writes a navigator past 80 lines that the default run and --check-index accept', async () => {
+    const root = makeTree('cds-ensure-past-floor-');
+    try {
+      for (const number of Array.from({ length: EXTRA_DOC_COUNT }, (_, index) => index)) {
+        writeFileSync(join(root, 'docs', 'ai', `z-extra-${number}.md`), DOC(`extra ${number}`));
+      }
+      const { code, stdout } = await runCli(['--ensure-index', `--root=${root}`]);
+      assert.equal(code, 0);
+      assert.match(stdout, /ensure-index: regenerated/);
+      const navigator = readFileSync(join(root, 'docs', 'ai', 'index.md'), 'utf8');
+      const lineCount = navigator.split('\n').length - (navigator.endsWith('\n') ? 1 : 0);
+      const maxLines = Number(navigator.match(/^maxLines: (\d+)$/m)?.[1]);
+      assert.ok(lineCount > NAVIGATOR_LINE_FLOOR);
+      const defaultRun = await runCli([`--root=${root}`]);
+      const indexCheck = await runCli(['--check-index', `--root=${root}`]);
+      assert.equal(defaultRun.code, 0, defaultRun.stdout);
+      assert.equal(maxLines, lineCount);
+      assert.equal(indexCheck.code, 0, indexCheck.stdout);
+    } finally {
+      drop(root);
+    }
+  });
+});

package/references/scripts/check-docs-size.mjs

@@ -45,6 +45,8 @@ const pathsFor = (root) => {
 };
 
 const MS_PER_DAY = 24 * 60 * 60 * 1000;
+const NAVIGATOR_CAP_FLOOR = 80;
+const countLines = (text) => text.split('\n').length - (text.endsWith('\n') ? 1 : 0);
 
 // The one token every `--ensure-index` outcome line opens with — deploy/upgrade prose relays it
 // verbatim and the kit's ensure op reads it, so it is a contract, not a message.
@@ -263,7 +265,7 @@ export const inspectFile = async (found, today, root = ROOT) => {
     return { path: rel, lineCount: 0, frontmatter: null, spec: null, refused: true, errors: [refusal], warnings: [] };
   }
   const text = await readFile(filePath, 'utf8');
-  const lineCount = text.split('\n').length - (text.endsWith('\n') ? 1 : 0);
+  const lineCount = countLines(text);
   const fm = parseFrontmatter(text);
   const spec = readSpecVerdict(rel, text);
 
@@ -332,7 +334,7 @@ lastUpdated: __TODAY__
 scope: permanent
 staleAfter: 30d
 owner: none
-maxLines: 80
+maxLines: __CAP__
 ---
 
 # Memory Map — __PROJECT__ \`docs/ai/\`
@@ -398,7 +400,6 @@ export const buildIndex = (rows, todayStr, meta = {}) => {
   const projectName = meta.projectName ?? DEFAULT_PROJECT_NAME;
   const onDemandLinks = meta.onDemandLinks ?? [];
   const hierarchicalLinks = meta.hierarchicalLinks ?? [];
-  const header = INDEX_HEADER.replace('__TODAY__', todayStr).replace('__PROJECT__', projectName);
   const tableHeader = `| File | Type | Lines/Max | Updated | Stale after |\n|------|------|-----------|---------|-------------|`;
   const singles = [];
   const grouped = COLLAPSE_GROUPS.map(() => []);
@@ -421,7 +422,8 @@ export const buildIndex = (rows, todayStr, meta = {}) => {
     hierarchicalLinks.length > 0
       ? `\n\n## Subdirectory \`AGENTS.md\` (hierarchical)\n\n${hierarchicalLinks.map((link) => `- ${link}`).join('\n')}`
       : '';
-  return `${header}${tableHeader}\n${tableRows}${onDemandSection}${hierarchicalSection}\n`;
+  const render = (cap) => `${INDEX_HEADER.replace('__CAP__', cap).replace('__TODAY__', todayStr).replace('__PROJECT__', projectName)}${tableHeader}\n${tableRows}${onDemandSection}${hierarchicalSection}\n`;
+  return render(Math.max(NAVIGATOR_CAP_FLOOR, countLines(render(NAVIGATOR_CAP_FLOOR))));
 };
 
 // Freshness regenerates the index with the on-disk header's OWN `lastUpdated`, so a mere day-rollover