acdl/.ciagent/GRILL.md

GRILL — v1.27 PO State Catalog & Ciagent Compression

Adversarial review of the v1.27 SPECIFY + CLARIFY + RESEARCH + PLAN. The grill red-teams the proposal across feasibility, scope, and the compression-loss claims. Each challenge gets a binding verdict (PROCEED / REVISE / ESCALATE). Autonomy: full.

Verdict: PROCEED (0.88) — 0 escalations, 1 revision

The milestone is feasible, scoped, and the compression is lossless. One binding revision (G-Q2) refines the archive list; already captured in PLAN. No work is blocked.

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Challenges

G-Q1 — Is archiving AUTONOMY_THESIS.md + COST.md a context loss?

Challenge: AUTONOMY_THESIS.md is the "autonomy in operations; human at stage gates" thesis — the defensibility brief. COST.md is the only AWS cost record. Archiving both moves them out of active context. Does this lose load-bearing content?

Verdict: PROCEED (confidence 0.90).

• AUTONOMY_THESIS.md (65 lines, "Last refined: v1.21") is fully folded into NORTH_STAR.md Vision (lines 17–22: "infrastructure operations become visible... human attestation remains required at stage gates") + Anti-Goals #2 ("Not a system that removes humans from accountability"). The thesis is the source; NORTH_STAR is the authoritative durable copy. Archive preserves the v1.21 refinement; active context reads NORTH_STAR.
• COST.md (106 lines, dated 2026-07-29, "v1.0 → v1.14") predates the v1.26 live pilot. The v1.26 live apply (ECS + ALB + DynamoDB + S3) incurred real costs this snapshot doesn't reflect. Archiving it is honest — a stale cost record misleads. STATE.md Domain 7 notes cost tracking as a capability (pre-apply Infracost grounded; actual-spend CUR deferred D-096). A future cost milestone writes a fresh report. No revision needed.

G-Q2 — Does the archive list include the v1.27 P0 pre-execution files by mistake?

Challenge: D-219 (user-confirmed) says "archive all 4 pre-execution artifacts" (CLARIFY/GRILL/IDEATE/RESEARCH). But P0 already overwrote them with v1.27 content. Archiving the v1.27 versions at v1.27 P1 would lose the v1.27 pre-execution narrative (the decisions D-214..D-225, the research inventory, this grill). Is the archive list wrong?

Verdict: REVISE (confidence 0.92). This is a real ambiguity in the plan. The user's D-219 decision was made before P0 overwrote the files; the intent was to archive the v1.26 pre-execution record. The v1.26-era content is preserved in git history (the pre-P0 commits) — the archive directory is not the only preservation layer. PLAN Task 2.1 already self-corrected: the final archive list is 7 platform files + 1 consumer file = 8 files, excluding the 4 pre-execution files. The 4 v1.27 P0 versions stay active through v1.27; they archive at v1.28 P1 if v1.28 happens. The archive README notes the v1.26 pre-execution record is in git history. No further revision needed — the plan self- corrected.

G-Q3 — Is the STATE.md backfill accurate enough to be the PO's source of truth?

Challenge: STATE.md has 36 capability rows across 10 domains, backfilled from 8 sources. The PO will read this before writing new REQs. If a row is inaccurate (wrong shipped tag, wrong file path, wrong controlling REQ), the PO could re-spec an existing capability or cite a stale invariant. Is the backfill accurate?

Verdict: PROCEED (confidence 0.85). The backfill sources are authoritative: core/regression_verify.py (the machine CAP-NNN registry), modules/registry.json (the live module catalog), REQUIREMENTS.md traceability (the REQ→phase→status record), CHECKPOINT.json (shipped tags), git log (file paths). The citations are direct (each row cites the controlling REQ + decision ID). The 11 invariants are distilled from PROJECT.md load-bearing decisions D-034..D-072 + W1..BA + Q1.3. The accuracy risk is mitigated by P1 Wave 1 (verify STATE.md against sources before archive). No revision needed — the verification step is in the plan.

G-Q4 — Does the NFR purity gate (zero feat: commits) hold for v1.27?

Challenge: v1.27 authors STATE.md (a new file). Is authoring a new catalog file a feat: (feature) that breaks the NFR purity gate?

Verdict: PROCEED (confidence 0.92). D-220 (CLARIFY) resolved this: STATE.md is documentation (a catalog of existing capabilities), not a new platform capability. The archive moves are chore: (file relocation, lossless). No code, no schema, no platform behavior change. The NFR purity gate (zero feat: commits) holds. All v1.27 commits use docs(P0N): or chore(P01): prefixes. No revision needed.

G-Q5 — Does fixing PROJECT.md phase-status in P2 create a P0/P1 audit inconsistency?

Challenge: The PROJECT.md phase-status block shows P3/P4/P5 as "pending" (the bug flagged in the prior conversation). P0 + P1 ship with the bug still present (the fix is P2). Does the P0/P1 audit see the inconsistency?

Verdict: PROCEED (confidence 0.86). The bug is pre-existing (it predates v1.27; it was the trigger for the prior conversation). P0/P1 audits check the v1.27 commits against the .ciagent/ state, not the pre-existing PROJECT.md drift. The P2 fix is the correction; the P3 audit verifies the fix landed. The intermediate state (P0/P1 with the bug present) is honest — the bug is documented in the v1.27 PLAN + the prior conversation, and the fix is scheduled. No revision needed — the phasing is intentional (D-225: P1 additive, P2 correction).

G-Q6 — Is the milestone scoped too small (3 phases, 8 archive moves)?

Challenge: v1.27 is a small milestone (3 phases, ~15 file operations, no code). Is it worth a milestone, or should it be a patch on v1.26?

Verdict: PROCEED (confidence 0.88). v1.27 is not a patch on v1.26 — v1.26 is shipped (v1.25.5, merged to main, milestone complete). The work is a new milestone by definition. The size is appropriate: STATE.md is a durable PO-facing artifact (loaded every ci-run going forward); the compression reduces active context by ~26%; the ship-discipline wiring affects every future milestone ship. Small but high-leverage. No revision needed.

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Summary

6 challenges; 0 escalations; 1 binding revision (G-Q2, already captured in PLAN Task 2.1). Overall verdict: PROCEED (confidence 0.88).

Binding revisions:

• G-Q2: Archive list refined to 7 platform + 1 consumer = 8 files. The 4 pre-execution files (CLARIFY/GRILL/IDEATE/RESEARCH) stay active through v1.27 (they hold the v1.27 P0 content); the v1.26-era content is in git history. Already in PLAN.

No work is blocked. The milestone is feasible, scoped, the compression is lossless (archive + git history), the STATE.md backfill is source-grounded with a verification step, the NFR purity holds, and the phasing (P1 additive, P2 correction, P3 ship) is sound.