Exact-size ceilings turned every two-word wording fix into a gate
event. The policy amends to: a ceiling sits at least 5% above the
doc's current size (pre-rewrite) and keeps that margin when ratcheted
to target — routine edits pass, real growth still trips the gate.
Amended together in all four policy homes (docs/AGENTS.md § Budgets,
the doc-tiers RFC, the gate script's module comment, the skill's
ratchet rule) plus the manifest values, so prose and mechanics stay
consistent.
The gate joined the doc-sync chain in this PR; the root file's two
enumerations of that chain must name it in the same change. The frozen
ceiling re-records the exact new count (8134).
- The manifest now freezes each budgeted doc at its exact current wc -w
count, matching the documented policy (a ceiling starts at the doc's
current size); the headroom that contradicted the freeze claim is
gone. Post-rewrite ratchets may still land at new-size-plus-headroom,
per the skill's ratchet rule — that is a different moment than the
initial freeze.
- --list now renders MISS/BAD rows for missing files and malformed
ceilings instead of silently dropping them (gate mode already failed
correctly; the report mode no longer under-reports).
Applies the documentation standard to its biggest offender. Every rule
survives as one to three lines plus a link to its durable home; the
stories, duplicate statements, and re-narrations go:
- Situational clusters evict to new homes: docs/testing.md (tiers,
with-key policy, real-over-mock, world-verification, real-entry-path
guards), docs/defensive-patterns.md (the bug-class rules), and
docs/cookbook/responding-to-pr-review-on-a-stack.md (the stacked-PR
review procedure).
- Doc-authoring rules consolidate into docs/AGENTS.md § Writing rules
(current-state-never-history, md-wrap, ts-block compilation, @mode,
catalog same-change, pair same-change).
- packages/README.md drops to the group table + the extension-vs-bundle
dependency rule; the hand ASCII graph yields to the generated
module-graph.md; group READMEs are the canonical per-package map.
- packages/AGENTS.md keeps only its packages-specific rules (export
shape, ctx.get, real-Loader coverage); examples/AGENTS.md repoints
its with-key-policy link; rfc/README.md loses a narrated-history
aside; dsh-code-review / dsh-find-simplifications / verify-md-wrap
references follow the moved content.
- Budget manifest ratchets: AGENTS.md 8200 -> 1500 (now 1,495 words),
packages/README.md 1900 -> 600, packages/AGENTS.md 600 -> 450; the
two new eviction docs join the budget set (testing 800, defensive
550); docs/AGENTS.md raises 1000 -> 1250 for the absorbed writing
rules (the one justified increase). The doc-tiers RFC's deferred list
prunes the two items this change ships.
Standing docs accrete a paragraph per PR with nothing pushing back; the
root AGENTS.md reached 8,130 words in 50 commits with the same rule
stated two and three times. This encodes the counter-pressure:
- docs/AGENTS.md becomes the documentation standard: the tier taxonomy
(one home per fact), target word budgets, and the slop checklist.
- verify-doc-budgets joins doc-sync: word ceilings for the six
accretion-prone standing docs, manifest-driven, frozen at current
sizes and ratcheted down as each doc is brought to target.
- .agents/skills/dsh-doc-standards: the thin placement/audit/red-gate
workflow over the standard, mirroring the dsh-translate-docs split.
- RFC (implemented/process) records the decision, alternatives, and
the first audit cycle's deferred work list.
The gate's first catch was the standard itself (1,057 > 1,000); it
ships condensed to 984 words rather than with a raised ceiling.
