2026-09-29 — The product thinker answered twenty-six owed rulings and the published-history question in one interview, asked one at a time by orchestrator abcd-23 of autonomous run A (recorded by lane recRulings for orchestrator abcd-cb). The answers are kept verbatim in the local-tier file `.abcd/.work.local/scratch/reports/rulings-answered-2609-29.md`, dated 2026-09-29, and are restated here because that file is not committed. Published history is left as it is, with no rewrite. The build loop's fidelity audit runs once, on the lane that closes the spec, over the whole delivery (AI). On the vendor denylist the product thinker answered, verbatim: "I think we need an allow list rather than trying to catch a deny list." The interviewer's reading of that answer, recorded as a reading and not as the product thinker's words, is that the per-provider allowlist is the control and the vendor denylist is not extended to chase spellings, with whether the bundled `anthropic/*` entry stays as a backstop left to the technical facilitator (AA(a)). Only a route the person set up on their own machine may use their paid key, and a repository's own route to it is refused, which replaces the route half of itd-2609081951381895 decision 8 (AA(b)). The live site setup, the API adapter and the decision adapter may each close on tests against a simulated service, with the live paid check recorded as owed to a person (iss-2609291925387011, iss-2609291925393913, iss-2609291925398978). itd-111's last criterion is met by an agent's timing check on macOS plus the Linux CI run, so the intent may be finished. Automated dependency updates are switched on, pushed with a personal or app token the person creates and stores as a repository secret (itd-2609221842494980; creating the token is the person's act, and the lane builds everything else and names the secret it expects). itd-6 adds a Go MCP module, proposed for the person's explicit sign-off before it is fetched; closing itd-6 on a fake server was not ruled in this interview. (A later answer the same day, H1b in the local-tier file `.abcd/.work.local/scratch/reports/rulings-answered-2609-29-b.md`, dated 2026-09-29, rules that it is not: itd-6 is finished only after running once against the real RepoPrompt app, a check owed to a person.) For itd-148: the store under the home folder wins (adr-2609091248200336); the store draft itd-2609091014076309 owns add, list and clean-up and itd-148 uses them; a session that declares itself the coordinator is exempt from the write block in the primary checkout and every other session is blocked; and the store draft is planned first, with nothing from the store draft, the merged-worktree clean-up included, built before its planning interview (Q4). itd-148's own wait is not part of that ruling: it follows from Q2, because itd-148 uses the store's verbs, and is carried by the `blocked_by` below. itd-148 and spc-42 are rewritten to match in this change, and itd-148 is now `blocked_by` the store draft. A release retrospective is seeded from a release, the intents a tag shipped (AD); itd-24 and its spec are rewritten to the release in this change. An unpointed route is refused naming the one setting to add, as built in 35100512e, so AC11 of itd-2609170822093401 is complete (BR1). A missed target becomes `next`, whatever the following release is numbered (BS1). Spec pieces keep "step" and the lane stages are renamed, a breaking change to the JSON fields `step`, `performed` and `refusal.step` that resolves iss-2609291313276243 and corrects the glossary entry `core/step.md` (BU1), and the old command spellings are removed in that same breaking release (BT1). The text board shows Later as a count only while the site and `--json` keep the full list (BV1), and an intent in progress appears only under Now (BV2). A pause of zero is allowed (BW1); drain stays in the agents' help list until it runs end to end (BX1); a managed repository must hold the drain eligibility decision in its own record, and drain refuses there until it does (BX2); a capture without a remedy is refused (BX3), which tightens the one-line capture friction `commands/capture.md` promises, so the lane that builds it reconciles that page, the principle wording and every caller that files a capture; a run's pick reason keeps the shared `pursued:` kind with its marker (BZ1); and an intent whose blocker was superseded waits on the successor, transitively (BZ2). The five itd-48 follow-ups are planned as one intent, drafted as itd-2609291923559186 (BT2), and all warn rules share one shrink-only baseline file in which a new warning fails, drafted as itd-2609291924469783 (BT3); both drafts wait on their planning interviews. Each ruling that contradicts a shipped behaviour or another record is amended in the change that builds it, not here. itd-7's planning interview stays owed.

Frontmatter

.abcd/work/decisions/dcn-2609290000000007-the-product-thinker-answered-twenty-six.md
open on GitHub ↗ · commit history ↗

mentions24

• adr-2609091248200336A tool never creates directories in user-owned project space; the store's location binds now and its verbs bind when the store ships
• adr-2609292012006845Now, Next and Later list an intent in a lane under Now only; phases stay retired
• iss-2609291313276243The glossary entry for step (.abcd/development/brief/glossary/core/step.md) says the loop's step interface, abcd implement step, uses the same word for the same thing as a spec's steps: the next piece of the current spec. The loop does not work that way: implement step performs one stage of the current lane (worktree, brief, implement, validate, land), and a lane lands one spec step, so the state file, the JSON payloads (step, performed, refusal.step) and the command pages already use one word for two things and qualify the spec's as spec step. itd-2609212103565953 criterion 5 asks the command page to describe them as one word for one thing, which cannot be written truthfully until someone rules which of the two keeps the word (rename the lane's stages, or change what implement step means) or restates the criterion.
• iss-2609291925387011The live check of abcd site setup against a real hosting provider is owed to a person. itd-2609061543533170 shipped on tests against a simulated provider, and the product thinker ruled on 2026-09-29 that each paid service (live site setup, the API adapter, the decision adapter) may close on tests against a simulated service, with the live paid check recorded as owed and done later by a person. Owed: in a managed repository, with a real hosting credential configured, run abcd site setup and confirm that the host is created and routed through the provider adapter, that the reported live address serves the rendered site, and that nothing beyond the one host is created or billed; record the result on this record and resolve it.
• iss-2609291925393913The live check of the OpenAI-compatible API adapter against a real paid provider is owed to a person. itd-2609081951381895 may close on tests against a simulated OpenAI-compatible service under the product thinker's ruling of 2026-09-29 on paid services (live site setup, the API adapter, the decision adapter), with the live paid check recorded as owed and done later by a person. Owed: with the person's own key stored through abcd ahoy connect, send one step through the adapter to a real aggregator and confirm that a model the provider block lists answers, that a model it does not list is refused before anything is sent, and that the provider's billing shows only the listed model; record the result on this record and resolve it.
• iss-2609291925398978The live check of the decision adapter against the real paid decision model is owed to a person. itd-2609221009495079 may close on tests against a simulated service under the product thinker's ruling of 2026-09-29 on paid services (live site setup, the API adapter, the decision adapter), with the live paid check recorded as owed and done later by a person. Owed: run one typed judgement through the decision adapter against the real decision model with the person's own key, and confirm the verdict is received, recorded and measured as the lab expects, with nothing billed beyond that one judgement; record the result on this record and resolve it.
• iss-2609291942515955itd-111 acceptance criterion 8, as amended at the close, says the product thinker's 2026-09-29 ruling (an agent's check on macOS plus the Linux CI run stand in for the per-platform check by a person) is recorded in .abcd/work/DECISIONS.md under that date, but no line of DECISIONS.md carries it at 8ffb6d069 or on main: the three 2026-09-29 entries concern the pre-commit sources refresh, a guidance principle and the five-agent ceiling. The shipped intent cites a ruling the ledger does not hold. Either the ruling is appended (the staleClose pull-request body says a separate rulings lane appends it) or the amendment cites where the ruling actually lives.
• itd-6RepoPrompt over MCP is one opt-in reviewer route, beside the host's own agents
• itd-7Lifeboats Carry RepoPrompt Workspace Definitions Forward
• itd-24Completed Releases Get A Retrospective
• itd-48`intent-fidelity-reviewer` Gains Its Cross-Doc And Kind-Classification Roles
• itd-111A Stale abcd Never Answers Silently
• itd-148Every change starts in its own worktree in abcd's store: the primary checkout is a read-only surface, and abcd blocks mutations there for every session but a declared coordinator
• itd-2609081951381895abcd ships an OpenAI-compatible API adapter, and a provider serves only the models it lists
• itd-2609091014076309Session and agent worktrees live in a machine-scoped store that abcd lists and reclaims, never beside the user's own projects
• itd-2609170822093401abcd proposes the model each agent deserves, and facilitates it where it can
• itd-2609211116005482`abcd build next` picks the readiest planned intent itself, and writes down why
• itd-2609212103568351The status board shows Now, Next and Later, computed from the record
• itd-2609212103572513An intent names the release it must land by, and the cut says whether it did
• itd-2609221842494980A dependency bump lands without a person re-authoring it, and no machine enters the contributor graph
• itd-2609291923559186The consistency pass runs where records are written and names each finding the same way every time
• itd-2609291924469783Every lint warning rule shares one baseline file that only shrinks, so a new warning fails the change that introduces it
• itd-2610090831227812A person who types `/abcd:` sees the commands people use
• spc-42every-change-starts-in-its-own-worktree-the-primary-checkout