booth/persistent-memory.md

# Persistent memory — booth

_Last updated: 2026-09-22_

> **Always check for `/tmp/booth-dev-handoff.md`** — if it exists and its
> `Written:` stamp is under 8 hours old, read it (it carries the in-flight
> handoff from the previous session), then delete it. Older than 8 hours:
> stale — delete it unread.

## Repo purpose

The Booth is the fleet's **operator-review surface**: agents post work by
making a folder under `~/booth-data`, the operator looks at it and judges it in
the browser, and the judgment gets back to the agent that posted it. It was
built as a file-shuttle and is being converged, unit by unit, onto the review
loop it turned out to actually be.

## Current state / in-flight

_As of 2026-09-22:_

- **U6 SHIPPED (`v0.6.0`) with a late fix (`v0.6.1`). PUSHED.** `main` and both
  tags are on `origin` as of 2026-09-22 — the tree is no longer single-copy.
  ⚠ **That "PUSHED" was already stale when written**: `2f85692` (the
  no-announcements ruling) landed after it and sat unpushed until 2026-09-22
  night. **Do not trust a "pushed" row — run `git rev-list --count
  origin/main..HEAD`.** A push is a point in time; this file is not.
  → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-22-u6-benches-released.md`
- **THE OPERATOR RULED ON EVERYTHING OUTSTANDING (2026-09-22, "accept all
  recs").** Four of five settled and executed; one blocked by the permission
  layer. Nothing is waiting on him. →
  `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-22-operator-ruled-on-the-open-five.md`
- ✅ **U7 IS LANDED — ALL SEVEN v1 UNITS ARE IN.** The fourth component
  (filename-prefix groups) is built; `test_no_group_rail_is_shipped_yet` was
  deleted in the same commit, as required.
  → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-22-u7-landed-and-a-table-that-did-not-reproduce.md`
- ✅ **RELEASED `v1.0.0b1` — the first 1.x release, staged as a BETA** (operator,
  2026-09-22: "cut 1.0 beta 1"). Feature-complete, no new features, remaining
  work is bugs. `1.0.0` final is cut when the beta survives.
  **PUSHED — `main` and the annotated tag are on `origin`; ahead 0, behind 0.**
  → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-22-v1-staged-as-a-beta-and-a-second-copy-of-the-version.md`
- ⚠ **`booth/__init__.py` IS A FOURTH STDLIB-ONLY MODULE** and nothing said so
  until now — `scripts/booth` executes it before every one of the documented
  three. Now covered by `test_stdlib_only`. Same detail file carries why
  `importlib.metadata` is the WRONG version source in this repo.
- 🛑 **ROUND 1 RULED NOT-AS-SHOWN, AND THE SCOPE FENCE WAS OURS** (operator,
  2026-09-23): *"He didn't go far enough, still looks like the booth. I want him
  to consider the flow and the requirements — design touches, layout, usability
  all belong to him."* **The handoff's "what we are not asking for: layout
  changes driven by information architecture" paragraph is VOID** — design-dev's
  "class additions only, no reordering" was that constraint honoured, so the
  ruling corrects OUR brief, not his round. Flow, layout, usability and the
  requirements are his; the IA is no longer fenced off. Two tiers survive:
  correctness (deterministic order, autoescape, blur-admits-cosmetic, restart
  discipline) and engineering defaults he may now ARGUE with (no-JS gallery,
  virtualization parked, compare mode deferred) — tier-2 disputes go to the
  operator, not settled between agents. Relayed in full; questions 2 and 3
  (voice, emblem) remain UNANSWERED and were not answered on his behalf.
  ⚠ **Calibration for the next round: his bar is "did anything change when I
  opened it".** He said the Booth "kind of looks the same" about our own U7
  navigation work, before ever seeing the design round.
- 🔶 **THE DESIGN ARC IS MID-FLIGHT AND design-dev IS BUILDING IN TWO MERGES.**
  First: **Reveal all + the booth-blur control** (re-sequenced to first because
  the operator said per-booth blur became important). Second: the Desk row
  revisions + the theme toggle. Each gets its own bug-hunt; he pings at each
  handover and **we merge and restart**.
- ✅ **BOOTH-LEVEL BLUR: STORAGE AND CLI ARE LANDED; ONLY THE UI IS PENDING.**
  Marker `<booth>/.blurbooth`, `POST /b/<name>/blurbooth`, and
  **`booth blur <name>` with NO files fogs the whole booth** (naming files is
  still per-item). COMPOSES with `.blurred`, never overrides. All 17 handles can
  self-blur at post time, which is the durable fix.
- ⚠ **THE DESK EXPOSES 84 IMAGES ACROSS 22 BOOTHS on the page he opens first**
  (measured 2026-09-23). The pre-redesign index showed ONE cover per booth, so
  four-up multiplied exposure by four and **nothing posted before the redesign
  opted into it.** That is why blur got re-prioritised.
  ⚠ **The operator declined to blur the `sindra-nude-*` booths for now** — he
  will do it himself once design-dev's control lands. **Do not blur them on his
  behalf.**
- ✅ **RULINGS 2026-09-23:** `×` (wipe) **hides** with the other Desk controls
  on hover; the theme toggle **reaches** `.bk-ask` chrome inside verbatim pages;
  global unblur is **reading A** (per-booth, tab-scoped, nothing persisted);
  **no `1.0.0` yet.**
  ⚠ The hover ruling looked like it reversed design-dev's "nothing hides behind
  hover" argument; he resolved it WITHOUT an overrule via
  `@media (hover: hover)` — hidden-until-hover only where hover exists, own line
  on touch. Do not re-raise it as a conflict.
- ✅ **ALL FOUR FLOW RULINGS ARE IN — A+B, compare THIS ARC, plain voice, no
  emblem** (operator via Miranda D-0016, 2026-09-23 08:07). Every one took
  design-dev's recommendation; no notes attached. **booth-dev is the SOLE RELAY
  — the operator will not brief design-dev directly.** Verbatim copy at
  `docs/rulings/2026-09-23-flow-direction.json`.
  → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-23-the-flow-rulings-and-what-they-cost-the-beta.md`
- ⚠ **ANSWERING A PICK REMOVES THE HOLD THAT PROTECTED THE RECORD.** A booth is
  held while a question is OPEN; the moment it is answered it becomes the record
  of a decision and stops being held. Both design booths hit this, by different
  routes (one withdrawn, one answered). **Capture a ruling into git, not into a
  booth.** Raised to design-dev as a flow question rather than patched.
- ⚠ **`v1.0.0b1`'s "no new features" PREMISE IS SUPERSEDED.** The arc now
  contains a flow redesign and compare mode. The tag stays as written (it
  records what was believed, not a claim about now), an alpha drop-back is
  ILLEGAL (`1.0.0a2` < `1.0.0b1`), and no further pre-release is cut until the
  arc lands. **Whether `1.0.0` waits for the redesign is UNDECIDED and his.**
- 🔶 **ROUND 2 IS UP AND FOUR RULINGS ARE WITH THE OPERATOR** — booth
  `booth-flow-concepts`, ask `flow`: direction / compare / voice / emblem.
  Three directions (Desk, Reel, Bench), six screens each in dark+light, plus a
  README stating eight requirements measured from the live booths. design-dev
  recommends **A+B** (Desk with the Reel as its review mode), **compare in this
  arc**, **plain-and-direct copy**, **no emblem**. He withdrew his own round-1
  `svos` ask as superseded — he did NOT answer anything on the operator's
  behalf.
- ✅ **`booth-svos-retheme` IS KEPT** — design-dev ran `booth keep` after we
  flagged that withdrawing his ask had removed the last hold. Round 1's renders
  stay one click away while the operator chooses; he releases it once `flow` is
  ruled.
- ✅ **ORDERING REVIEW DONE FOR ROUND 2's SURFACES** (he asked before building).
  His **ordinals rule improves invariant 6** — an ordinal that counts across ALL
  items makes "#07" stable under every filter, where today "the third one" is
  ambiguous the moment a filter is on.

  ⚠ **One correction we sent was WRONG, and the record is corrected here rather
  than left to be re-asserted.** We read his "SET order" as "the order they were
  set in" and told him it was already `(created, id)`. He meant **the SET's
  order — by tile number.** Those genuinely differ: flag #15 then #07, and
  today's panel lists #15, #07 while his tray lists #07, #15. His rule is also
  cleaner than ours — the flag set sorted by its target's position in
  `sorted(rel)` is a **total order needing no tie-break, because rels are
  unique.** Do not re-raise the tie-break point; it was our misreading.

  The correction that held: **"last activity" must reuse `_newest_mtime`**,
  whose `.lock` exclusion is load-bearing — a naive `max(mtime)` lets a no-op
  mark POST float a dead booth to the top. Taken, with no second definition of
  activity on the Desk.
- 🔶 **SVOS CONCEPT ROUND IS UP AND THREE RULINGS ARE WITH THE OPERATOR**
  (booth `booth-svos-retheme`, ask id `svos`: ship / voice / emblem, all three
  with design-dev's recommendation attached). **Nothing from us gates it and
  the branch must NOT be merged until he pings after the rulings.**
  Branch `refs/heads/design-dev/svos-retheme` is fetched into this repo as an
  **inert ref** — nothing checked out, `main` clean, merge-tree clean.
  ⚠ **DO NOT TRUST A SHA WRITTEN HERE — READ THE REF.** He rebases onto our
  `main` and rewrites the ref in place; it has already moved `878ed86` →
  `a99b7bb` (rebase onto `1826d19`, plus the scroll-margin fix). Merging a SHA
  copied out of this file would merge a pre-rebase branch. Same class as the
  stale "PUSHED" row and the stale postbox-mode note: **this file records what
  was true when written, and a moving ref is not that.** Run
  `git show-ref | grep svos` and `git merge-tree --write-tree HEAD <ref>`.
- 🔶 **THE FIXUP HOLD IS PARTIAL, NOT BLANKET.** `booth/templates/booth.html`
  is **RELEASED** — design-dev does not touch it, so bug-hunt findings there
  land immediately. **HELD** while his branch is out: `base.html`, `view.html`,
  `doc.html`, `embed.js`, and `app.py`'s `FAVICON_HREF`.
- ⚠ **A REAL LATENT CSS DEFECT, FOUND BY design-dev, ASSIGNED TO HIS REWRITE.**
  `base.html` reads `--line` / `--bg` / `--fg` / `--muted` and **defines none of
  them**; 15 of those uses carry no fallback (lines 281-314). `border:1px solid
  var(--line)` with the var undefined is invalid at computed-value time, so the
  WHOLE border declaration drops — the keep/blur/reveal buttons have had no
  border and a transparent background. The U7 rail above them reads the same
  names WITH fallbacks, which is why the rail looks deliberate and the buttons
  never did. **Do not fix on `main`** — it is the one file he is rewriting.
- ⚠ **A `postbox send` note is a point-in-time snapshot, NOT a durable fact.**
  The send said `design-dev: pull-only`; `postbox handles` says `push
  reachable`, and he replied in-session. Read the mode from `postbox handles`.
- ⚠ **U7'S CONTRACT CARRIED A MEASUREMENT THAT DID NOT REPRODUCE**, and it was
  the number the scope departure rested on. The stated rule gives 24 and 27
  groups where the table claimed 5 and 1; the table was assembled from two
  different heuristics. **A cold contract-review panel cannot catch this** — the
  artifact is internally plausible. Re-run any measurement a contract's scope
  rests on before implementing it. Same detail file.
- ⚠ **A MUTATION HARNESS NEEDS A GREEN BASELINE AND CACHE DEFEAT**, or it
  certifies falsifiers without running them. Both defects bit in one session.
  → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-22-a-mutation-harness-that-certified-a-broken-test.md`
- **648 tests green; 12/12 U7 falsifiers mutation-proved. Deployed; 21/21
  booths 200.** ⚠ The set churned again mid-session (19 → 21).
- ✅ **THE MUTATION HARNESS IS NOW `scripts/mutation_check.py`** (operator,
  2026-09-22: "keep the harness"). Tables in `tests/mutations/*.toml`, one per
  unit — **add a unit by adding a file, never by editing the script.** It has
  its own positive and negative controls in `tests/test_mutation_check.py`,
  including a known-vacuous falsifier it must catch. **When you write a
  `*Falsifiable:*` line, add its row and run it** — a falsifier nobody has run
  is a claim, not a test.
- ✅ **THE BUG-HUNT PANEL LANDED AND IS TRIAGED** (`397ea89`): six defects fixed,
  two accepted known risks, one held for design-dev. **660 green, 20/20
  mutation-proved, deployed, 21/21 booths 200.**
  → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-23-the-bug-hunt-panel-and-five-vacuous-falsifiers.md`
- ⚠ **BROWSERS MATCH A URL FRAGMENT RAW FIRST, decoded only second.** So a raw
  rel on BOTH the anchor and the id is not "unencoded", it is AMBIGUOUS, and the
  jump can land on the WRONG artifact. Encoding one side just moves the
  collision — **both sides must use `Item.url`.** Same detail file.
- ⚠ **FIVE VACUOUS FALSIFIERS IN U7 ALONE**, three arms finding the same one
  independently. A guard-strength pass is the highest-value part of a panel on a
  well-tested diff; the findings sit in the gaps the code comments are most
  confident about.
- 🛑 **STANDING RULING — NO ANNOUNCEMENTS OUT OF THIS REPO, AND THE OPERATOR
  SENDS THE EVENTUAL ONE HIMSELF** (operator, 2026-09-22). Verbatim: *"no
  announcements until the entire arc is done, and even then i'll do it myself."*
  Two clauses, both binding: **(a)** no althing announcement of any kind ships
  from booth-dev until the v1 arc is COMPLETE — not per-unit, not at the 1.0
  tag, not "just the peers who consume it"; **(b)** when the arc IS done, the
  announcement is HIS to send, not a thing to ask permission for. This is
  STRICTER than `~/.claude/CLAUDE.md`'s broadcast gate, which merely requires
  approval — here the send is not the agent's to make at all, so *asking* is
  also out of scope. Do not offer, draft-and-await, or surface it as a pending
  decision; it is settled and not a standing question.
  **The 17-handle `booth link` note is consequently REASSIGNED, not blocked.**
  The full draft + recipient list stays at
  `docs/pending/fleet-note-booth-link-refusal.md` as MATERIAL FOR HIM. It is no
  longer an open loop, no longer awaiting approval, and no longer a thing to
  raise. Same for anything U4's `keep`-semantics change would have warranted
  telling peers.
- ⚠ **NOT SEEDED, and this survives the blanket ruling.** "No seeding yet" was a
  SPECIFIC prior instruction, not a recommendation of mine, so "accept all recs"
  does not override it. `.benches.json` does not exist in `~/booth-data`.
- **A U7 directive (D-0011) misrouted to infra-ops and is SUPERSEDED.** Miranda
  confirmed directly. Nothing to act on.
  → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-22-a-directive-misrouted-by-pane-title.md`
- ⚠ **THE 17 CONSUMING HANDLES WERE NEVER TOLD that `keep` stopped meaning
  "waiting on an answer"** — and the note above does not tell them either; it is
  about `booth link`. **This CHANGES HOW THE 2026-10-06 RE-COUNT READS**: a flat
  `.forever` rate does NOT falsify the diagnosis.
- **Two dated predictions pending, not to be run early.** U5's adoption
  re-measure **2026-09-29**; the `.forever` re-count **on or after 2026-10-06**.
- **FIVE `/heid*` methodology proposals sit with the operator**, untracked by
  his choice.
- The booth set churns hard: 26 → 24 → 25 → 23 → **19**. Re-count rather than
  trusting any number here.

## Recent decisions

- `[2026-09-23]` ⚠ **The cache that aged the thing it cached** — thumbnails 77.5MB→0.78MB; READ BEFORE PARKING ANYTHING ON A MEASUREMENT (we counted images and the cost was in bytes), and BEFORE PUTTING A SERVER-WRITTEN CACHE INSIDE A BOOTH (excluding its contents does not stop it aging the booth) → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-23-the-cache-that-aged-the-thing-it-cached.md`
- `[2026-09-23]` ⚠ **The probe that nearly dismissed a live injection vector** — the link board rendered `javascript:` hrefs; READ BEFORE TRUSTING A NEGATIVE RESULT FROM AN OBVIOUS PROBE, and before assuming an existing scheme check is the guard you are looking for → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-23-the-probe-that-nearly-dismissed-a-live-vector.md`
- `[2026-09-23]` ✅ **The bug-hunt panel found six defects and five vacuous falsifiers** — READ BEFORE BUILDING ANY FRAGMENT ANCHOR (browsers match raw before decoded, so both sides must be encoded), and before trusting a well-commented diff's guards → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-23-the-bug-hunt-panel-and-five-vacuous-falsifiers.md`
- `[2026-09-22]` ✅ **v1.0.0b1 — the v1 target staged as a beta, and a version that was two copies** — READ BEFORE DERIVING A VERSION FROM `importlib.metadata` HERE; it reports a different artifact, and `booth/__init__.py` turns out to be stdlib-only → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-22-v1-staged-as-a-beta-and-a-second-copy-of-the-version.md`
- `[2026-09-22]` ✅ **U7 landed — and the number that justified it did not reproduce** — all seven v1 units are in; READ BEFORE TRUSTING A MEASUREMENT INSIDE A CONTRACT, and before assuming a degeneracy guard covers the degeneracy you actually have → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-22-u7-landed-and-a-table-that-did-not-reproduce.md`
- `[2026-09-22]` ⚠ **A mutation harness certified a broken test, twice, for two reasons** — no green baseline, and the pyc cache silently reverting same-size mutations; READ BEFORE WRITING ONE → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-22-a-mutation-harness-that-certified-a-broken-test.md`
- `[2026-09-22]` 🛑 **STANDING: no announcements out of this repo until the arc is done, and he sends that one himself** — verbatim *"no announcements until the entire arc is done, and even then i'll do it myself."* Stricter than the house broadcast gate: the send is not the agent's to make, so **asking is also out of scope**. The drafted 17-handle note is REASSIGNED to him, not blocked — see the in-flight row above; do not raise it again.
- `[2026-09-22]` **The operator ruled on all five open items at once** — four executed incl. the first push; the broadcast was blocked by the permission layer and is drafted at `docs/pending/` → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-22-operator-ruled-on-the-open-five.md`
- `[2026-09-22]` **U7 is three-quarters built and blocked on one word** — the ratified three landed; the sections-vs-groups departure is NOT built and is the operator's call, tracked at `docs/contracts/u7_navigation.contract.md` → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-22-u7-three-quarters-and-one-ruling.md`
- `[2026-09-22]` **An approved directive misrouted because pane_find addresses by a rolling pane title** — resolved; the MECHANISM is the durable part, reported to infra-ops, untracked by booth-dev → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-22-a-directive-misrouted-by-pane-title.md`
- `[2026-09-22]` **U7 re-measured before scoping — sections are dead, filename prefixes are not** — PRE-WORK ONLY, no unit started; read before writing U7's contract → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-22-u7-remeasured-before-scoping.md`
- `[2026-09-22]` **The last open defect closed, and building its falsifier found another** — the wrong-shaped answer fixed at `_hydrate`; `_safe_fragments` lost its natural trigger and its handler could not survive the failure it handled → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-22-a-wrong-shaped-answer-500s-the-gallery.md`
- `[2026-09-22]` **U6 released as `v0.6.0` — benches, and the number that was two defects** — six of seven v1 units landed, NOT PUSHED → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-22-u6-benches-released.md`
- `[2026-09-22]` **Three cold panels on one unit, and what each lens could only see alone** — READ BEFORE DECIDING TO SKIP A GATE; all five passes found something the others structurally could not → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-22-three-cold-panels-on-one-unit.md`
- `[2026-09-22]` **U6 landed — three surfaces, three jobs, one predicate** — the seam review caught three real contract defects incl. a per-row `resolve_booth` that would have 404'd the board → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-22-u6-benches-landed.md`
- `[2026-09-22]` **The 69% link-board rot was two defects wearing one number** — READ BEFORE SCOPING ANY LINK-BOARD WORK; U5 closed the larger half and full-URL-vs-origin identity is a measured call → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-22-one-number-was-two-defects.md`
- `[2026-09-22]` **U3 landed — the page declares the seam, the Booth mounts into it** — ten regexes against author HTML replaced by a substring test and a `+` → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-22-u3-declared-embed-seam-landed.md`
- `[2026-09-22]` **A wrong-shaped answer 500s the gallery and the marks page** — PRE-EXISTING (measured at `42ea67f`), NOT U3; the v0.2.2 lesson is only half-implemented → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-22-a-wrong-shaped-answer-500s-the-gallery.md`
- `[2026-09-22]` **The browser became a test surface** — READ BEFORE TOUCHING `playwright` IN pyproject; the pinned upper bound is the foot-gun, and these tests SKIP rather than fail → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-22-the-browser-became-a-test-surface.md`
- `[2026-09-22]` **A vacuity pass that tries the contract's own mutation agrees with itself** — U3 ran one, reported 7/7, and a cold panel then showed one of the seven was vacuous; READ BEFORE WRITING A *Falsifiable:* LINE → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-22-seven-of-seven-falsifiers.md`
- `[2026-09-22]` **U4 landed — lifetime is derived, not declared** — three states, viewing is activity, and no new arithmetic anywhere → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-22-u4-derived-lifetime-landed.md`
- `[2026-09-22]` **The `.forever` diagnosis got a live positive control** — 3 of the 4 booths awaiting an answer were ALSO hand-pinned — RE-COUNT 2026-10-06 → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-22-forever-had-a-live-positive-control.md`
- `[2026-09-22]` **No fleetwide notice for U4, and what that does to the prediction** — READ BEFORE THE 2026-10-06 RE-COUNT; a flat rate does not falsify the diagnosis → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-22-no-notice-and-what-it-does-to-the-prediction.md`
- `[2026-09-22]` **Four independent paths to one fail-open delete** — the bug-hunt panel's class, and the zsh word-splitting trap that shipped an empty bundle → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-22-four-paths-to-one-fail-open-delete.md`
- `[2026-09-22]` **Two reads of one file are not one read of one state** — a TOCTOU seam that composes two correct readers into a fail-open delete → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-22-two-reads-are-not-one-state.md`
- `[2026-09-22]` **Five of seven INV falsifiers did not falsify anything** — read before writing a *Falsifiable:* line; a green test cited one rather than being one → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-22-vacuous-falsifiers.md`
- `[2026-09-22]` **The third one-branch template miss** — this repo's recurring blind spot; read before adding a fact to any template → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-22-third-one-branch-template-miss.md`
- `[2026-09-22]` **The size cap opened a service-wide hang** — a FIFO has st_size 0; a bound that trusts it inherits what it does not mean → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-22-size-cap-opened-a-hang.md`
- `[2026-09-22]` **An existing test stopped me retiring documented behaviour** — the clean fix for the mtime race would have silently changed TTL doctrine → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-22-doctrine-not-defect.md`
- `[2026-09-22]` **Two U5 panels, and prose reached a released outage** — read the detail before assuming a conformance finding stops at its own module → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-22-u5-panels-reached-a-released-bug.md`
- `[2026-09-22]` **U5's adoption prediction split in two** — the handle rides for free, the why must be learned — RE-MEASURE 2026-09-29 → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-22-u5-adoption-split-in-two.md`
- `[2026-09-22]` **The U2 bug-hunt panel was not ceremony** — the lock-unlink race and the TTL guard that was failing at its own job → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-22-u2-bug-hunt-panel.md`
- `[2026-09-22]` **The lenient reader's blast radius was the whole service** — marks_for runs per booth per index load; a raise there is an outage → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-22-lenient-reader-blast-radius.md`
- `[2026-09-22]` **`booth marks` / `booth answer` got real exit codes** — read it before changing anything the 17 consuming handles call → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-22-cli-exit-codes.md`
- `[2026-09-22]` **`scripts/booth` went from zero tests to five** — they run the real script under system python3, so they also check INV-1 → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-22-scripts-booth-got-tests.md`
- `[2026-09-21]` **v0.2.0 was tagged while a gate was in flight** — the sequencing lesson: if a gate is outstanding, the tag waits → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-21-v020-tagged-with-a-gate-in-flight.md`
- `[2026-09-21]` **A write over a damaged `.marks.json` wiped the booth** — the reads-lenient / writes-strict asymmetry, and why it exists → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-21-marks-write-wiped-judgment.md`
- `[2026-09-21]` **Seam review and cold panel had zero overlap, twice** — evidence for running both; neither substitutes for the other → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-21-two-gates-are-complementary.md`
- `[2026-09-21]` **Every code-changing finding came from the AMBIGUITY pass** — a finding about the /heid-contract-review skill, not about this repo → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-21-ambiguity-pass-did-the-work.md`
- `[2026-09-21]` **Deterministic order is a cross-cutting v1 invariant** — operator directive; read before adding ANY ordered surface → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-21-deterministic-order-invariant.md`
- `[2026-09-21]` **U2 (marks) landed — one primitive for three mechanisms** — what moved where, and the HTTP mirror remote sessions poll → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-21-u2-marks-landed.md`
- `[2026-09-21]` **A partially-answered pick counts as OPEN** — declared, not smuggled; it is the reading that makes U4 correct → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-21-partial-answer-counts-as-open.md`
- `[2026-09-21]` **The U2 seam review earned its place, and how** — inline.place indexes by subscript — the miss a cold panel cannot see → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-21-u2-seam-review-earned-it.md`
- `[2026-09-21]` **Marks are one `.marks.json` per booth** — operator decision with two rejected alternatives; read before restructuring → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-21-marks-storage-decision.md`
- `[2026-09-21]` **U7's section premise is half wrong** — every booth that needs navigation is FLAT — read before starting U7 → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-21-u7-section-premise-half-wrong.md`
- `[2026-09-21]` **`sindra-finalists` is U2's flag motivation, caught live** — evidence, not argument → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-21-sindra-finalists-is-the-motivation.md`
- `[2026-09-21]` **The information architecture and the v1 gate landed** — the single defect the seven units decompose → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-21-ia-and-v1-gate-landed.md`
- `[2026-09-21]` **The `.forever` diagnosis is a falsifiable prediction** — U4's success criterion — re-count a fortnight AFTER U4 lands → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-21-forever-diagnosis-is-a-prediction.md`
- `[2026-09-21]` **Extracted from `eshpfi` into its own repo** — test_booth.py is the regression net the v1 rewrite is checked against → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-21-extracted-from-eshpfi.md`

## Tried and abandoned

- `[2026-09-21]` **Tagging a release while a review gate was in flight** — cost a same-hour v0.2.1 and a correction to 15 handles → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-21-tagging-with-a-gate-in-flight.md`
- `[2026-09-21]` **Letting the write path share the read path's leniency** — a tolerant reader and a tolerant writer are not the same decision → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-21-tolerant-writer-over-tolerant-reader.md`
- `[2026-09-21]` **Letting Jinja hot-reload templates in the deployment root** — caused a live outage: 19 of 25 booths at 500. Why auto_reload=False → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-21-jinja-hot-reload-outage.md`
- `[2026-09-21]` **Five mechanisms to get one question beside one artifact** — the accretion signature this whole v1 rewrite is undoing → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-21-five-mechanisms-one-job.md`
- `[2026-09-21]` **Regex-injecting chrome into arbitrary author HTML** — the defect U3 exists to close → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-21-regex-injecting-chrome.md`
- `[2026-09-21]` **A boolean escape hatch as the lifetime mechanism** — why `.forever` is a symptom; the defect U4 exists to close → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-21-boolean-escape-hatch-as-lifetime.md`
- `[2026-09-21]` **Letting the link board absorb the announce job** — 69% rot; U5 gave the job a home, which is what unblocks U6 → `persistent-memory.d/2026-09-21-link-board-absorbing-announce.md`