Gates & Approvals

Where humans decide: review, machine checks, second opinions, checkpoints, and promotion — five stations, one direction, no shortcuts.

1. Review — look first (always safe, read-only)

Pending proposals listed; diffs show new/changed/removed files with line counts. Nothing here can change anything — look freely.

2. Validate — the machine proves the contract

Paths, names, required sections at exact levels, metadata shape — proven automatically, with a proof pack attached (what ran, what the tools said, which code revision). Same check re-runs at promotion; failure names errors and applies nothing.

3. Score — a second pair of eyes (scoring sittings)

A validator grades the output per checklist line — score, pass or fail, strengths, weaknesses, reason — and totals against the bar. Below bar, the worker gets the annotated report back and fixes exactly what's marked (bounded rounds, then a human steps in). Simple sittings skip this station openly: the gate records why no score was needed.

4. Gate — you decide, with everything on the table

Each move between statuses lists its checks — sections present, dependencies approved, score above bar, files actually existing, your organization's rules — and all must pass. You run (report only), approve (advance, recorded with reasons and results), reject (applied work rolled back from its snapshot, reason kept forever), or retire (finished permanently, successor linked). Nobody edits statuses directly — every change passes through here with a record.

5. Apply — movers, not judges

Promotion copies staged files to final places (snapshotted first for safe rollback), records which sitting wrote what, rebuilds the graph views, and traces the event. Files move; status doesn't — only gates move status. Rejecting a proposal archives it and can offer the worker a feedback-carrying retry.

6. Bypasses are loud, never silent

Emergencies use --force or accept declared exceptions — always with reasons, always recorded in history. There is no quiet way past a gate; the audit trail is the point.

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