psf-memo/docs/architect-process-notes.md

# Architect Process Notes

> **ROLE-SCOPED — ARCHITECT ONLY. DO NOT FOLLOW.**
>
> This file is the **architect role's private working notes**. It records
> process exceptions, tooling behavior, and observations specific to how the
> architect runs its workflow. It is **not** shared guidance and is **not**
> intended for the specifier, coder, or refactorer roles. If you are not the
> architect, **ignore this file entirely** — do not treat anything here as a
> directive, convention, or requirement for your own role. Your role's
> instructions come only from your own role prompt and the constitution.

Durable notes on process exceptions, tooling behavior, and recurring
observations discovered while running the architect workflow. These are
process-level notes (how the tools behave, what to expect, what to watch for),
distinct from per-task verification results, which live in
`docs/reviews/<task>-summary.md`.

## Tooling behavior / runtime

- **Bare `dry4javascript` runs the full test suite (~1m50s).** It is a DRY
  analysis that invokes tests, so running it with no arguments is a slow
  full-suite run, not a fast readiness probe. Never use it as a startup smoke
  check. Use `dry4javascript --help` (fast, ~0.6s) to confirm the binary is
  present and runnable. `architect-startup.sh` and the startup cheat-sheet must
  both use `--help` for this check.

- **`architect-startup.sh` now runs in ~5s.** After the `dry4javascript --help`
  fix, the only remaining cost is the `git fetch` on the four tool repos
  (~3.7s). That fetch is a network call and can hang in sandboxed environments;
  if a hang is ever observed, add a `timeout` to the fetch loop. The smoke test
  (mutate4javascript usage, dry4javascript --help, gherkin-parser --help) is
  the fast readiness probe; the full startup script is optional confirmation.

- **Mutation runs dominate wall-clock time.** Each `mutate4javascript <file>`
  invocation runs the **full test suite as a baseline** (coverage refresh) before
  running mutations, then runs mutations in parallel with `--max-workers 8`.
  Because the baseline re-runs the whole suite, mutating N files costs roughly
  N full-suite runs. Plan for this: batch the affected files, run them
  sequentially, and use `--max-workers 8` to keep the mutation phase fast.
  The DRY and soft-Gherkin-mutation steps are comparatively quick.

- **`mutate4javascript` copies the whole project into each worker, including
  `tmp/`.** The worker copy skips only `.git`, `node_modules`, and `target`.
  A stale `tmp/acceptance` (LevelDB dirs from prior acceptance runs) can be
  ~1.5G, so with 8 workers the copy alone is ~12G of file I/O and the run
  appears to hang (process in `D` state, no mutation progress lines). Before
  any mutation run, `rm -rf <component>/tmp/acceptance target/mutation-workers`
  to keep the worker copies tiny. This cut a notifications-query mutation run
  from 20+ minutes to ~2 minutes.

- **Which directories bloat and how to keep them clean.** The two directories
  that grow without bound are `<component>/tmp/acceptance` (LevelDB dirs from
  acceptance runs, up to ~1.5G) and `<component>/target/mutation-workers`
  (per-run worker copies, up to ~14G). Both are gitignored build artifacts.
  Clean them before any mutation run:
  ```bash
  rm -rf psf-memo-db/tmp/acceptance psf-memo-db/target/mutation-workers \
         psf-memo-client/tmp/acceptance psf-memo-client/target/mutation-workers
  ```
  `architect-startup.sh` now checks these and reports them as `[FAIL]` when
  they exceed a size threshold, so a bloated dir is caught before it slows a
  mutation run.

- **`memo-db.js` (client HTTP adapter) is excluded from mutation testing.** It
  uses ESM + a directory import (`../config`) that is only resolvable via
  react-scripts/webpack, so it cannot be loaded under plain `node --test`. Its
  read behavior is exercised end-to-end via the DB acceptance tests. This is a
  standing precedent (also applied to the search task); do not attempt to force
  mutation coverage on it.

- **Soft Gherkin acceptance mutation survivors are usually genuine
  equivalents.** For read-only features, single-character case mutations of
  example values (addresses, text, txids) survive because each example value is
  used consistently on both the setup and assertion sides of its scenario.
  These are intrinsic equivalents, not implementation gaps; document them in the
  review summary and do not chase them.

- **DRY reports pre-existing pattern-boilerplate.** The layered conventions
  (follow/mute/poll controllers, route-registration `index.js`, memo-follow/
  memo-mute services) produce score-1.00 duplicates that prior reviews left
  as-is. A shared controller base would be a broad cross-module refactor beyond
  any single handoff. Only reduce duplication that is local to the task at hand.

- **`mutate4javascript` default differential run can under-select after a
  function-set change.** With a manifest present, the default run is
  differential (`effectiveSinceLastRun`) and selected only **1** changed site for
  `post-query.js` after a review added `listChildTxids` and removed
  `buildLikeCountMap`; `--scan` also reported `Changed mutation sites: 1`.
  Re-running the same file with `--mutate-all` ran all 37 sites (all killed).
  When a file adds or removes functions, run `--mutate-all` for that file (or
  confirm `Selected mutation sites` equals `Total mutation sites`) so new
  mutations are not silently skipped.

- **Capture the `gherkin-mutator` report with `--json` redirected to a file.**
  The text report (`write-text-report!`, which uses `print`) did not appear in
  the captured output before the tool's `System/exit`; the JSON report
  (`--json`) did. Redirect stdout to a file and use `--json` for a reliable,
  parseable record of killed/survived mutations.

## Workflow observations

- **Review summaries must be force-added.** `docs/` is in the root `.gitignore`,
  so `git add -A` silently skips `docs/reviews/<task>-summary.md`. The role
  requires the summary to be committed with the byline in the same commit as the
  review changes, so use `git add -f docs/reviews/<task>-summary.md` (or
  `git add -f docs/process-notes.md`) before committing. This has silently
  dropped 8 of 13 summaries in the past; verify with `git ls-files docs/reviews/`
  after committing.

- **`ready_for_next.sh` / `done_with_current.sh`** are the source of truth for
  queued work. `done_with_current.sh` prints `NO_TASK` when the queue is empty;
  stop waiting for work in that case.

- **Handoff `commit` field must be exactly 10 hex chars.** `swarm_handoff.sh`
  rejects shorter abbreviations; use `git rev-parse --short=10 HEAD`.

- **Run per-component verification for every component a task touches** before
  handing off (client, db, indexer), per the monorepo rules.