Rendered from docs/obligations/0150-a-current-decision-declares-no-required-edge-to-the-document-it-settled-so-22-of-23-reach-no-specification-at-all.md in the Headwater corpus. Every document on this half of the site is typed by the taxonomy the descriptor names: corpus.json.

A current decision declares no required edge to the document it settled, so 22 of 23 reach no specification at all

Context

A count against main at the current tip found 33 decision documents, of which 23 carry status: current. The taxonomy assigns decision the purpose rationale, and assigns specification and design_spec the purpose behavior. The base package requires every corpus to carry both purposes. The design depends on a settled decision handing its ruling to the specification layer. headwater explain and related then walk from one document to the other. Those verbs read only declared relations in front matter, not prose citations. A decision that names its consequence only in Markdown text stays invisible to the graph.

Obligation

Of the 23 current decisions, only HW-DR-0022 declares a traces_to edge reaching a specification. That edge runs one way, and spec 7 declares no reciprocal edge back to the decision. The other 22 declare no relation reaching an HW-SPEC-* or HW-REG-* target at all. HW-DR-0010, the decision that named this project, declares no relations key at all. This repository's own CLAUDE.md restates that decision's ruling at its top, and the graph still carries zero edges to or from it. Across the 33 decision documents, traces_to is used 21 times, nearly always pointing at the evaluation that supports the decision. governs is used 9 times, and it points directly at engine source files, skipping the specification layer. Neither direction answers what document now states the rule a decision settled. The taxonomy already has a mechanism for a forced two-way edge, reciprocal: required with a named inverse. It applies that mechanism to supersedes and discharges, but not to traces_to or governs. The corpus owes a ruling on whether a current decision must declare at least one edge to the document or code that carries its ruling. It also owes a ruling on whether that edge must be reciprocal.

Discharge

This closes on a ruling, recorded as a decision, on whether current decisions carry the obligation and whether the reach must be two-way. If the ruling requires the edge, discharge also needs the decision-record bundle or the base package to declare its shape. That shape could add reciprocal: required to traces_to, or declare a new relation scoped from decision to specification and design_spec. It needs HW-DR-0010 resolved, either with an edge added or with naming stated as the honest exception the case against argues for. It needs HW-DR-0022 and spec 7 to become a real two-way test case. That means a declared edge on the spec side, not only the Markdown citation that stands there today. Discharge is met when headwater check --strict reports zero current decisions with no outbound non-evidence edge, or names the obligation that tracks the remaining count.