Rendered from docs/obligations/0189-a-base-shelf-path-is-closed-to-every-later-entry-over-the-same-ground.md in the Headwater corpus. Every document on this half of the site is typed by the taxonomy the descriptor names: corpus.json.

A base shelf path is closed to every later entry over the same ground

Context

The base package holds shelves.specifications at docs/specifications/**. Shelf determinism refuses a second pattern over the same ground, because a document that two shelves claim has no shelf.

The standards-spec entry models the tradition whose layout is spec 2's own contract-sidecar sketch, specifications/<component>/functional.md. It could not use that path. It declares docs/component-specs/** instead, which is a name the tradition does not use. The third finding at line 156 of the doctrine holds the argument. It is the design-spec entry's second finding seen from the shelf side rather than the section side.

Obligation

An opinionated default in a minimal base costs every later entry over the same ground. The cost is a worse name for a shelf that an adopter reads. The owner owes a reading of what a base shelf may claim. Three answers are open and this record prefers none of them. The base may claim no path that a tradition would want, which makes specifications the wrong name for a base shelf. Shelf determinism may admit two patterns where a later entry overrides an earlier one. Or an entry may rebind the path of a base shelf, which is an operation that no overlay has today.

Discharge

This record discharges when spec 2 states which of the three holds, or when the base gives up the path. Until then each later entry over the specification territory pays the same cost. Each one renames its shelf for a reason that no adopter can see from the name.