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Process Business Rules

Purpose: Business rules for the Process product area


7 rules from 2 features. 7 rules have explicit invariants.


- Session files for completed phases become orphaned and show stale data


Orphaned session files are removed during generation

Section titled “Orphaned session files are removed during generation”

Invariant: Only session files for active phases are preserved; all other phase files must be deleted during cleanup and replaced with fresh content.

Rationale: Stale session files for completed or deferred phases mislead LLMs that read the sessions directory for context, causing incorrect planning decisions.

Verified by:

  • Orphaned session files are deleted during generation
  • Active phase session files are preserved and regenerated

Invariant: Cleanup must be idempotent, tolerate missing directories, and produce empty results when no phases are active.

Rationale: Generator runs are not guarded by precondition checks for directory existence. Cleanup must never crash regardless of filesystem state.

Verified by:

  • No active phases results in empty sessions directory
  • Cleanup is idempotent
  • Missing sessions directory is handled gracefully

Deleted files are tracked in cleanup results

Section titled “Deleted files are tracked in cleanup results”

Invariant: The cleanup result must include the relative paths of all deleted session files for transparency and debugging.

Rationale: Without deletion tracking, operators cannot audit what the generator removed, making it impossible to diagnose missing file issues after a run.

Verified by:

  • Deleted files are tracked in generator output

session-file-lifecycle.feature

- Context is lost when work pauses mid-phase (LLM sessions have no memory)


Handoff context generation captures session state

Section titled “Handoff context generation captures session state”

Invariant: Active phases with handoff context enabled must include session handoff sections with template and checklist links.

Rationale: Without structured handoff sections, LLM sessions lose context between runs and developers waste time re-discovering phase state.

Verified by:

  • SESSION-CONTEXT.md includes handoff section for active phases
  • Discovery tags appear in handoff context section
  • Paused phase shows status indicator

Handoff templates and checklists contain required sections

Section titled “Handoff templates and checklists contain required sections”

Invariant: Session handoff template and retrospective checklist must exist and contain all required sections for structured knowledge transfer.

Rationale: Missing template sections cause incomplete handoffs, leading to lost context and repeated work when a new session resumes.

Verified by:

  • Handoff template exists and contains required sections
  • Retrospective checklist exists and contains required sections

PROCESS_SETUP.md documents handoff and coordination protocols

Section titled “PROCESS_SETUP.md documents handoff and coordination protocols”

Invariant: PROCESS_SETUP.md must document both session handoff protocol and multi-developer coordination patterns.

Rationale: Without a single authoritative coordination reference, parallel developers follow ad-hoc processes that cause merge conflicts and duplicated effort.

Verified by:

  • PROCESS_SETUP.md documents handoff protocol
  • PROCESS_SETUP.md documents multi-developer coordination

Edge cases and acceptance criteria ensure robustness

Section titled “Edge cases and acceptance criteria ensure robustness”

Invariant: Handoff context must degrade gracefully when no discoveries exist and must be disableable. Mid-phase handoffs, multi-developer coordination, and retrospective capture must all preserve context.

Rationale: If handoff generation crashes on empty state or cannot be disabled, it blocks unrelated generation workflows and erodes trust in the automation.

Verified by:

  • Fresh phase shows no previous context message
  • Handoff context can be disabled
  • Mid-phase handoff preserves context
  • Multiple developers can coordinate
  • Session retrospective captures learnings

session-handoffs.feature


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