Merge branch 'codex/simp-hide-concrete-agent-loop' into codex/simp-hide-subagent-internals

docs/AGENTS.md

@@ -1,10 +1,10 @@
 # AGENTS.md — The documentation standard
 
-This file is the contract for every Markdown files in the repo: each tier's job, the writing rules, and the word budgets that `verify-doc-budgets` enforces. The audit/apply workflow is the [dsh-doc-standards](../.agents/skills/dsh-doc-standards/SKILL.md) skill; the decision record is [the doc-tiers-and-budgets RFC](rfc/implemented/process/2026-07-04-doc-tiers-and-budgets.md).
+This is the repo's Markdown placement, writing, and budget contract. Use [dsh-doc-standards](../.agents/skills/dsh-doc-standards/SKILL.md) to apply it; the [doc-tiers-and-budgets RFC](rfc/implemented/process/2026-07-04-doc-tiers-and-budgets.md) records the rationale.
 
 ## The tier taxonomy: one home per fact
 
-Every fact has exactly one home — the tier whose job it is — and every other place that needs it links there instead of restating it. A rule restated in two files drifts word-by-word until the copies disagree; a link cannot drift, and `verify-md-links` keeps it resolving.
+Each fact has one owning tier; other tiers link to it. Restated rules drift, while `verify-md-links` keeps links resolving.
 
 | Tier | Job | Does NOT belong there |
 |---|---|---|
@@ -15,12 +15,12 @@ Every fact has exactly one home — the tier whose job it is — and every other
 | [rfc/](rfc/README.md) | Decision records: the why and the what-was-given-up; `implemented/` RFCs describe shipped reality in present tense | Migration plans, test checklists, and spec-speak ("should…") once the decision has shipped |
 | [postmortem/](postmortem/README.md) | Incident stories — the only tier where war-story narrative belongs | — |
 | [cookbook/](cookbook/adding-a-package.md) | Step-by-step how-tos with numbered verify steps | Design rationale (→ the RFC each guide links) |
-| Package README | The per-package contract: config, semantics, limitations, extension points | JSDoc restatement, generated-catalog restatement (event/tool tables), other packages' concerns |
+| Package README | The per-package contract: config, semantics, limitations, extension points, and [Model Experience](cookbook/adding-a-package.md#4-write-the-package-readme) | JSDoc restatement, generated-catalog restatement (event/tool tables), other packages' concerns |
 | [development.md](development.md) | First-stop contributor onboarding: local setup, daily workflow, and CI shape at summary level; a bilingual pair under the [i18n contract](i18n/README.md) | Runtime/version rationale (→ RFCs), gate-by-gate enumerations that drift from `package.json` scripts |
 | Generated catalogs: [cordis events](cordis-catalog/events.md), [cordis services](cordis-catalog/services.md), [tool-catalog](tool-catalog.md), [config-catalog](config-catalog.md), [persistence-catalog](persistence-catalog.md), [module-graph.md](module-graph.md) | Exhaustive enumerations regenerated from source, freshness-gated | Hand edits of any kind |
 | Skills (`.agents/skills/`) | Workflows: how to carry out a recurring task against the contracts | The contracts themselves (→ docs) |
 
-Placement test: a story about a bug → postmortem. Why we chose X → RFC. How to do task Y → cookbook. What type Z looks like → core-data-structures. What package P promises → its README. A rule every agent must always obey → root AGENTS.md, one line, linking the home that holds the why.
+Placement: bugs → postmortems; rationale → RFCs; procedures → cookbooks; type shapes → core data; package promises → READMEs; standing orders → root `AGENTS.md` with a link to their rationale.
 
 ## Writing rules
 
@@ -28,7 +28,6 @@ Placement test: a story about a bug → postmortem. Why we chose X → RFC. How
 - **A decision worth re-litigating gets an RFC in the same PR.** The test: would a maintainer six months out ask "why was it done this way?" and find no answer in the code? If yes, write one ([when to write one](rfc/README.md)); mechanical or self-evident changes need none.
 - **One physical line per paragraph** (`verify-md-wrap`): the editor soft-wraps; hard breaks make a one-word edit re-diff the whole paragraph. Prose only — code blocks, tables, and list structure stay; code comments stay under the linter's column limit.
 - **Fenced `ts` blocks must compile** (`doc-typecheck`); a pasted type definition is fenced ` ```ts type-equiv ` and registered in the manifest so it cannot drift ([mechanics](development.md#documenting-types-verbatim-ts-type-equiv)).
-- **Every new event's JSDoc carries an `@mode` tag** (emit | waterfall | parallel | serial); the catalog generator hard-errors without it. Write the JSDoc to stand alone — it becomes the catalog entry ([catalog RFC](rfc/implemented/process/2026-06-20-generated-cordis-catalog.md)).
 - **The [core-data-structures catalog](core-data-structures/core.md) updates in the same change** that reshapes a documented type. `verify-type-equiv` catches drifted pastes, not never-documented new types ([what counts as core](core-data-structures/core.md#what-counts-as-core)).
 - **Bilingual pairs update together**: editing either side obligates the counterpart and a re-record in the same change ([i18n contract](i18n/README.md)).
 - Your audience is professional programmers. Prefer concise and straight-forward English over metaphor. Do not overuse words like "gate", "vocabulary", "surface", "seams".

docs/config-catalog.md

@@ -303,7 +303,7 @@ export interface Config {
 }
 ```
 
-Source: [`packages/hooks/hooks-claude/src/index.ts:56`](../packages/hooks/hooks-claude/src/index.ts)
+Source: [`packages/hooks/hooks-claude/src/index.ts:55`](../packages/hooks/hooks-claude/src/index.ts)
 
 ## `@deepseek-ai/dsh-hooks-codex`
 
@@ -328,7 +328,7 @@ export interface Config {
 }
 ```
 
-Source: [`packages/hooks/hooks-codex/src/index.ts:47`](../packages/hooks/hooks-codex/src/index.ts)
+Source: [`packages/hooks/hooks-codex/src/index.ts:46`](../packages/hooks/hooks-codex/src/index.ts)
 
 ## `@deepseek-ai/dsh-jsonrpc`
 

docs/cookbook/adding-a-package.md

@@ -13,7 +13,10 @@ packages/<group>/<pkg>/
                    # you use Config, + ../../<group>/<dep> for each dsh dep)
   src/index.ts     # service default export or plugin (name/inject/apply/Config)
   tests/<x>.spec.ts
-  README.md        # service API, events, extension points, design notes
+  README.md        # service API, events, extension points, design notes,
+                   # + gated Model Experience context blocks or short sentence
+                   # + the gated "Known Limitations and Deferred Work" section
+                   # (or a whitelist entry in scripts/verify-package-readme-limitations.ts)
 ```
 
 Choose an existing group when one matches the package's role (`core`, `llm`, `bash`, `compact`, `subagent`, `todo`, `session-persistence`, `ui`, `util`, or `support`). A new group is allowed, but it is a pure container: no `package.json`, no source files, and packages still sit exactly one level below it.
@@ -37,10 +40,39 @@ Covered automatically by globs or package-manifest discovery — no edits needed
 
 For a swappable capability, split interface / implementation / consumer into separate packages (see docs/architecture.md § "Capability seams" — the bash trio is the template). A single-purpose plugin stays one package.
 
-## 4. Verify
+## 4. Write the package README
+
+Keep package-specific service API, config, events, extension points, and design notes first. Document only behavior, limitations, and deferred work owned by this package: a feature already implemented elsewhere is not this package's limitation. An indirect Model Experience sentence may name the consumer that surfaces this package's contribution, but it does not restate that consumer's implementation. End a package README with this canonical sequence:
+
+````markdown
+## Model Experience
+
+### Request surface and condition
+
+**What the model sees**: An exact data-dependent shape, an anchored generated-catalog link, or an introduction to the verbatim literal below.
+
+**Token effect**: Fixed, conditional, retained, replaced, capped, or zero-direct token effect.
+
+#### Verbatim text for this context surface, when needed
+
+```markdown
+Stable system-prompt prose of any length, or another long non-generated literal, copied exactly from source.
+```
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **Consumer-visible gap** — exact boundary or deliberately deferred work.
+````
+
+Fill Model Experience from the implementation. Direct, multi-surface, conditional, capped, or lifetime effects use one H3 block per context surface; each block has the exact bold-led `What the model sees` and `Token effect` fields shown above. A structured section grounds at least one surface in concrete model-visible text through inline code, a nested `markdown` block, or an anchored tool-catalog link. Put every stable system-prompt paragraph, including a one-liner, in a titled H4 plus `markdown` fence immediately after those fields inside the owning H3 whose title contains `system prompt`; never leave prompt prose in inline code. Quote other short stable model-visible source literals inline, using named placeholders such as `<mode>` only for interpolated values, and attach other long non-generated literals to their owning H3 in the same H4-plus-fence form. Describe an attached literal as the text "below" instead of linking between Model Experience subsections; the physical nesting already records ownership. A tool-schema surface uses `schema` in its H3 and links the relevant anchored package section in the generated [tool schema catalog](../tool-catalog.md) instead of copying its default descriptions or JSON Schema; describe only configuration or composition deltas the catalog does not contain. A runtime-only definition outside the catalog's stated scope links that scope and explains the exception before reproducing its stable text. Summarize data-dependent payloads or provider-owned text by identifying their exact shape and renderer. Do not infer prompt visibility from tool-schema visibility because independently registered guidance can remain after a scoped tool restriction.
+
+An audited package with no context effect or one simple consumer-owned path belongs in [`SENTENCE_MODEL_EXPERIENCE`](../../scripts/verify-package-readme-model-experience.ts) and uses one line beginning `None, as ` or `Indirectly, through `. A generic package whose public contract is model-agnostic may instead join the narrow `NO_MODEL_EXPERIENCE_SECTION` allowlist and omit the heading entirely; the allowlist retains the audit reason so absence cannot mean forgotten documentation. Pure transport and keyless test-support packages otherwise use `None, as ` when they create no model-bound content even if consumers use them during composition. A provider backend whose single context path is formatted and inserted entirely by a named consumer uses `Indirectly, through ` even when it caps or filters data before returning it; so does a wiring bundle whose model effects all belong to named children. Do not give these packages a structured block describing another package's work. Packages that own model input, output shaping, multiple context paths, or an auxiliary request keep context-surface blocks; the verifier gates their H3 headings, field labels, spacing, concrete literal evidence, nested H4-plus-`markdown` blocks, absence of local subsection links, system-prompt literals, and schema-surface-to-catalog links. A package with genuinely no limitations joins the separate allowlist in [`verify-package-readme-limitations.ts`](../../scripts/verify-package-readme-limitations.ts); the two omission allowlists are independent. The [Model Experience RFC](../rfc/implemented/process/2026-07-12-package-model-experience-contract.md) records the rationale.
+
+## 5. Verify
 
 ```sh
 pnpm install        # registers the workspace
+pnpm run doc-sync
 pnpm run constraints && pnpm run typecheck && pnpm run lint
 pnpm run test:coverage  # 100% per-file over src (types.ts exempt)
 pnpm run build && pnpm run hygiene

docs/core-data-structures/bash.md

@@ -154,7 +154,7 @@ interface CollectedOutput {
 
 ## File sandbox: `BashSandboxInfo`
 
-A sandbox-consuming executor (`dsh-bash-sandbox`) exposes its configured fallback through `BashExecutor.sandboxMode`. The tool layer folds each agent session's durable `bash/sandbox-mode` override, stamps the effective mode onto the request, states it in the per-agent prompt, and may replace it for one user-approved strictly wider call. The mode/enforcement vocabulary is owned and cataloged by the [`@deepseek-ai/dsh-sandbox` seam](sandbox.md), whose provider wraps the executor's argv; modes govern FILE effects only, not network or process visibility.
+A sandbox-consuming executor (`dsh-bash-sandbox`) exposes its configured fallback through `BashExecutor.sandboxMode`. The tool layer folds each agent session's durable `bash/sandbox-mode` override, stamps the effective mode onto the request, and may replace it for one user-approved strictly wider call. It deliberately neither states the standing mode nor narrates switches; a denial result names the mode that command actually ran under. The mode/enforcement vocabulary is owned and cataloged by the [`@deepseek-ai/dsh-sandbox` seam](sandbox.md), whose provider wraps the executor's argv; modes govern FILE effects only, not network or process visibility.
 
 A sandboxed run always reports the facts it executed under on `BashRunResult.sandbox`: `denied` is the executor's conservative classification of a failure as sandbox-caused (a failed exit whose stderr carries a filesystem-permission signature — never a clean exit or a signal kill), read from the collected stderr tail; `enforcement` reports how completely the selected backend governs the mode's file effects (`SandboxEnforcement = 'full' | 'partial'` — `partial` when an older Landlock ABI governs only a subset of the requested accesses; absent under `danger-full-access`, where nothing is confined); `runnerFailed` marks the opposite of a denial — the sandbox RUNNER itself failed and the command never ran (stamped only on settled background tasks; a foreground run surfaces the same condition as the thrown `SANDBOX_UNAVAILABLE` error):
 
@@ -193,7 +193,7 @@ interface BashSandboxInfo {
 }
 ```
 
-One more piece completes the vocabulary: the `SANDBOX_UNAVAILABLE` error code (owned by the [sandbox seam](sandbox.md)) is what the `ctx.sandbox` provider throws — and the executor propagates — when a confined mode has no usable backend. A selected runner refusing its profile reaches the same fail-closed foreground error; a settled background task records `runnerFailed`. The model sees the current effective mode in the prompt, receives denial/runner facts in results, and can request a one-shot strictly wider retry through `sandbox_permissions` plus `justification`; `ctx.approval` must grant that exact call before anything executes. The complete policy and switching design is the [sandbox RFC](../rfc/implemented/feature/2026-07-06-sandbox.md).
+One more piece completes the vocabulary: the `SANDBOX_UNAVAILABLE` error code (owned by the [sandbox seam](sandbox.md)) is what the `ctx.sandbox` provider throws — and the executor propagates — when a confined mode has no usable backend. A selected runner refusing its profile reaches the same fail-closed foreground error; a settled background task records `runnerFailed`. The model receives denial/runner facts in results, learns the effective mode only when a denial marker names it, and can request a one-shot strictly wider retry through `sandbox_permissions` plus `justification`; `ctx.approval` must grant that exact call before anything executes. The complete policy and switching design is the [sandbox RFC](../rfc/implemented/feature/2026-07-06-sandbox.md).
 
 ## Background tasks: `BashTask`
 

docs/persistence-catalog.md

@@ -75,7 +75,7 @@ Source: [`packages/core/session/src/types.ts:294`](../packages/core/session/src/
 
 #### `bash/sandbox-mode` — log-only
 
-The session's sandbox mode was switched — log-only (like `approval/*`; NOT a surface event, carries no `surfaceOp`): durable and replayable, never in the model transcript. The LAST such event is the session's override (effectiveSandboxMode); who asked for it is derivable from position (an event after the log's last `request/header` was a runtime switch by the user; see the tool layer's narrator).
+The session's sandbox mode was switched — log-only (like `approval/*`; NOT a surface event, carries no `surfaceOp`): durable and replayable, never in the model transcript. The LAST such event is the session's override (effectiveSandboxMode); execution and ACP config-option reporting fold it without adding prompt text or a context notice.
 
 ```ts persistence-catalog
 'bash/sandbox-mode': { mode: SandboxMode }

docs/rfc/INDEX.md

@@ -171,6 +171,8 @@ Generated by `pnpm run gen-rfc-index` from the RFC tree — never edit by hand;
 | [Raise the Node LTS engine floor to 22.19](implemented/process/2026-07-06-node-engine-floor.md) | 2026-07-06 |
 | [Parallel GitHub CI gates](implemented/process/2026-07-06-parallel-github-ci-gates.md) | 2026-07-06 |
 | [Parallel pre-push gates](implemented/process/2026-07-06-parallel-pre-push-gates.md) | 2026-07-06 |
+| [A gated Known-Limitations section in every package README](implemented/process/2026-07-10-readme-known-limitations-gate.md) | 2026-07-10 |
+| [Package Model Experience contract](implemented/process/2026-07-12-package-model-experience-contract.md) | 2026-07-12 |
 
 ### Testing
 

docs/rfc/implemented/feature/2026-06-30-hook-bridges.md

@@ -6,14 +6,14 @@ Status: implemented
 
 The harness's extension surface is its typed interception seams ([the interception-seams RFC](2026-06-30-interception-seams.md)): a "native hook" is just an ordinary cordis plugin subscribing to `agent/session-start`, `agent/prompt-submit`, `tools/pre-execute`, `tools/post-execute`, `agent/turn-continuation`, `subagent/start`, `subagent/end`. But users arrive with **existing** Claude Code (CC) and Codex hook configs — a `hooks.json` (or a settings file's `hooks` key) full of shell-command hooks — and want those to run unmodified. This RFC introduces the two **bridge plugins** that translate that external shell-hook protocol onto the typed seams, built on the shared wire-protocol library ([the hook-protocol-lib RFC](2026-06-30-hook-protocol-lib.md)).
 
-The framing that shapes the whole design: **a bridge is a faithfulness adapter, not a power tool.** Anything a bridge does (block a tool, inject context, force continuation, observe a subagent) a native cordis plugin does more powerfully — typed returns, full `ctx`, no serialization boundary. The bridge's only reason to exist is to run an UNMODIFIED external CC/Codex hook with byte-faithful semantics. That keeps each bridge thin: parse the config, pick a matcher mode, build the per-event payload, call `runHook` + `mergeHookOutputs` from the shared lib, map the neutral outcome onto a seam Decision.
+The framing that shapes the whole design: **a bridge is a compatibility adapter, not a power tool.** Anything a bridge does (block a tool, inject context, force continuation, observe a subagent) a native cordis plugin does more powerfully — typed returns, full `ctx`, no serialization boundary. The bridge's reason to exist is to run the explicitly supported subset of external CC/Codex command hooks. That keeps each bridge thin: parse the config, pick a matcher mode, build the per-event payload, call `runHook` + `mergeHookOutputs` from the shared lib, and map the neutral outcome onto a seam Decision. The package READMEs own the exact current unsupported-event and partial-field inventory against the official protocols.
 
 ## Decision
 
 Two independent plugins in the `packages/hooks/` group, each a function/namespace plugin (`name`/`inject`/`Config`/`apply`, NO default export — see [postmortem 0001](../../../postmortem/0001-acp-default-export-drops-inject.md)) injecting only `bash`:
 
-- **`dsh-hooks-claude`** — the CC dialect. Seven hook points: `SessionStart`, `UserPromptSubmit`, `PreToolUse`, `PostToolUse`, `Stop`, `SubagentStart`, `SubagentStop`. Owns CC's per-event stdin payloads (a base of `session_id`/`cwd`/`hook_event_name` plus per-event fields), CC's env + `${CLAUDE_PLUGIN_ROOT}`/`${CLAUDE_PROJECT_DIR}` substitution, and the literal-or-regex matcher mode. A CC hook's stdin carries a **trailing newline**.
-- **`dsh-hooks-codex`** — the Codex dialect: a deliberate SUBSET. Five hook points (`PreToolUse`, `PostToolUse`, `SessionStart`, `UserPromptSubmit`, `Stop` — no subagent/notification/compaction), an always-regex matcher, snake_case payloads with `turn_id`/`model`/`permission_mode` extras written WITHOUT a trailing newline, no env and no `${…}` substitution, and a block-only decision model (a Codex hook can never pre-approve, so `allow`/`ask` are not honored). A tool call's payload carries the real `tool_name` (the value the matcher tests, so a config's tool matcher fires) in Codex's `tool_input: { command }` shape.
+- **`dsh-hooks-claude`** — the CC dialect. Seven of Claude Code's current hook points: `SessionStart`, `UserPromptSubmit`, `PreToolUse`, `PostToolUse`, `Stop`, `SubagentStart`, and `SubagentStop`. Owns CC-shaped per-event stdin payloads (a base of `session_id`/`cwd`/`hook_event_name` plus per-event fields), `CLAUDE_PROJECT_DIR` plus `${CLAUDE_PLUGIN_ROOT}`/`${CLAUDE_PROJECT_DIR}` substitution, and the literal-or-regex matcher mode. A CC hook's stdin carries a **trailing newline**.
+- **`dsh-hooks-codex`** — five of Codex's current hook points: `PreToolUse`, `PostToolUse`, `SessionStart`, `UserPromptSubmit`, and `Stop`. It uses an always-regex matcher, Codex-shaped snake_case payloads with `turn_id`/`model`/`permission_mode` extras written WITHOUT a trailing newline, no Codex plugin-env injection or config-time placeholder substitution, and no pre-tool approval or rewrite path. A tool call's payload carries the real `tool_name` in the bridge's reduced `tool_input: { command }` shape.
 
 ### Outcome → Decision mapping
 
@@ -26,8 +26,8 @@ Each bridge maps the neutral `MergedHookOutcome` from the shared lib onto the se
 | `tools/pre-execute` | `deny`→`deny`; `ask`→`ask` | `block`→`deny` (no allow/ask) |
 | `tools/post-execute` | `deny`→`block`+feedback; context-only→delegate+fold | same |
 | `agent/turn-continuation` | blocking Stop → `continue` (reason = next-step steering) | same |
-| `subagent/start` (emit) | additionalContext → inject into a live in-process child; a remote child has no local injection target | — (not a Codex event) |
-| `subagent/end` (emit) | observe-only | — |
+| `subagent/start` (emit) | additionalContext → inject into a live in-process child; a remote child has no local injection target | unsupported by this bridge |
+| `subagent/end` (emit) | observe-only | unsupported by this bridge |
 
 The CC bridge's `ask` result is a real permission path, not a terminal bridge decision: `dsh-tools` resolves it through the optional [approval seam](2026-07-06-approval-seam.md). A composed ACP answerer prompts the owning editor session and `allowed-once` proceeds; without an ApprovalService or answerer, the call fails closed to `deny`.
 
@@ -45,16 +45,16 @@ Claude Code always exports `CLAUDE_PROJECT_DIR`, and common unmodified hooks ref
 
 ### Containment
 
-The config is parsed ONCE at load; a read/parse failure logs and registers nothing rather than crashing boot (a typo'd path must not take the agent down). Only `type: 'command'` hooks run — a `prompt`/`agent`/HTTP hook (CC) or an `async: true` / non-command hook (Codex) is parsed-and-skipped with a warning. The emit-listener paths (`session-start`, `subagent/start`) run detached, with their `inject` contained in a `.catch` that logs (a throwing inject must not break session boot or the loop).
+The config is parsed ONCE at load; a read/parse failure logs and registers nothing rather than crashing boot (a typo'd path must not take the agent down). Only shell-form `type: 'command'` hooks run for CC; `http`, `mcp_tool`, `prompt`, and `agent` handlers are parsed-and-skipped. Codex runs only synchronous command handlers and skips `async: true` or non-command entries. The emit-listener paths (`session-start`, `subagent/start`) run detached, with their `inject` contained in a `.catch` that logs (a throwing inject must not break session boot or the loop).
 
 ### Where hooks run, and where their config comes from
 
 Two different cwds, kept distinct on purpose. The hooks **themselves** run in the agent's **session workspace**: for the agent-scoped points the bridge threads the session's `cwd` (`session/new.cwd`, on the session header) to `runHook` as the process working directory, so a hook's `pwd` / relative-file read / marker write operates in the user's project tree, not the server's launch directory. The **config path**, by contrast, is **process-level**: `configPath` is resolved and parsed once at load against the process launch cwd, so a single `hooks.json` applies to the whole process — there is no per-session config discovery that reads a project-local `hooks.json` from each `session/new.cwd` (`TODO(per-session-hook-config)`). This is an honest limitation of the current cut: the example `cordis.yml` documents that its `./hooks.json` is process-level, not per-project.
 
-## Deferred (faithful-but-degraded)
+## Deferred compatibility gaps
 
 - **Tool-input rewrite.** A CC/Codex `updatedInput` is logged + warned, not honored — input rewrite is a deferred consistency-design problem ([the pre-tool-input-rewrite RFC](../../proposed/feature/2026-06-30-pre-tool-input-rewrite.md)), because the pre-execution args are read by `tool/call` audit + `assistant/message` history + ACP/tool-bash presentation, so an honest rewrite is a design unit, not a field.
-- **Stop loop-guard** (`TODO(stop-loop-guard)`). CC/Codex break an infinite force-continue with `stop_hook_active` (true once a Stop hook fired this run) plus a max-consecutive cap; both are deferred. `stop_hook_active` is always `false`, so a Stop hook that unconditionally blocks would force-continue every step — a hook author must self-limit until the guard lands.
+- **Stop loop-guard** (`TODO(stop-loop-guard)`). Claude Code supplies `stop_hook_active` and overrides a hook after eight consecutive blocks; Codex supplies `stop_hook_active` but documents no equivalent cap. Both bridges always report `false`, so a Stop hook that unconditionally blocks force-continues every step — a hook author must self-limit until state tracking lands.
 - **Hook `continue:false` (hard halt).** A hook can ask to halt the whole run (CC/Codex `continue:false`); the shared merge folds it into `MergedHookOutcome.stop`/`stopReason`, but no bridge acts on it (`TODO(hook-continue-false)`) — the interception seams have no "hard-halt the agent" primitive yet (a Decision blocks/steers a single point, not the run). Deferred with the loop-guard work; the halt request is recorded in the `hook/result` log, and the hook keeps its per-point effect (decision/context) meanwhile.
 - **Config discovery.** The path is explicit in `cordis.yml` and process-level (see above); the full multi-layer CC/Codex precedence walk, per-session project-local discovery, and the trust/hash model are not reimplemented (`TODO(per-session-hook-config)`).
 - **Session-start / subagent-start context is best-effort, not gated (`TODO(session-start-gating)`).** `agent/session-start` is a synchronous emit and the bridge runs its hook on a detached `.then`, so the injected `additionalContext` is not guaranteed to land before the first turn reaches the model — a slow hook can miss the first request (the context then arrives as a later injection). `subagent/start` is emitted only after child publication, so the bridge can capture the live in-process child synchronously, but the result driver may queue the prompt as that same readiness boundary resolves and a short-lived child can finish before the detached hook injects. Making startup context a gated/awaited primitive is a loop-level change deferred to the interception seams; the contract is "injected as soon as the hook resolves", not "before the first request". The bridge tests do NOT wait on the injection where they assert the guaranteed-timing behavior, so they document the real (best-effort) timing rather than masking it.

docs/rfc/implemented/feature/2026-07-12-subagent-persona-tool-filter-and-depth.md

@@ -32,7 +32,7 @@ This uses the normal system-prompt registration mechanism rather than a second p
 
 ### Tool filtering is one live global-view rule
 
-The tool filter controls visibility and executable lookup together. An in-process provider installs `ToolRegistry.restrict()` in the child's scope before publication, and the registry's single resolver applies the same result to prompt schemas, lookup, execution, and Code Mode SDK generation.
+The tool filter controls capability visibility and executable lookup together. An in-process provider installs `ToolRegistry.restrict()` in the child's scope before publication, and the registry's single resolver applies the same result to wire tool schemas, lookup, execution, and Code Mode SDK generation. Independently registered system-prompt sections are outside `ToolRegistry`, so filtering a tool does not remove that plugin's standalone guidance.
 
 Resolution follows these rules:
 

docs/rfc/implemented/process/2026-07-10-readme-known-limitations-gate.md

@@ -0,0 +1,28 @@
+# RFC: A gated Known-Limitations section in every package README
+
+Status: implemented
+
+## Problem
+
+The [documentation standard](../../../AGENTS.md) assigns limitations to the package-README tier ("the per-package contract: config, semantics, limitations, extension points"). Without a required shared shape, variant headings and omissions make "this package has no known limitations" indistinguishable from "nobody wrote them down", and no single grep can enumerate the repo's known gaps.
+
+## Decision
+
+Every package manifest under `packages/<group>/<pkg>/package.json` has a sibling README carrying a canonical `## Known Limitations and Deferred Work` section: a condensed bullet list of consumer-visible gaps (unimplemented features, platform caveats, deliberate MVP cuts) and consciously postponed work (TODO markers, RFC deferrals still open). A `doc-sync` gate, `verify-package-readme-limitations` ([scripts/verify-package-readme-limitations.ts](../../../../scripts/verify-package-readme-limitations.ts)), derives the package set from those manifests, rejects a missing README, and enforces the shape per README: exactly one limitations-like heading, byte-equal to the canonical h2, with at least one top-level bullet. Near-miss headings at any level ("Limitations", "Deferred", "What is NOT here", "Non-goals", …) fail the gate, so variant sections cannot creep back beside — or instead of — the canonical one.
+
+A package with genuinely nothing to declare is whitelisted (`NO_LIMITATIONS` in the script) and must NOT carry the section. The inverted check keeps the whitelist honest in both directions: an empty or boilerplate section cannot satisfy the gate, and giving a whitelisted package real limitations forces the whitelist edit in the same change. Whitelist entries are validated against the scanned package set, so a package rename or removal fails loud instead of silently un-gating a README.
+
+The gate checks presence, shape, and the whitelist; the bullets' truthfulness and specificity are governed by review under the documentation standard, like the rest of the README tier. The standing rule lives in [packages/AGENTS.md](../../../../packages/AGENTS.md).
+
+## Alternatives considered
+
+- **Free-form headings, gate only that "something limitations-like" exists** — preserves variant headings, stays un-greppable, and needs the same near-miss heuristics anyway without buying uniformity.
+- **Require the section in ALL READMEs, allowing an empty body or "None."** — boilerplate "None" rots silently as a package gains real limitations; the whitelist inversion turns "nothing declared" into an explicit, lintable claim that review can challenge.
+- **A word-count ceiling on the section** — limitation lists are legitimately variable in length; package READMEs are deliberately unbudgeted (per the [budget policy](../../../AGENTS.md)) and review governs their prose.
+
+## Consequences
+
+- A new package cannot ship without either declaring its gaps or explicitly claiming it has none; a missing, drifted, or empty section fails `doc-sync` locally (pre-push) and in CI (`package-readme-limitations` in the run-gates doc-sync leaf set).
+- Every package README answers the limitations question through the canonical heading or an explicit no-limitations allowlist entry.
+- One more fast tsx script in the `doc-sync` chain; no new dependency (plain `node:fs` glob + line scan).
+- The canonical heading is enforced verbatim, so renaming it later is a mechanical one-script-plus-all-READMEs change guarded by the same gate.

package.json

@@ -39,12 +39,14 @@
     "verify-md-links": "tsx scripts/verify-md-links.ts",
     "verify-doc-refs": "tsx scripts/verify-doc-refs.ts",
     "verify-package-paths": "tsx scripts/verify-package-paths.ts",
+    "verify-package-readme-model-experience": "tsx scripts/verify-package-readme-model-experience.ts",
     "verify-mermaid": "tsx scripts/verify-mermaid.ts",
     "verify-rfc-classification": "tsx scripts/verify-rfc-classification.ts",
     "verify-rfc-format": "tsx scripts/verify-rfc-format.ts",
     "verify-type-equiv": "tsx scripts/verify-type-equiv.ts",
     "verify-translation-pairing": "tsx scripts/verify-translation-pairing.ts",
     "verify-doc-budgets": "tsx scripts/verify-doc-budgets.ts",
+    "verify-package-readme-limitations": "tsx scripts/verify-package-readme-limitations.ts",
     "verify-node-next-types": "tsx scripts/verify-node-next-types.ts",
     "verify-runtime-closure": "tsx scripts/verify-runtime-closure.ts",
     "gen-cordis-catalog": "tsx scripts/gen-cordis-catalog.ts",
@@ -65,7 +67,7 @@
     "verify-scoped-dispatch": "tsx scripts/verify-scoped-dispatch.ts",
     "verify-module-graph": "tsx scripts/gen-module-graph.ts --check",
     "constraints": "tsx scripts/check-workspace-constraints.ts",
-    "doc-sync": "pnpm run doc-typecheck && pnpm run verify-cordis-catalog && pnpm run verify-cordis-api && pnpm run verify-export-jsdoc && pnpm run verify-tool-catalog && pnpm run verify-config-catalog && pnpm run verify-persistence-catalog && pnpm run verify-doc-graphs && pnpm run verify-scoped-dispatch && pnpm run verify-md-wrap && pnpm run verify-md-links && pnpm run verify-doc-refs && pnpm run verify-package-paths && pnpm run verify-mermaid && pnpm run verify-rfc-classification && pnpm run verify-rfc-format && pnpm run verify-type-equiv && pnpm run verify-translation-pairing && pnpm run verify-doc-budgets",
+    "doc-sync": "pnpm run doc-typecheck && pnpm run verify-cordis-catalog && pnpm run verify-cordis-api && pnpm run verify-export-jsdoc && pnpm run verify-tool-catalog && pnpm run verify-config-catalog && pnpm run verify-persistence-catalog && pnpm run verify-doc-graphs && pnpm run verify-scoped-dispatch && pnpm run verify-md-wrap && pnpm run verify-md-links && pnpm run verify-doc-refs && pnpm run verify-package-paths && pnpm run verify-package-readme-model-experience && pnpm run verify-mermaid && pnpm run verify-rfc-classification && pnpm run verify-rfc-format && pnpm run verify-type-equiv && pnpm run verify-translation-pairing && pnpm run verify-doc-budgets && pnpm run verify-package-readme-limitations",
     "hygiene": "pnpm run knip && pnpm run publint && pnpm run constraints && pnpm run verify-node-next-types && pnpm run verify-runtime-closure",
     "demo:echo": "node --expose-internals --import tsx packages/ui/stdio-agent/src/bin.ts examples/echo-agent/cordis.yml",
     "demo:repl": "node --expose-internals --import tsx packages/ui/stdio-agent/src/bin.ts examples/coding-agent/cordis.yml",

packages/AGENTS.md

@@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
 # AGENTS.md — Harness Packages
 
-This directory contains all `@deepseek-ai/dsh-*` harness packages. Repo-wide conventions (effects, declaration merging, waterfall semantics, ESM, testing policy) are in the root [AGENTS.md](../AGENTS.md) § Conventions; the points below are packages-specific.
+These package-specific rules supplement the repo-wide [conventions](../AGENTS.md#conventions).
 
 - **Plugin export shape — namespace OR default, never both.** A *service* package exports the service class as `export default` (the Loader instantiates it). A *function/namespace* plugin exports `name` / `inject` / `Config` / `apply` as separate named exports and **must NOT add `export default`** — the cordis Loader's `unwrapExports` does `exports.default ?? exports`, so a stray default export collapses the module to the bare `apply` function and silently discards the `inject`/`name`/`Config` namespace, leaving the plugin with no injected services (it then throws `cannot get property … without inject` at load). See [docs/postmortem/0001](../docs/postmortem/0001-acp-default-export-drops-inject.md).
 - **Read an optional (non-injected) service via `ctx.get(name)`, not `ctx.<name>`.** For a service a plugin reads opportunistically but deliberately leaves out of `static inject` (e.g. `AgentLoop` reading `sessionPersistence`), the `ctx.<name>` property proxy resolves by an ancestor-only fiber walk that throws when the call arrives through a foreign traceable shadow (the service lives on a sibling fiber). `ctx.get(name)` is the topology-independent global-store lookup, strict by default (an inactive/absent backend reads as `undefined` — prefer it over the `ctx.get(name, false)` overload, which also skips the active-state check). Services that ARE in `static inject` resolve fine via `ctx.<name>`. See [docs/postmortem/0001](../docs/postmortem/0001-acp-default-export-drops-inject.md).
@@ -14,5 +14,5 @@ Naming notes:
 - `src/types.ts` contains only types — no runtime code.
 - Tests live at package level under `tests/`, not `src/__tests__/`.
 - A package's README and JSDoc are part of the change: altered behavior (config keys, defaults, error codes, wire fields) updates them in the same commit. `doc-sync` gates what it can; prose accuracy stays on the author ([the documentation standard](../docs/AGENTS.md)).
-
-Read the per-package README.md for package-specific details: service API, events, extension points, TODOs.
+- Package READMEs document model/token effects using the [canonical Model Experience format](../docs/cookbook/adding-a-package.md#4-write-the-package-readme).
+- Package READMEs carry `## Known Limitations and Deferred Work` or a justified [allowlist entry](../scripts/verify-package-readme-limitations.ts) ([rationale](../docs/rfc/implemented/process/2026-07-10-readme-known-limitations-gate.md)).

packages/README.md

@@ -38,4 +38,4 @@ The inter-package dependency graph is generated: [docs/module-graph.md](../docs/
 
 The rule it must obey: **extension plugins depend on interfaces, never on the concrete loop.** `dsh-agent-loop` is swappable — UI/hook/tool plugins keep working against the `dsh-agent` vocabulary if the loop is replaced. The sanctioned exception is a **composition/bundle** package like `dsh-agent-core`, whose whole job is to assemble the concrete spine: it depends on `dsh-agent-loop` (and the other concrete spine plugins) on purpose. The rule constrains plugins that EXTEND the system, not the bundle that COMPOSES it. A swappable capability splits into interface / implementation / consumer packages (the bash trio is the template — see [capability seams](../docs/rfc/implemented/architecture/2026-06-13-capability-seams.md)).
 
-Each package has its own `README.md` with purpose, service API, events, extension points, and deliberate non-goals (TODOs).
+Package READMEs cover purpose, APIs, extension points, and [Model Experience](../docs/cookbook/adding-a-package.md#4-write-the-package-readme) unless on the model-agnostic [omission allowlist](../scripts/verify-package-readme-model-experience.ts). They also carry `## Known Limitations and Deferred Work` or use its [allowlist](../scripts/verify-package-readme-limitations.ts).

packages/bash/bash-local/README.md

@@ -25,6 +25,18 @@ Design surveyed against the bash tools of Claude Code, OpenCode, Codex, and pi;
 - **Model-friendly env + credential scrub** — `process.env` minus credential-shaped vars (`*KEY*`/`*SECRET*`/`*TOKEN*`), then `NO_COLOR=1 TERM=dumb PAGER=cat GIT_PAGER=cat` (Codex's hardcoded set) so pagers and ANSI color don't garble results. This scrub is the security control that keeps the harness's *ambient* credentials out of a spawned command. A spec's `env` is merged LAST (after the scrub), so a caller's explicit entry — a value it already holds — wins even on a credential-shaped name. The spec's `stdin`, when supplied, is written to the child and closed; with none supplied, fd 0 is `/dev/null` — the exact pre-seam default, so a command that probes stdin's file type is unaffected. Both `env`/`stdin` are set by in-process plugins (the hooks bridges); the model-facing tool doesn't expose them. See [the bash-stdin-env RFC](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/architecture/2026-06-30-bash-stdin-env-trusted-plugin-surface.md).
 - **Background tasks** — `start()` returns immediately, no timeout applies (Claude Code detaches timeouts when backgrounding), `readOutput()` is incremental with whole-stream byte offsets, and disposal kills everything. The spec's opaque `owner` token is stored on the tracked task and returned by `ownerOf(id)` — the executor never interprets it (the consumer's access policy does), and because it lives with the task here it survives a `tool-bash` HMR reload.
 
-## Sandboxing
+## Model Experience
 
-Execution policy does NOT belong in this package: this executor always runs commands unconfined. Confinement is [`dsh-bash-sandbox`](../bash-sandbox/README.md), which extends this executor verbatim and confines commands under the `ctx.sandbox` seam's bwrap/Landlock/Seatbelt backends ([sandbox RFC](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/feature/2026-07-06-sandbox.md)); per-call allow/deny/ask policy belongs on the `tools/pre-execute` gate.
+Indirectly, through `dsh-tool-bash`, which renders this executor's bounded stdout/stderr tails, background-task deltas and state, spill-file path, exact `Error: unknown bash task "<taskId>"` and `Error: aborted before spawn: <reason>` failures, and retains each resulting tool message until compaction.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **Unconfined by itself** — this executor always runs commands with the harness process's authority; deployments needing confinement compose [`dsh-bash-sandbox`](../bash-sandbox/README.md), while per-call allow/deny/ask policy belongs on `tools/pre-execute`.
+- **No persistent shell or PTY** — every call starts a fresh non-login `bash -c`; cwd-only persistence and interactive terminal sessions remain deferred until a real workflow requires them.
+- **POSIX-only** — the `bash` binary, detached process groups, group kills, and SIGTERM→SIGKILL escalation are hardcoded; Windows is unsupported.
+- **The credential scrub is a name heuristic** — `*KEY*`/`*SECRET*`/`*TOKEN*` only; differently-named secrets (e.g. `*PASSWORD*`) pass through, and a whitelist for over-scrubbed vars is noted future work.
+- **Spill files are never deleted** — full-output recovery files (and the private per-process spill dir) accumulate under the OS tmpdir until something external cleans them.
+- **Finished background tasks are never evicted** — they stay in the task map, retaining their in-memory output tails, until executor disposal.
+- **`OutputCollector.snapshot()` / `totalBytes` are test-shaped residuals** — the live poll path uses `readFrom()` and a marked cleanup can inline the final snapshot and remove the unused public getter.
+
+The raw process handling lives in `src/run.ts`; `src/index.ts` is the service wiring.

packages/bash/bash-sandbox/README.md

@@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
 # @deepseek-ai/dsh-bash-sandbox
 
-Sandbox-consuming implementation of the [`@deepseek-ai/dsh-bash`](../bash/) executor seam. Load it **instead of** `@deepseek-ai/dsh-bash-local`, together with a [`ctx.sandbox`](../../sandbox/sandbox/) provider (e.g. [`@deepseek-ai/dsh-sandbox-local`](../../sandbox/sandbox-local/)) — the model-facing tool layer (`dsh-tool-bash`) is untouched; that swap is exactly what the seams exist for.
+Sandbox-consuming implementation of the [`@deepseek-ai/dsh-bash`](../bash/) executor seam. Load it **instead of** `@deepseek-ai/dsh-bash-local`, together with a [`ctx.sandbox`](../../sandbox/sandbox/) provider (e.g. [`@deepseek-ai/dsh-sandbox-local`](../../sandbox/sandbox-local/)) — no alternate tool plugin is needed; `dsh-tool-bash` detects the executor's `sandboxMode` capability and adds the escalation fields.
 
 Every command is confined by handing the provider the exact `['bash', '-c', command]` argv this executor is about to spawn and spawning the returned (wrapped) argv instead. WHICH platform runner confines it — and whether one is usable at all (fail closed with a structured `SANDBOX_UNAVAILABLE` error, never a silent unconfined run) — is the provider's concern; this package owns the bash side only.
 
@@ -31,3 +31,30 @@ Deny-only at the seam: a denial is a reported fact, and this executor never nego
 ```
 
 The keyless consumer-integration proofs are `tests/bwrap.e2e.ts`, `tests/landlock.e2e.ts`, and `tests/seatbelt.e2e.ts` (the real provider + real runner driven through `ctx.bash`, world-verified, each self-skipping where its runner is absent); see [the acp-agent example's default composition](../../../examples/acp-agent/) for the runnable demo.
+
+## Model Experience
+
+### Bash tool schema, indirectly
+
+**What the model sees**: The generated [`dsh-tool-bash` schemas](../../../docs/tool-catalog.md#deepseek-aidsh-tool-bash) are the baseline. By advertising a confining `sandboxMode`, this backend augments `bash` with `sandbox_permissions` using enum `workspace-write` | `danger-full-access` and with `justification`. The backend adds no prompt prose, and the session's effective mode remains unstated.
+
+**Token effect**: Small fixed schema increment on requests where `bash` is visible; mode switches add no context tokens.
+
+### Bash tool result, indirectly
+
+**What the model sees**: After ordinary bounded output, a denied call appends exactly `[sandbox: file access denied under <mode> mode]`. When escalation is available it next appends `[sandbox: escalation available — retry this exact command once with sandbox_permissions (the narrowest wider mode that suffices) + justification; the approval prompt asks the user]`. A settled background runner failure instead appends `[sandbox: the sandbox runner itself failed under <mode> mode — the command did not run; this is a sandbox problem, not a command failure]`.
+
+**Token effect**: Zero additional tokens on an unremarkable allowed run beyond ordinary output. Denial or failure adds the quoted conditional marker, retained until compaction.
+
+### Bash tool error, indirectly
+
+**What the model sees**: If no runner can enforce a confined mode, the foreground call fails with code `SANDBOX_UNAVAILABLE` and the exact message `sandbox mode "<mode>" is requested but no sandbox backend is usable on this host; refusing to run the command unconfined. Install bubblewrap or run a Landlock-enforcing kernel (Linux), ensure sandbox-exec is usable (macOS) — Windows has no confinement backend yet — or switch the consumer to danger-full-access.` An execution-time runner failure appends ` Runner failure: <first stderr line>`.
+
+**Token effect**: Conditional error text is visible for that call and retained in history until compaction.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **Confinement covers file effects only** — network access and process visibility are unchanged, so the modes are not a general-purpose security sandbox.
+- **Denials are inferred from failed-command stderr** — backend signatures make the inference portable, but a matching application error can be classified as a denial and a denial omitted from the retained tail can be missed.
+- **A background runner failure has no immediate error channel** — it is recorded on the settled task and surfaces when the caller polls with `bash_output`.
+- **`danger-full-access` deliberately bypasses `ctx.sandbox`** — it is an explicit unconfined mode, not a wider sandbox profile.

packages/bash/bash-sandbox/src/index.ts

@@ -143,9 +143,9 @@ function matchesSignature(exitCode: number | null, stderr: string, signatures: r
  * fallback exposed by {@link sandboxMode}; `dsh-tool-bash` folds a session's
  * durable `bash/sandbox-mode` override and stamps the effective mode onto each
  * request, while an approved escalation may stamp a strictly wider mode for
- * one call. The tool's per-agent prompt section states that same effective
- * mode, and each run's `result.sandbox` reports what actually executed plus
- * enforcement completeness.
+ * one call. The prompt deliberately does not state the mode; each run's
+ * `result.sandbox` reports what actually executed plus enforcement
+ * completeness, and the tool layer renders denial or runner-failure facts.
  */
 export class SandboxBashExecutor extends LocalBashExecutor {
   static inject = ['sandbox']

packages/bash/bash/README.md

@@ -11,7 +11,7 @@ This package is the interface quarter of the bash capability, split so each conc
 | `@deepseek-ai/dsh-bash-sandbox` | an implementation: `dsh-bash-local`'s mechanics with every spawn confined via [`ctx.sandbox`](../../sandbox/sandbox/), denials reported as result facts |
 | `@deepseek-ai/dsh-tool-bash` | the model-facing tool schemas over `ctx.bash` |
 
-The split mirrors the LLM seam (`LlmService`/`LlmAdapter`) and the agent-tool survey: pi hides execution behind a `BashOperations` interface (local shell / SSH / VM backends), Codex behind an exec-server protocol. `dsh-bash-sandbox` is exactly that swap in action — a sandboxing executor behind the same interface, tool schemas untouched; a containerized or remote executor slots in the same way.
+The split mirrors the LLM seam (`LlmService`/`LlmAdapter`) and the agent-tool survey: pi hides execution behind a `BashOperations` interface (local shell / SSH / VM backends), Codex behind an exec-server protocol. `dsh-bash-sandbox` is exactly that swap in action — a sandboxing executor behind the same interface; the consumer detects its `sandboxMode` capability and adds escalation fields without importing the implementation. A containerized or remote executor slots in the same way.
 
 ## Service API (`ctx.bash`)
 
@@ -35,3 +35,13 @@ Implementations subclass `BashExecutor`, implement the abstract methods, and cal
 The seam also owns the per-session mode override vocabulary (the sandbox RFC § Per-session mode switching): the log-only `'bash/sandbox-mode'` session event, the pure fold `effectiveSandboxMode(events)` (last event wins; `undefined` means "apply the executor default"), and THE write path `setSandboxMode(session, mode)` — the session log is the store, so an override survives restart by replay and two sessions can never see each other's mode. Writers must respect turn-enclosure: the ACP bridge anchors an idle switch at the next turn rather than appending between turns. The task id (`BashTaskId`) and the `owner` token (`OwnerToken`) are [branded](../../util/brand) — `OwnerToken` is a DISTINCT brand from `SessionId` (the seam never imports `dsh-session`; the `dsh-tool-bash` consumer is the single boundary that casts its `SessionId` into one). `run()` returns `BashRunResult` (exitCode, signal, timedOut, aborted, timeoutMs, stdout/stderr as `CollectedOutput`) and `start()`/`readOutput()` use `BashTask`/`BashTaskRead` for the background side. A sandboxing executor additionally stamps `sandbox` result facts on results and settled tasks (`BashSandboxInfo`: the mode it executed under, the conservative `denied` classification, and — for confined modes — the backend's `enforcement` completeness); the mode/enforcement vocabulary is owned by the [`dsh-sandbox`](../../sandbox/sandbox/) seam, and the facts are documented in [core-data-structures/bash.md](../../../docs/core-data-structures/bash.md). See `src/types.ts` for the full contracts.
 
 `stdin` and `env` are set by in-process plugins (the hooks bridges, native plugins) to feed a hook command its JSON payload on stdin and its `CLAUDE_PROJECT_DIR`/`CLAUDE_PLUGIN_ROOT` env. The model-facing `dsh-tool-bash` tool does not expose them as parameters — a model already has equivalent power through shell syntax (`FOO=bar cmd`, a heredoc), so they would be redundant tool params. This is not a security boundary: the implementation's credential scrub (not these fields) is what keeps the harness's ambient secrets out of a spawned command. They are plain optionals on the resolved spec (unlike `owner`'s required-but-nullable): a missing one means "none", the safe default. See [the bash-stdin-env RFC](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/architecture/2026-06-30-bash-stdin-env-trusted-plugin-surface.md).
+
+## Model Experience
+
+Indirectly, through `dsh-tool-bash`, which turns executor output and sandbox facts into guidance and retained tool-result tokens.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **No interactive-input vocabulary** — `stdin` is written once at spawn and closed; the seam has no channel to feed a running task and no PTY session concept.
+- **Two overlapping surfaces flagged for pruning** — `BashTask.done` duplicates `onTaskDone` (shipped consumers use only the latter), and `get()`/`list()` have test-harness consumers only; both are marked in [the long-running-runtime RFC](../../../docs/rfc/proposed/architecture/2026-06-20-generic-long-running-tool-runtime.md).
+- **Foreground timeouts are always executor-owned** — a caller-owned-deadline mode on the seam is explicitly deferred by [the tool-call timeout-policy RFC](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/architecture/2026-07-07-tool-call-timeout-policy.md).

packages/bash/bash/src/session-mode.ts

@@ -5,12 +5,13 @@
  * `effective = fold(events) ?? the executor's configured default`, so an
  * override survives restart by replay, two sessions can never see each
  * other's state, and there is no external config store. The event is
- * log-only (the `approval/*` precedent): the model learns the mode from the
- * prompt section and the boundary notices in `@deepseek-ai/dsh-tool-bash`,
- * never from the event itself. EXECUTION honors the fold in the tool layer —
- * it stamps the effective mode onto each call's `BashExecRequest.sandboxMode`
- * (weakest-precedence: an escalation grant for the call outranks it) — the
- * executor itself stays a config-fixed default plus per-call overrides.
+ * log-only (the `approval/*` precedent): the model receives neither this event
+ * nor a standing mode statement. `@deepseek-ai/dsh-tool-bash` names the mode
+ * only when it renders a sandbox denial. EXECUTION honors the fold in the tool
+ * layer — it stamps the effective mode onto each call's
+ * `BashExecRequest.sandboxMode` (weakest-precedence: an escalation grant for
+ * the call outranks it) — the executor itself stays a config-fixed default
+ * plus per-call overrides.
  *
  * @module dsh-bash/session-mode
  */
@@ -24,9 +25,8 @@ declare module '@deepseek-ai/dsh-session' {
      * The session's sandbox mode was switched — log-only (like `approval/*`;
      * NOT a surface event, carries no `surfaceOp`): durable and replayable,
      * never in the model transcript. The LAST such event is the session's
-     * override ({@link effectiveSandboxMode}); who asked for it is derivable
-     * from position (an event after the log's last `request/header` was a
-     * runtime switch by the user; see the tool layer's narrator).
+     * override ({@link effectiveSandboxMode}); execution and ACP config-option
+     * reporting fold it without adding prompt text or a context notice.
      */
     'bash/sandbox-mode': { mode: SandboxMode }
   }
@@ -54,8 +54,8 @@ export function effectiveSandboxMode(events: readonly SessionEvent[]): SandboxMo
 /**
  * THE write path for a session's sandbox-mode override: appends exactly one
  * `bash/sandbox-mode` event — the switch IS its event; nothing mutates mode
- * state out of band. Takes effect on the session's next bash call and next
- * prompt assembly (the consumers fold on every read).
+ * state out of band. Subsequent execution and ACP config-option reporting fold
+ * it on read; no prompt assembly consumes it.
  * @param session - the session the override belongs to.
  * @param mode - the mode every subsequent bash call in this session runs
  *   under (until the next switch).

packages/bash/tool-bash/README.md

@@ -1,10 +1,10 @@
 # @deepseek-ai/dsh-tool-bash
 
-The model-facing bash tools — `bash`, `bash_output`, `bash_kill` — registered over the `ctx.bash` executor seam (`@deepseek-ai/dsh-bash`). Pure schema + text shaping; every process concern lives behind the seam, so sandboxed or remote executor implementations swap in without changing what the model sees.
+The model-facing bash tools — `bash`, `bash_output`, `bash_kill` — registered over the `ctx.bash` executor seam (`@deepseek-ai/dsh-bash`). This package owns schema and text shaping while process concerns stay behind the seam. Executor facts can change rendered results, and a sandboxing executor activates the escalation fields, without moving those presentation rules into the backend.
 
 Requires a loaded executor implementation (e.g. `@deepseek-ai/dsh-bash-local`); the plugin stays pending until `ctx.bash` exists (`inject: ['tools', 'bash', 'systemPrompt']`).
 
-The plugin also contributes the `tool:bash` prompt section (order 105) — the cross-call habit the per-tool descriptions cannot carry: check the `[exit code: N]` marker on every result and investigate failures before moving on. Under a sandboxing executor it additionally contributes the per-agent `env:bash-sandbox` section (order 110) stating each session's EFFECTIVE mode, and the pre-step narrator — see [Per-session mode](#per-session-mode-switching-and-visibility).
+The plugin also contributes the `tool:bash` prompt section (order 105) — the cross-call habit the per-tool descriptions cannot carry: check the `[exit code: N]` marker on every result and investigate failures before moving on. A sandboxing executor changes the `bash` schema and result markers but adds no mode statement or switch notice; see [Per-session mode](#per-session-mode-switching).
 
 ## Tools
 
@@ -38,7 +38,7 @@ The owning agent's shared registry/session id (`agent.id`) is stamped onto the t
 
 ## UI presentation
 
-These tools own how their calls render in a UI (an editor's tool-call card) via the `dsh-tools` `presentCall`/`presentResult` seam, each returning a `card`-tagged render intent — a UI never special-cases tool names. A FOREGROUND `bash` run declares a **terminal card**: `presentCall` returns `{ card: 'terminal', title, description?, cwd? }` — the **title** is the exact `command` ("ls -la src"), the model-written `description` rides along (rendered ABOVE the card), and `cwd` comes from the model `workdir` when given (absolute as-is, relative for the UI bridge to resolve against the session cwd; else left for the bridge to fill from the session cwd) — and `presentResult` returns `{ card: 'terminal', title?, output?, exitCode?, signal? }` carrying the raw output plus the parsed `exitCode`/`signal`, so a capable client (Zed) renders a terminal card with an exit-status pill. The result carries the raw `output`; the bridge DERIVES the ` ```console ` fenced fallback for a no-terminal-capability UI (the tool no longer encodes the fences itself), so the model-facing result text stays unfenced. A `run_in_background` call is NOT a terminal (it returns a task id immediately and never streams a terminal — poll with `bash_output`) and instead returns a **generic card** (`{ card: 'generic', title, kind: 'execute', rawInput: command, content: [description] }`); an `isError` result (spawn failure / abort) likewise returns a `generic` result view with no exit pill (there is no real process exit). `bash_output`/`bash_kill` return a `generic` card with a task-scoped title ("Read output from background task bash-3" / "Kill background task bash-3") and the task id as rawInput. These methods are pure/display-only (they also run on `session/load` replay), and a malformed/older logged arg shape falls back to a generic presentation rather than throwing. See `packages/core/tools` ("Tool-owned UI presentation") and `packages/ui/acp` ("Terminal card" / "Tool-call presentation").
+These tools own how their calls render in a UI (an editor's tool-call card) via the `dsh-tools` `presentCall`/`presentResult` seam, each returning a `card`-tagged render intent — a UI never special-cases tool names. A FOREGROUND `bash` run declares a **terminal card**: `presentCall` returns `{ card: 'terminal', title, description?, cwd? }` — the **title** is the exact `command` ("ls -la src"), the model-written `description` rides along (rendered ABOVE the card), and `cwd` comes from the model `workdir` when given (absolute as-is, relative for the UI bridge to resolve against the session cwd; else left for the bridge to fill from the session cwd) — and `presentResult` returns `{ card: 'terminal', title?, output?, exitCode?, signal? }` carrying the raw output plus the parsed `exitCode`/`signal`, so a capable client (Zed) renders a terminal card with an exit-status pill. The result carries the raw `output`; the bridge DERIVES the ` ```console ` fenced fallback for a no-terminal-capability UI while the tool keeps model-facing result text unfenced. A `run_in_background` call is NOT a terminal (it returns a task id immediately and never streams a terminal — poll with `bash_output`) and instead returns a **generic card** (`{ card: 'generic', title, kind: 'execute', rawInput: command, content: [description] }`); an `isError` result (spawn failure / abort) likewise returns a `generic` result view with no exit pill (there is no real process exit). `bash_output`/`bash_kill` return a `generic` card with a task-scoped title ("Read output from background task bash-3" / "Kill background task bash-3") and the task id as rawInput. These methods are pure/display-only (they also run on `session/load` replay), and a malformed/older logged arg shape falls back to a generic presentation rather than throwing. See `packages/core/tools` ("Tool-owned UI presentation") and `packages/ui/acp` ("Terminal card" / "Tool-call presentation").
 
 ## Background completion notices
 
@@ -57,3 +57,48 @@ On top of a denial sits the escalation gate ([the sandbox RFC § Escalation](../
 ## Per-session mode switching
 
 Under a sandboxing executor this plugin makes the session's standing mode override ([the sandbox RFC § Per-session mode switching](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/feature/2026-07-06-sandbox.md); the `bash/sandbox-mode` fold owned by [`dsh-bash`](../bash/README.md)) real at EXECUTION: every call is stamped `escalation grant > session override > undefined` onto `BashExecRequest.sandboxMode`; without either, the executor's `resolve()` applies its configured default. Nothing is stamped under a non-sandboxing executor (nothing would honor it) or for an agent-less caller (no session to fold). The prompt deliberately does NOT state the mode and a switch is not narrated: a standing declaration teaches the model to refuse preemptively, while the denial marker already names the mode the command ran under exactly when the boundary is hit — behavior, not belief, carries the state.
+
+## Model Experience
+
+### System prompt
+
+**What the model sees**: Every request in this plugin's registration scope contains the bash guidance below. A sandboxing executor adds no mode statement or switch notice. Scoped tool restrictions can hide the schemas without removing this independently registered section.
+
+**Token effect**: Small fixed input cost per request while the plugin is active, unchanged by sandbox mode or mode switches.
+
+#### Bash guidance
+
+```markdown
+Check the [exit code: N] marker on every bash result; investigate failures before moving on.
+```
+
+### Tool schemas
+
+**What the model sees**: The model sees the generated [`bash`, `bash_output`, and `bash_kill` schemas](../../../docs/tool-catalog.md#deepseek-aidsh-tool-bash). `sandbox_permissions` and `justification` augment `bash` only when the mounted executor advertises sandboxing. Agent-scoped tool restrictions can remove the definitions for that agent.
+
+**Token effect**: Fixed schema cost on every request where the tools are visible; sandbox support adds the escalation fields and its conditional description paragraph.
+
+### Foreground result
+
+**What the model sees**: The renderer emits the data-dependent stdout tail, then optional `[stderr]` and the stderr tail. With no output it emits exactly `(no output)`. Conditional lines are exactly `[output truncated; full output: <path-or-(unavailable)>]`, `[sandbox: file access denied under <mode> mode]`, `[timed out after <timeoutMs>ms]`, `[killed by signal: <signal>]`, and `[exit code: <exitCode>]`; the sandbox escalation and runner-failure lines are quoted in [`dsh-bash-sandbox`](../bash-sandbox/README.md).
+
+**Token effect**: Zero result tokens before a call. Output is bounded per stream, while each emitted line remains in history until compaction.
+
+### Background task context and results
+
+**What the model sees**: Start returns exactly `started background task <taskId>`. Completion injects exactly `background bash task <taskId> finished <status>. Read its output with bash_output.` Reads return only the data-dependent delta or `(no new output)`, optionally `[some output was dropped from memory; full output: <paths-or-(unavailable)>]`, then exactly one of `[status: running]`, `[status: killed]`, `[status: killed by <signal>]`, or `[status: completed, exit code: <exitCode>]`. Kill returns `killed background task <taskId>` or `task <taskId> had already finished`.
+
+**Token effect**: Start and status text is small; deltas are data-dependent. The completion notice and every tool result are retained until compaction, but polling does not repeat already-delivered output.
+
+### Tool errors
+
+**What the model sees**: Validation and policy failures are normalized as `Error: <message>`. This package's stable messages are `invalid command: expected a non-empty string`, `invalid description: expected a non-empty string`, `invalid timeoutMs: expected a positive number, got <value>`, `invalid escalation: sandbox_permissions requires a justification`, `invalid escalation: justification is only valid together with sandbox_permissions`, `invalid justification: expected a non-empty sentence`, `invalid task_id: expected a string, got <value>`, `task <taskId> belongs to another session`, `sandbox_permissions is not available in this composition (no sandboxing executor to escalate)`, `sandbox escalation to "<mode>" is not strictly wider than this call's current "<mode>" mode`, the approval-availability/rejection/cancellation variants, and `command aborted`.
+
+**Token effect**: Only the failing call adds these retained tokens; a rejected escalation does not add command output because the command does not run.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **Replay exit pills parse from result text** — output whose final line happens to be exactly `[exit code: N]` / `[killed by signal: …]` shows a wrong pill on session replay; a display-only known residual.
+- **The bash tools opt out of `timeout-policy` budgets** — `bash` keeps the executor-owned `BASH_TIMEOUT` path and `bash_output`/`bash_kill` declare no budget, per [the tool-call timeout-policy RFC](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/architecture/2026-07-07-tool-call-timeout-policy.md).
+- **Completion notices do not wake an idle agent** — they become durable context for the next request; a caller needing progress now must poll `bash_output` or send another message.
+- **Tasks started outside an agent have no ownership fence** — their predictable ids are readable and killable by any caller; only agent-started tasks carry a session owner token.

packages/bash/tool-bash/src/index.ts

@@ -477,12 +477,12 @@ export function apply(ctx: Context): void {
   /**
    * The session's standing mode override for an ordinary (non-escalating)
    * call: the `bash/sandbox-mode` fold of the calling agent's log, stamped
-   * onto the request so EXECUTION follows the same effective mode the prompt
-   * section states. Weakest precedence — an escalation grant (freshly
-   * approved for exactly this call) outranks it, and without either the
-   * executor's `resolve()` applies its configured default. Undefined for a
-   * non-sandboxing executor (nothing honors it) and for agent-less callers
-   * (no session to fold).
+   * onto the request so execution follows the fold without stating it in the
+   * prompt. Weakest precedence — an escalation grant (freshly approved for
+   * exactly this call) outranks it, and without either the executor's
+   * `resolve()` applies its configured default. Undefined for a non-sandboxing
+   * executor (nothing honors it) and for agent-less callers (no session to
+   * fold).
    */
   const sessionOverride = (exec: ToolExecution): SandboxMode | undefined =>
     defaultMode === undefined || exec.agent === undefined ? undefined : effectiveSandboxMode(exec.agent.session.events)

packages/code-runtime/code-runtime-worker/README.md

@@ -30,3 +30,15 @@ Every field is validated (positive numbers) and defaulted; there are no other tu
 ## The worker entry, unbuilt and built
 
 `worker.ts` is deliberately erasable-only TypeScript with type-only cross-package imports: unbuilt (vitest/tsx), the host spawns `src/worker.ts` directly and Node's native type stripping loads it; built, the entry ships as the sibling CommonJS bundle `lib/worker.cjs` (its own tsdown entry). The CommonJS format is required because pkg's VFS Worker hook compiles filesystem-string entries as CommonJS. The host converts either entry URL to a filesystem string before constructing `Worker`, which works through both ordinary Node resolution and that pkg hook. The built path is pinned by `tests/built-lib.e2e.ts`, the real-load-path guard from [docs/testing.md](../../../docs/testing.md).
+
+## Model Experience
+
+Indirectly, through Code Mode in `dsh-tools`, which renders this worker's capped printed or returned data, exact `[dsh-code-runtime-worker] log capture truncated at <maxLogBytes> bytes` and `… [truncated]` markers, and `Error: code run failed (<kind>): <message>` failures into a retained `run_code` result while keeping binding traffic and worker internals outside context.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **OS processes a program spawns survive termination** — `worker.terminate()` ends the thread only, weaker than bash-local's process-group kill; orphan cleanup is a deployment concern until a container backend exists.
+- **Type-strip rides Node's experimental `stripTypeScriptTypes` API** — the relied-on behavior is pinned by unit tests, with amaro/sucrase as named drop-in replacements if it shifts.
+- **`computeMs` expiry can overshoot by up to one poll interval** — busy time is sampled every 25 ms (an internal constant, deliberately not config).
+- **Programs get a five-method `console` shim** (`log`/`info`/`warn`/`error`/`debug`) — deliberately not Node's full console surface.
+- **A non-cloneable or oversize completion value does not cross as a value** — it arrives as a bounded, truncation-marked `util.inspect` rendering in `value`'s place.

packages/code-runtime/code-runtime/README.md

@@ -17,3 +17,13 @@ Semantics every implementation must honor (contract details in the class JSDoc):
 ## Vocabulary
 
 `CodeRunRequest` (`program`, `bindings`, `signal?`) carries everything the runtime acts on — defaulting (time budgets, output caps) is the implementation's validated config, never a hidden `??` inside `run()`. `bindings` is a list of `CodeBindingNamespace`s (`global` + `functions`), each exposed to the program as one global object of async callables. `CodeRunResult` reports the completion `value?`, the ordered `logs` (`CodeLogEntry`: `console`/`stdout`/`stderr` source, console `level`, capped text), and the `error?` (`CodeRunFailure`: `kind` + model-feedable `message`). See `src/types.ts` for the full contracts.
+
+## Model Experience
+
+Indirectly, through Code Mode in `dsh-tools`, which exposes `run_code` and returns program logs, values, or failures as retained tool-result tokens.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **`run()` is one-shot** — `logs` arrive only on the resolved `CodeRunResult`; the seam exposes no streaming-log or progress surface for a live program's output.
+- **A persistent REPL-style kernel is recorded future work** — the no-state-between-runs contract stands until a persistent-kernel backend brings its own logging story ([Code Mode RFC](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/feature/2026-06-15-code-mode.md)).
+- **Only the worker-thread backend ships** — `'process'`/`'container'` are declared well-known `isolation` values with no implementation; a hard security boundary awaits a container backend.

packages/compact/compact-basic/README.md

@@ -56,3 +56,75 @@ export function apply(ctx: Context): void {
 ```
 
 Loading the plugin registers `ctx.compact`. With `auto: true` (the default) it compacts automatically under token pressure; a consumer (a future `/compact` tool) can also call `ctx.compact.compactIfNeeded(...)` or `ctx.compact.compactRegion(...)` directly.
+
+## Model Experience
+
+### Conversation history
+
+**What the model sees**: Before a step whose estimated envelope and history exceed the threshold, the conversation model receives the checkpoint preamble below, a blank line, `<compacted-summary>`, the data-dependent summary, and `</compacted-summary>`. This one checkpoint replaces the selected older range and is followed by the retained recent units.
+
+**Token effect**: The replacement reduces future input history rather than appending a second copy. The summary remains until a later compaction replaces it; one oversized indivisible unit can still exceed the budget.
+
+#### Conversation checkpoint preamble
+
+```markdown
+This is an automatically generated checkpoint condensing an earlier span of the conversation to free up context. Treat the captured context as established background and build on it without restating it. Continue the task directly from the messages that follow, without acknowledging this checkpoint.
+```
+
+### Auxiliary summarizer user message
+
+**What the model sees**: The summarization model receives exactly `Summarize this conversation history:` followed by a blank line, the data-dependent [`renderTranscript()`](../compact/README.md) output, another blank line, and `Summary:`. The conversation model never sees this private request or its reasoning; only returned text is stored.
+
+**Token effect**: This is a separate model call with data-dependent input and `maxTokens`-capped output. Convergence retries can pay this cost more than once.
+
+### Auxiliary summarizer system prompt
+
+**What the model sees**: The summarization model receives the checkpoint-writing instruction below.
+
+**Token effect**: Fixed auxiliary input cost plus the data-dependent transcript on every summarization attempt.
+
+#### Auxiliary summarizer system prompt
+
+```markdown
+You are a compaction engine for an AI coding assistant. Condense the conversation transcript into a structured checkpoint that lets another model resume the work with no loss of essential context.
+
+Output EXACTLY the Markdown structure below: keep every section, in order. Use terse bullets, not prose paragraphs. Write "(none)" for an empty section — never drop a section.
+
+## Primary Request and Intent
+- [the user's original and evolving goals; quote verbatim where the exact wording matters]
+
+## Key Technical Concepts
+- [technologies, frameworks, patterns, and conventions in play]
+
+## Files and Code
+- [exact path: why it matters, key changes or snippets]
+
+## Errors and Fixes
+- [error: how it was resolved, plus any related user feedback]
+
+## Pending Tasks
+- [explicitly requested work not yet completed]
+
+## Current Work
+- [precisely what was in progress at this checkpoint]
+
+## Next Step
+- [the single next action, directly in line with the most recent request, or "(none)"]
+
+## Critical Context
+- [decisions and their rationale, constraints, user preferences, open questions, data needed to continue]
+
+Rules:
+- Preserve exact file paths, commands, error strings, identifiers, and function signatures.
+- Capture user feedback and explicit instructions faithfully, especially corrections.
+- Do NOT mention this summarization process or that the context was compacted.
+- If the transcript already contains a <compacted-summary> block, it is a PRIOR checkpoint. Do not copy it forward verbatim: preserve still-true facts, drop stale ones, and merge newer information into a single consolidated summary under the same structure.
+```
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **Token estimation is the chars/`charsPerToken` heuristic** — a marked TODO schedules replacing it with an exact count (a real tokenizer, or provider `usage` fed back) so thresholds track the model's actual budget.
+- **`estimatePressure()` does not count the request's `tools` field** — pressure is underestimated by the size of the serialized tool schemas the request also carries.
+- **`compactRegion` requires an open turn** — a manual call on a fully-closed session throws ("no open turn") rather than compacting.
+- **Summarization failure fails closed with full, over-budget history** — including truncation at the summarization `maxTokens`, which hidden reasoning tokens can consume; the auto path logs a warning and proceeds.
+- **The summarization call has no transcript-snapshot coverage** — `dsh-llm-replay` derives calls from `assistant/chunk` events, so this chunk-less direct `ctx.llm.stream()` call cannot replay (named deferred replay infrastructure in [the seam RFC](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/feature/2026-06-18-compaction-capability-seam.md)).

packages/compact/compact/README.md

@@ -7,7 +7,7 @@ This package is the interface tier of the compaction capability, split so each c
 | Package | Role |
 |---|---|
 | `@deepseek-ai/dsh-compact` (this) | the interface: abstract service + `compact/*` events + `CompactionResult` + the shared transcript renderer (`renderTranscript`/`renderContentBlocks`) |
-| `@deepseek-ai/dsh-compact-basic` (deferred) | a backend: chars-per-token estimation (`charsPerToken`, default 4) + token-budget retention + `llm.stream()` summarization |
+| `@deepseek-ai/dsh-compact-basic` | a backend: chars-per-token estimation (`charsPerToken`, default 4) + token-budget retention + `llm.stream()` summarization |
 | `@deepseek-ai/dsh-tool-compact` (deferred) | the model-facing `/compact` tool over `ctx.compact` |
 
 Unlike the bash seam, this interface depends on `@deepseek-ai/dsh-session` and `@deepseek-ai/dsh-llm` — the contract's verbs are defined over a `Session`, and its durable `compact/summary` event uses the `ContentBlock` vocabulary, so they cannot be expressed without naming those packages. That deviation from the "interface depends only on cordis" guidance is intentional and recorded in the [compaction capability-seam RFC](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/feature/2026-06-18-compaction-capability-seam.md).
@@ -48,3 +48,24 @@ The `compact/*` events extend `SessionEventMap` (merge-extensible) via declarati
 ## Implementing a backend
 
 Subclass `CompactService`, implement `compactIfNeeded` and `compactRegion`, and load the subclass as a plugin — it registers as `ctx.compact`. A tokenizer-, template-, or model-backed implementation can live as a sibling package without changing callers.
+
+## Model Experience
+
+### Conversation history, when a backend is invoked
+
+**What the model sees**: A successful implementation replaces an older surface range with one user-role summary checkpoint; the raw events stay logged but stop appearing in derived model messages. The seam itself performs no rewrite.
+
+**Token effect**: Zero direct tokens from this interface. A backend trades many retained history tokens for one summary and leaves the recent tail unchanged.
+
+### Transcript supplied to a compaction consumer
+
+**What the model sees**: `renderTranscript()` joins entries with one blank line and renders them exactly as `User: <content>`, `Assistant: <content>`, `Tool result (call <callId>): <content>`, `Tool error (call <callId>): <content>`, `[Context: <content>]`, or `[Steering: <content>]`. Non-text blocks render exactly as `[reasoning: <text>]`, `[tool-call: <name>(<arguments>)]`, `[tool-result: <content>]`, `[tool-result]`, or `[<block-type>]`.
+
+**Token effect**: Data-dependent input tokens are paid only by the auxiliary model or consumer that requests this transcript; the conversation model does not receive a duplicate transcript.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **No model-facing consumer tier yet** — `@deepseek-ai/dsh-tool-compact` (the `/compact` tool) is deferred; compaction is reachable only via direct `ctx.compact` calls or a backend's auto listener.
+- **Single-unit overflow is out of contract** — one retained unit (a closed step or a large pasted `user/message`) alone exceeding the budget cannot be compacted; the call may go out over-budget.
+- **A session prefix that alone approaches the window is a configuration error no backend fixes** — compaction shrinks derived history, never the prefix.
+- **Request context injected by downstream `agent/request` listeners sits outside pressure accounting** — `compactIfNeeded` counts prefix, derived history, and system prompt only.

packages/compact/compact/src/index.ts

@@ -11,7 +11,7 @@
  * touching consumers.
  *
  * The split follows the capability-seams RFC — interface (this) /
- * implementation (deferred) / consumer (a `/compact` tool, deferred) — modeled
+ * implementation (`dsh-compact-basic`) / consumer (a `/compact` tool, deferred) — modeled
  * on the bash trio. Unlike `dsh-bash`, this interface necessarily
  * depends on `dsh-session` and `dsh-llm`: the contract's verbs are defined over
  * an agent-owned `Session` and the durable summary event uses the

packages/cordis/tool-cordis/README.md

@@ -31,3 +31,29 @@ All three tools render `generic` cards (`read` / `execute` / `delete`); `cordis_
 ## Export shape
 
 Namespace plugin: named exports `name` / `inject` / `Config` / `apply`, no default export ([docs/postmortem/0001](../../../docs/postmortem/0001-acp-default-export-drops-inject.md)).
+
+## Model Experience
+
+### Tool schemas
+
+**What the model sees**: The conversation model sees the generated [`cordis_inspect`, `cordis_mount`, and `cordis_unmount` schemas](../../../docs/tool-catalog.md#deepseek-aidsh-tool-cordis) whenever this plugin is visible.
+
+**Token effect**: Fixed schema cost on every request in that tool view.
+
+### Tool-call history and results
+
+**What the model sees**: Inspect joins selected sections exactly as `## <section>` then a newline and the data-dependent body, with one blank line between sections. Mount returns `mounted <id> (plugin "<name>", state: <state>)`, optionally inserting ` — waiting for service(s): <names> (activates when provided)` before the closing parenthesis. Unmount returns `unmounted <id> (plugin "<name>")`; an unknown id becomes `Error: no dynamic plugin with id "<id>" (list mounts with cordis_inspect what:"dynamic")`. The submitted mount program remains in the assistant tool-call history.
+
+**Token effect**: Inspect output and mount code are data-dependent and resent until compaction; lifecycle acknowledgements are small.
+
+### Later requests after a mount
+
+**What the model sees**: A mounted plugin may register tools, prompt contributions, or listeners that change later requests for the scopes it targets; unmount removes those contributions after quiescence.
+
+**Token effect**: Indirect token impact equals the mounted plugin's contributions and lasts only for the mount lifetime.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **The sandbox is containment for honest code, not a security boundary** — host-realm helpers on the sandbox global are reachable, so mount code can reach Node; load this plugin as deliberately as you would grant a bash tool (see § Trust stance).
+- **The `ctx` façade exposes no `effect()`** — mount code cannot register a bespoke disposer; `on`/`provide`/`tools.register` cover every mount seen so far, and a guarded `effect` waits on a real need (`FIXME(sandbox-effect)`).
+- **`vmTimeoutMs` bounds only synchronous evaluation** — an async mount body escapes it; there is no async budget on mount code.

packages/core/agent-core/README.md

@@ -2,7 +2,7 @@
 
 The **default executor-less, UI-less agent spine** as ONE Cordis bundle plugin. It loads the fixed set of services every harness agent needs, including the local skill provider, and forwards the loop's `agents` list as its own config — so an app package composes a working agent by adding only a front door and the swappable backends.
 
-This is the package to read to see **the whole plugin tree at once** — the teaching role the inlined `echo-agent` `cordis.yml` used to play before the spine moved behind this bundle.
+This is the package to read to see **the whole shared plugin tree at once**: the teaching overview of the spine behind every app package.
 
 ## The tree it loads
 
@@ -17,7 +17,7 @@ This is the package to read to see **the whole plugin tree at once** — the tea
 @deepseek-ai/dsh-skill            skill provider registry
 @deepseek-ai/dsh-skill-local      local filesystem skill provider
 @deepseek-ai/dsh-agent            agent registry + agent/* event vocabulary
-@deepseek-ai/dsh-invariants       dev-mode event-contract assertions
+@deepseek-ai/dsh-invariants       runtime event-contract assertions
 @deepseek-ai/dsh-tool-bash        the model-facing bash/bash_output/bash_kill schemas
 @deepseek-ai/dsh-tool-skill       session-prefix skill catalog + model-facing loader schema
 @deepseek-ai/dsh-agent-loop       THE concrete loop (gets the forwarded `agents`)
@@ -48,3 +48,13 @@ The bundle FORWARDS each field to the child that owns it: `agents` to `agent-loo
 ## Why a code bundle, not a shared YAML include
 
 A YAML include can dedupe the config, but it cannot OWN a `bin`, and it can only *describe* the front-door coupling in a comment and trust each leaf to obey. Moving the spine into a package, and the front-door cluster into the app packages, means the default leaf for an ACP server has no logger entry to copy wrong — "the ACP app never logs to stdout" stops being a prose warning a leaf must remember and becomes the app package's default shape (a leaf can still add a sibling logger, so the rule stays documented — but it has nothing to get wrong by default). Services register in the root store keyed by their isolate symbol, so a child loaded here is visible to the bundle's siblings (the leaf's adapter and executor) exactly as a nested `plugin-include` subtree's services were — cordis gates every read on `inject`, never on load order.
+
+## Model Experience
+
+Indirectly, through `dsh-system-prompt`, `dsh-tool-skill`, `dsh-tool-bash`, and `dsh-tools`, which this bundle mounts without adding model-bound wrapper content.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **FIXME: package name and location imply product core** — rename `dsh-agent-core` to `dsh-demo-bundle` and move it under `packages/support/`; it is a demo composition bundle, not the product spine.
+- **The spine set is fixed in code** — `apply()` mounts every child unconditionally (including `tool-bash`); no config excludes or replaces one, so swapping the loop or dropping a spine member means composing a different bundle.
+- **`dsh-invariants` mounts unconditionally** — this bundle has no toggle, so every composition using it pays the dev-mode relational assertions; Session's always-on validation and freezing are separate.

packages/core/agent-loop/README.md

@@ -97,7 +97,7 @@ Error containment: a throwing plugin ends the **turn**, never the loop. A throwi
 
 Cancellation: `agent.cancel()` is the single public stop primitive — it clears the queued + steering FIFOs, aborts the in-flight step, and drives a turn-scoped marker the driver checks at every point a turn could start or continue (right after the idle wait, after the `running` flip, before each step, and at the continuation gate) so a turn about to start is dropped. A cancelled turn ends `aborted`; a queued-but-not-started prompt never runs and cannot be batched into the cancelled turn. The marker is reset once per loop iteration, so a cancel governs exactly one turn and never leaks onto a later prompt. (The loop still aborts its own per-step `AbortController` directly on disposal and from `cancel()`; that controller is loop-internal, not a public verb.)
 
-### What is NOT here
+### What belongs to plugins
 
 Everything that goes beyond "call the model, run the tools, repeat" belongs to plugins listening on the event taxonomy:
 - Hooks and policy: the relevant `agent/*` checkpoints plus the guarded `tools/pre-execute` → `tools/execute` → `tools/post-execute` → `tools/result` pipeline; exact signatures and modes live in the [generated event catalog](../../../docs/cordis-catalog/events.md)
@@ -106,3 +106,25 @@ Everything that goes beyond "call the model, run the tools, repeat" belongs to p
 - Sub-agents: implemented outside the loop as `ctx.subagents` providers; in-process providers use `ctx.agents.create()` and owned `AgentHandle` teardown, while child streaming/progress and background/poll collection remain deferred.
 - Persistence: `session/event` + `session/flush`
 - UI: `session/event` (assistant token stream, boundaries, tool activity) + `agent/*` control events (`agent/status`, `agent/created`/`agent/disposed`)
+
+## Model Experience
+
+### Complete conversation request
+
+**What the model sees**: For each step, the loop sends the rendered per-agent system prompt, visible tool schemas, the frozen session prefix, and the session's derived messages. It supplies `model` and `cwd` variable values but no additional fixed prose.
+
+**Token effect**: System text, schemas, and prefix are paid again on every step. Per-agent scoping chooses the initial contributions, while the authoritative assembly waterfall can alter the final request and makes its listener responsible for protocol coherence.
+
+### Retained message history
+
+**What the model sees**: Accepted user messages, assistant messages, tool calls and results, injected context, and steering are logged and sent on later steps. Raw stream chunks, lifecycle boundaries, and other log-only events are excluded.
+
+**Token effect**: Input grows with every surface message until a compaction replacement shadows older nodes; a multi-step tool turn resends the accumulated prefix and history each step.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **Tool calls within a step execute sequentially** — parallel execution waits on concurrency-safety metadata in the tool contract (see `dsh-tools`).
+- **No resume-or-create policy on the config path** — config-driven `create()` starts a fresh `${id}-session-<uuid>` every run (`TODO(demo)`), and a config `resumeSessionId` whose resume fails logs a warning and creates no agent.
+- **Config agents have no per-agent persona field or setup hook** — they use the deployment persona; scoped persona/tool composition is available only through the programmatic `ctx.agents.create()` / `resume()` factory options.
+- **No built-in turn budget** — the default continuation is `continue` whenever a step had tool calls or steering; bounding a runaway turn requires an `agent/turn-continuation` force-stop plugin.
+- **`runLoop`/`Inbox`/`InboxMessage` stay exported with no outside consumer** — [removal is proposed](../../../docs/rfc/proposed/simplification/2026-07-04-prune-dead-core-spine-surface.md).

packages/core/agent-loop/src/index.ts

@@ -483,12 +483,8 @@ export class AgentLoop extends Service implements AgentFactory {
         released.resolve()
       }
     }
-    const disposeAgentListener = ownerCtx.on('agent/disposed', (agent) => {
-      if (agent.id === sessionId) checkReleased()
-    })
-    const disposeSessionListener = ownerCtx.on('session/disposed', (session) => {
-      if (session.id === sessionId) checkReleased()
-    })
+    const disposeAgentListener = ownerCtx.on('agent/disposed', checkReleased)
+    const disposeSessionListener = ownerCtx.on('session/disposed', checkReleased)
     try {
       checkReleased()
       await this.ownership.waitWhileActive(released.promise)

packages/core/agent-loop/tests/config-session-id.spec.ts

@@ -136,6 +136,37 @@ describe('config-driven session id', () => {
     await ctx.fiber.dispose()
   })
 
+  it('cancels an exact-id reload while the prior lifecycle is still draining', async () => {
+    const root = await mkdtemp(join(tmpdir(), 'dsh-cfg-exact-cancel-'))
+    dirs.push(root)
+    const ctx = await makeCoreContext()
+    await ctx.plugin(SessionPersistenceJsonl, { root })
+    const sessionId = SessionId('stdio-exact-cancel')
+    const config = { agents: [{ id: 'main', sessionId, model: 'mock' }] }
+    const firstLoop = await ctx.plugin(AgentLoop, config)
+    await expect.poll(() => ctx.agents.get(sessionId)).toBeDefined()
+    const first = ctx.agents.get(sessionId) as ReactLoopAgent
+
+    const flushGate = Promise.withResolvers<undefined>()
+    ctx.on('session/flush', (session) => {
+      if (session === first.session) return flushGate.promise
+    })
+    first.inject([{ type: 'text', text: 'persist before cancellation' }], {
+      source: { kind: 'plugin', plugin: 'test' },
+    })
+
+    const firstDisposal = firstLoop.dispose()
+    await expect.poll(() => first.status).toBe('disposed')
+    const secondLoop = await ctx.plugin(AgentLoop, config)
+    await secondLoop.dispose()
+    expect(ctx.agents.get(sessionId)).toBe(first)
+
+    flushGate.resolve(undefined)
+    await firstDisposal
+    expect(ctx.agents.get(sessionId)).toBeUndefined()
+    await ctx.fiber.dispose()
+  })
+
   it('contains an exact-id persistence lookup failure', async () => {
     const root = await mkdtemp(join(tmpdir(), 'dsh-cfg-exact-failure-'))
     dirs.push(root)
@@ -208,33 +239,37 @@ describe('config-driven session id', () => {
     await ctx.fiber.dispose()
   })
 
-  it('joins an exact-id persistence lookup before AgentLoop disposal completes', async () => {
-    const root = await mkdtemp(join(tmpdir(), 'dsh-cfg-exact-dispose-'))
-    dirs.push(root)
-    const ctx = await makeCoreContext()
-    await ctx.plugin(SessionPersistenceJsonl, { root })
-    const listing = Promise.withResolvers<Awaited<ReturnType<typeof ctx.sessionPersistence.list>>>()
-    vi.spyOn(ctx.sessionPersistence, 'list').mockReturnValue(listing.promise)
-    const warn = vi.spyOn(ctx.logger, 'warn').mockImplementation(() => undefined)
-    const failures: unknown[] = []
-    ctx.on('agent-loop/config-start-failed', (_sessionId, error) => { failures.push(error) })
-
-    const loop = await ctx.plugin(AgentLoop, {
-      agents: [{ id: 'main', sessionId: SessionId('stdio-exact-dispose'), model: 'mock' }],
-    })
-    let disposed = false
-    const disposal = loop.dispose().then(() => { disposed = true })
-    await Promise.resolve()
-    expect(disposed).toBe(false)
-
-    listing.reject(new Error('startup cancelled by teardown'))
-    await disposal
-    expect(ctx.agents.get(SessionId('stdio-exact-dispose'))).toBeUndefined()
-    expect(failures).toEqual([])
-    expect(warn).not.toHaveBeenCalled()
-    warn.mockRestore()
-    await ctx.fiber.dispose()
-  })
+  it.each(['resolve', 'reject'] as const)(
+    'joins an exact-id persistence lookup that will %s before AgentLoop disposal completes',
+    async (outcome) => {
+      const root = await mkdtemp(join(tmpdir(), 'dsh-cfg-exact-dispose-'))
+      dirs.push(root)
+      const ctx = await makeCoreContext()
+      await ctx.plugin(SessionPersistenceJsonl, { root })
+      const listing = Promise.withResolvers<Awaited<ReturnType<typeof ctx.sessionPersistence.list>>>()
+      vi.spyOn(ctx.sessionPersistence, 'list').mockReturnValue(listing.promise)
+      const warn = vi.spyOn(ctx.logger, 'warn').mockImplementation(() => undefined)
+      const failures: unknown[] = []
+      ctx.on('agent-loop/config-start-failed', (_sessionId, error) => { failures.push(error) })
+
+      const loop = await ctx.plugin(AgentLoop, {
+        agents: [{ id: 'main', sessionId: SessionId('stdio-exact-dispose'), model: 'mock' }],
+      })
+      let disposed = false
+      const disposal = loop.dispose().then(() => { disposed = true })
+      await Promise.resolve()
+      expect(disposed).toBe(false)
+
+      if (outcome === 'resolve') listing.resolve([])
+      else listing.reject(new Error('startup cancelled by teardown'))
+      await disposal
+      expect(ctx.agents.get(SessionId('stdio-exact-dispose'))).toBeUndefined()
+      expect(failures).toEqual([])
+      expect(warn).not.toHaveBeenCalled()
+      warn.mockRestore()
+      await ctx.fiber.dispose()
+    },
+  )
 
   it('identity-nests the deferred resume fiber under its labeled owner effect', async () => {
     const ctx = new Context()

packages/core/agent/README.md

@@ -52,8 +52,27 @@ The handle every plugin programs against:
 
 - Agent creation: `AgentLoop.create()` is the concrete config-path implementation (in `dsh-agent-loop`), while programmatic consumers create/resume owned agents through `ctx.agents.create()` / `ctx.agents.resume()`. Replace the loop by implementing `Agent` and registering via `ctx.agents.register()`.
 - Event listeners: all `agent/*` events are declared here — no dependency on the loop package needed.
-- Subagent delegation: implemented by `@deepseek-ai/dsh-subagent`, not by a method on `Agent`; providers create or drive ordinary `Agent` handles through the factory seam, so spawn/fork/ACP transports stay outside the core agent interface.
+- Subagent delegation is not an `Agent` method; providers create or drive ordinary handles through the factory seam, so delegation transports stay outside the core agent interface.
 
-### What is NOT here (TODO)
+## Model Experience
+
+### User, steering, and injected messages
+
+**What the model sees**: `send`, `steer`, and `inject` feed the owning session. `agent/prompt-submit`, `agent/session-prefix`, and other declared events let plugins block a prompt or add request material; this interface contributes no fixed prose itself.
+
+**Token effect**: Accepted content becomes retained history or a repeated session prefix; blocked content contributes no request tokens. Size is caller- and plugin-dependent.
+
+### Agent-scoped request composition
+
+**What the model sees**: Registrations through `agent.ctx` can shadow prompt sections or tools and can install agent-only interceptors during unpublished setup.
+
+**Token effect**: The package adds zero tokens itself; scoped contributions affect only that agent and disappear on disposal.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
 
 - **Inter-agent channels beyond delegation** — shared state, streaming child output, and background/poll semantics remain outside the current synchronous `ctx.subagents` seam.
+- **`agent/session-start` cannot gate startup** — it remains a synchronous, veto-less notification; async composition that must finish before publication belongs in the factory's `setup(agentCtx)` transaction instead.
+- **No public step-only abort** — `cancel()` clears ALL pending work (queued + steering + in-flight); an abort that preserves queued prompts returns only with a named consumer ([stop-surface RFC](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/simplification/2026-06-20-public-agent-stop-surface.md)).
+- **`HookContext` carries exactly one `MessageSource`** — contributions from several plugins merged onto one tool call collapse under one source; mixed provenance is unrepresentable.
+- **`SessionStartSource` reserves `'clear'`/`'compact'` with no emitter yet** — only `'startup'`/`'resume'` occur until the driving subsystems land (`TODO(compaction)`).
+- **`agent/pre-step`'s `fullSystemPrompt`/`sessionPrefix` parameters are a flagged smell** — compaction is their only consumer; a lazy prompt provider or a compaction-specific pressure seam is the marked revisit.

packages/core/scope/README.md

@@ -18,3 +18,9 @@ Scoped-context registration primitive. `createScope(ctx, key)` mints a Cordis co
 Ownership and visibility derive from ONE fact — which context a registration went through. An explicit `{ scope }` registration parameter could express "visible to X, disposed with Y", which is almost always a bug; the scoped context makes it unrepresentable. This is trusted registration and listener routing, not sandboxing or an authority hierarchy: a same-process plugin is not confined, and a child scope need not be a subset of its parent's view. Rationale, alternatives, and the security non-goal: [the agent-scope RFC](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/architecture/2026-07-08-agent-scope-contexts.md#security-and-authority-are-explicit-non-goals).
 
 Handing out a scoped context hands out the minting plugin's service-resolution surface (resolution walks the minting fiber's dependency chain, not the holder's) — mint it from the plugin whose dependencies the scoped registrations need to resolve.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **Only scope-aware surfaces isolate state** — registries must file by `scopeOf()` and events must dispatch through `scopeTarget()`; an arbitrary Cordis service remains context-global merely because it is called through a scoped context.
+- **A context carries one nearest scope key** — nested scopes shadow their parent's tag rather than forming hierarchical or multi-membership policy sets.
+- **Service reachability comes from the scope minter** — handing out `Scope.ctx` also hands out the minting plugin's injected service surface, so a broader minter cannot later be narrowed by the holder.

packages/core/session/README.md

@@ -78,6 +78,29 @@ Every `SessionEvent` carries two optional top-level fields (structural metadata)
 - Replay/fork: `ctx.sessions.create(id, { seed })` seeds a new session with an existing event log. The surface rebuilds deterministically from `surfaceOp` markers in the seeded events. The constructor reads each seed entry once and uses the same one-pass lossless-JSON snapshot and exact surface-metadata shape checks as `append`, then enforces contiguous seqs and deep-freezes every accepted record; a stateful caller, exotic nested value, marker-less or malformed surface event, metadata on a non-surface event, or retained seed reference therefore cannot silently change the reconstructed history. Broader turn-enclosure checks stay in `dsh-invariants` and persistence repair. Ordinary live-session forks use `ctx.sessions.fork(source, boundary?, childSessionId?)`, where `boundary` is the inclusive source event seq to fork through.
 - Compaction: the `dsh-compact-basic` plugin appends a `user/message` with `surfaceOp: { op: 'replace', start, end }` to shadow old surface nodes behind a summary checkpoint.
 
-### What is NOT here (TODO)
+## Model Experience
+
+### Derived message history
+
+**What the model sees**: The model receives projections of `user/message`, `assistant/message`, and `tool/result` surface nodes verbatim. A `context/message` is a user-role message containing exactly `<context source="<source-kind>">`, its content blocks, and `</context>`; `steering/message` uses the identical `<steering source="<source-kind>">` / `</steering>` wrapper. Tool calls live inside assistant messages. Chunks, boundaries, usage, hook records, todo records, and other log-only events add no message.
+
+**Token effect**: Appended surface nodes are resent on later steps. A `replace` surface operation removes the shadowed nodes from future inputs without deleting their raw log records.
+
+### Crash-repair result
+
+**What the model sees**: If a persisted turn ended with unanswered tool calls, each synthetic error result contains exactly `Tool call interrupted by a crash; no result was recorded.`
+
+**Token effect**: Zero tokens in an intact session. Each repaired call adds this retained error text on resume.
+
+### Logged request header
+
+**What the model sees**: The session reconstructs the system prompt, tool schemas, call config, and session prefix that the loop actually sent. Header events do not add a second copy to message history; the prefix is prepended outside `deriveMessages()`.
+
+**Token effect**: Zero duplicate tokens from logging. The reconstructed prefix, system text, and schemas still incur their normal per-request cost.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
 
 - **Session branching/tree** (pi-style entry tree) — deferred unless needed beyond boundary-based `fork()`.
+- **`fork()` cuts only at closed-turn boundaries of live sessions** — the boundary must be a `turn/end` event and the source must be in the store; forking a persisted-but-unloaded session is excluded from the [fork API](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/feature/2026-06-30-session-store-fork-api.md).
+- **`SESSION_FORMAT_VERSION` stays pinned at `0`** — pre-release, no compatibility implied: a backend rejects any other version, and no migration path exists until the first release ([policy](../../../AGENTS.md)).
+- **`TurnEndReasonMap` omits the ACP-named `refusal` / `max_turn_requests` variants** — producer-gated: they land when an adapter or the loop first emits them.

packages/core/system-prompt/README.md

@@ -38,9 +38,31 @@ Merge-extensible: plugins can declare extra fields on `PromptAssembly` and `Asse
 - Tool schema providers: `ToolRegistry` registers itself as a tool provider automatically.
 - The [`system-prompt/assemble` waterfall](#live-events): cooperatively mutate or replace the assembly per caller.
 
-### What is NOT here
+Design rationale: [the prompt-variables RFC](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/architecture/2026-07-05-prompt-variables-and-tool-guidance-ownership.md).
 
-- Any end-user prompt-editing API — this plugin owns the config-authored global persona default, creator plugins may register agent-scoped shadows during setup, and every other section comes from the plugin that owns the fact. (The `harness:identity` line is deliberately a code literal: a harness fact, not a deployment choice; the `system-prompt/assemble` waterfall is the escape valve for a deployment that must drop it.)
-- Prompt compaction (belongs on the `agent/pre-step` seam in `dsh-agent`).
+## Model Experience
 
-Design rationale: [the prompt-variables RFC](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/architecture/2026-07-05-prompt-variables-and-tool-guidance-ownership.md).
+### System prompt
+
+**What the model sees**: Every assembly starts with the harness identity below, then the configured persona and ordered plugin sections after strict variable interpolation. Empty sections disappear; scoped sections and variables can shadow globals for one agent. The final `system-prompt/assemble` waterfall result is authoritative, so an expert listener's changes determine the delivered prompt and tool schemas.
+
+**Token effect**: Identity is a fixed per-request cost. Persona and plugin text are repeated per request and scale with their rendered content.
+
+#### Harness identity
+
+```markdown
+You are an AI agent powered by the DeepSeek Harness SDK.
+```
+
+### Tool schemas
+
+**What the model sees**: For shipped tools, the model receives the per-agent-visible subset of the [generated tool schemas](../../../docs/tool-catalog.md#tool-package-map), ordered by configuration or lexicographically after restrictions and assembly interception. Extensions can contribute additional definitions through the same registry. Sections and schema providers are separate assembly inputs, so a tool restriction does not remove independently registered guidance.
+
+**Token effect**: Schema tokens repeat on every request. Restricting a tool removes its entire schema cost for that agent but not a separate prompt section; reordering changes cache shape but not semantic content.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **Deployment-authored prompt text is config/composition only** — this plugin owns the global persona default, creator plugins may register agent-scoped shadows, and other sections come from the plugin that owns the fact; there is no end-user prompt-editing API.
+- **No escape syntax for literal `{{…}}` braces** — every complete group is interpolated against registered variables; an escape is deferred until a real prompt needs one.
+- **`toolOrder` misconfiguration surfaces at prompt assembly (the first turn), not at boot** — only shape violations throw at config load.
+- **Sections sharing an `order` value tie-break by registration order** — a plugin-load artifact; determinism relies on the distinct-order band convention, unlike the canonicalized tool order.

packages/core/tools/README.md

@@ -138,7 +138,47 @@ Under `mode: code` (or `both`) the registry turns the tool surface into a progra
 
 The wire collapse is the registry's own contribution (`systemPrompt.tools()` is mode-aware), so the logged `request/header` records it for free. When no assembly listener changes the registry's prompt or schema contributions, `code` assembles exactly `[run_code]`, pinned by tests and the snapshot goldens. Try it: `pnpm run demo:code-mode` ([the coding-agent example's Code Mode overlay](../../../examples/coding-agent/README.md#code-mode)); `pnpm run demo:code-mode acp` serves the same mode over ACP instead of the REPL.
 
-### What is NOT here (TODO)
+## Model Experience
 
-- **Concurrency metadata** — tool definitions do not declare whether executions are safe to overlap.
-- **Parallel execution** — the loop and Code Mode bridge execute tool calls sequentially until that metadata exists.
+### Normal tool schemas
+
+**What the model sees**: In normal mode the model sees each visible definition's exact name, description, and JSON schema; the shipped definitions are recorded in the generated [tool package map and schema sections](../../../docs/tool-catalog.md#tool-package-map). Agent-scoped restrictions, shadows, and extension registrations change that agent's end-tool set.
+
+**Token effect**: Fixed per-request cost proportional to the visible definitions. Restrictions that hide tools remove their entire schema cost for that agent.
+
+### Code Mode schema and system prompt
+
+**What the model sees**: Code Mode exposes the generated [`run_code` schema](../../../docs/tool-catalog.md#deepseek-aidsh-tools), the SDK instructions below, and the generated exact `declare const tools` block. `both` exposes normal schemas and this Code Mode surface.
+
+**Token effect**: Fixed per-request cost proportional to the visible definitions. Code Mode trades end-tool schemas for generated SDK text plus one transport schema rather than promising a universal reduction.
+
+#### Code Mode SDK instructions
+
+```markdown
+## Writing code for run_code
+
+Pass `run_code` the body of an async TypeScript function (erasable syntax only — no `enum` or namespaces; type annotations are advisory, the code runs type-stripped). Inside the program:
+
+- Call tools as `await tools.name(args)` — quoted access for exotic names: `tools["my-tool"](args)`. Every call resolves to the tool's text output as a string. Tool arguments must be JSON-serializable.
+- A FAILED tool call rejects with an `Error` carrying the tool's error text — `try/catch` it to handle and continue.
+- Calls execute sequentially, even under `Promise.all`.
+- Emit results with `return` and/or `console.log(...)`. ONLY what you print or return comes back to you — intermediate tool results never enter the conversation, so extract just what you need.
+
+The available tools:
+```
+
+### Tool-call history and results
+
+**What the model sees**: The loop retains model-emitted arguments and the registry's final content. Any thrown or denied call becomes exactly `Error: <message>`. Code Mode returns only the outer program's printed lines and rendered return value, `(run_code completed with no output)` when both are empty, or `Error: code run failed (<kind>): <message>` followed conditionally by `Captured output:` and the captured lines. Inner dispatch events stay log-only; post-execute listeners may append source-attributed context after the result.
+
+**Token effect**: Arguments, results, and additional context are data-dependent and resent until compaction. Restrictions that hide tools also remove their schemas before the model can call them.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **Native tool calls execute sequentially** — `ToolDefinition` carries no concurrency-safety metadata; adding it (and parallel execution in the loop) waits on the deferred tool-shapes review (`TODO(review)`).
+- **`tools/pre-execute` deliberately cannot rewrite `exec.arguments`** — logged and rendered args would desync from what ran; the rewrite design is [a proposed RFC](../../../docs/rfc/proposed/feature/2026-06-30-pre-tool-input-rewrite.md).
+- **`defineTool`'s schema DSL is a deliberate subset** — string/number/boolean/object/array with string-only `enum`; `validateArgs` tolerates extra keys and never applies `default` (`XXX(unused-default)` flags removing that field); raw-registered JSON-Schema tools validate their own input.
+- **`timeoutMs` on a definition is declarative only** — the registry never enforces deadlines; enforcement requires the `@deepseek-ai/dsh-timeout-policy` wrapper.
+- **Code Mode is TypeScript-only and the presentation mode is service-wide** — `mode: code`/`both` rejects prompt assembly unless `ctx.codeRuntime.language === 'typescript'`; scoped restrictions/shadows still choose each agent's visible bindings, but one tool cannot be native-only while another is code-only.
+- **Code Mode bindings return text only** — non-text content blocks in a sub-call result collapse to `[<type> content]` placeholders.
+- **`run_code` state is fresh per run** — a persistent REPL-style kernel is rejected for the MVP (cross-call state would be invisible to the log); see [the Code Mode RFC](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/feature/2026-06-15-code-mode.md).

packages/fs/fs-local/README.md

@@ -19,8 +19,17 @@ await ctx.plugin(LocalFileSystem, { cwd: process.cwd() })
 - **`writeText`** — atomic: writes to a temp file opened exclusively (`wx`, `0o600`) inside a randomly-named private staging dir (`0o700`) next to the target, fsyncs, then renames over the target. An existing file's mode is preserved, while new files default to `0o600`. The `expected` guard is OPTIONAL: omitting it unconditionally creates-or-overwrites; `createIfAbsent` creates a missing target and rejects an existing one (`FS_NOT_OBSERVED`); `replaceIfVersion` replaces only at the observed version (a missing target or mismatch is `FS_STALE_VERSION`).
 - **`editText`** — atomic literal read-modify-write over the same primitive, serialized per target by a mutation lock. The `expected` guard is OPTIONAL: when supplied it verifies the version BEFORE literal matching (a stale edit reports `FS_STALE_VERSION`, never `FS_EDIT_NOT_FOUND`/`FS_AMBIGUOUS_EDIT` against newer content); omitting it edits the current content unconditionally. A missing target reports `FS_STALE_VERSION` either way. LF-normalizes for matching, restores the file's dominant CRLF/LF style, and rejects empty `oldString` / zero matches (`FS_EDIT_NOT_FOUND`) or ambiguous multi-matches without `replace_all` (`FS_AMBIGUOUS_EDIT`).
 
-## `cwd` is not a sandbox
+The raw I/O lives in `src/fsio.ts` (Cordis-free, independently unit-tested); `src/index.ts` is the thin service wiring.
 
-`config.cwd` is a resolution default, not a containment boundary — absolute paths and `..` escape it. Enforce containment with a stricter `ctx.fs` backend or a permission plugin on the `tools/execute` waterfall. See [the filesystem capability-seam RFC's Consequences section](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/architecture/2026-06-17-filesystem-capability-seam.md#consequences).
+## Model Experience
 
-The raw I/O lives in `src/fsio.ts` (Cordis-free, independently unit-tested); `src/index.ts` is the thin service wiring.
+Indirectly, through `dsh-tool-fs`, which renders this provider's line-windowed UTF-8 content, mutation acknowledgements, and exact provider messages under `Error: <message>` into capped retained tool results while versions, atomic-write mechanics, and directory metadata remain internal.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **`config.cwd` is not a sandbox** — it is a resolution default, not containment: absolute paths and `..` escape it. Enforce containment with a stricter `ctx.fs` backend or a permission plugin on the `tools/execute` waterfall ([capability-seam RFC](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/architecture/2026-06-17-filesystem-capability-seam.md#consequences)).
+- **An overwrite reads the whole prior file into memory** — solely as the UI diff basis; bounding that pre-read above a size threshold is deferred (`TODO(overwrite-diff-bound)`).
+- **Version tokens are `mtimeMs:size`** — an external change that preserves both within the filesystem's timestamp granularity defeats the stale guard.
+- **`editText` holds the whole file (plus the edited copy) in memory** — streaming exists only on the read path.
+- **Binary detection is asymmetric** — reads NUL-sample only the first 8192 bytes while edits scan the whole buffer, so a file with a late NUL reads fine but rejects edits.
+- **The per-target mutation lock is in-process only** — a writer in another process is caught only by the optional version guard, never serialized.

packages/fs/fs-policy/README.md

@@ -46,3 +46,18 @@ The `fs/write-intent`/`fs/edit-intent` slots hold exactly one decider — this p
 ## No method coupling
 
 Because the plugin influences the world only through events, removing it does not break `@deepseek-ai/dsh-tool-fs` at a service-injection boundary: the tool falls through to the bare `ctx.fs` provider (unconditional write/edit, no observed-state). Loading it back layers the policy on. That graceful add/remove is the whole point of the event gate over a mandatory method service.
+
+## Model Experience
+
+### Filesystem tool outcome
+
+**What the model sees**: This plugin adds no prompt or schema. Through `dsh-tool-fs`, an edit without a prior read becomes exactly `Error: edit requires reading "<path>" first` with code `FS_NOT_OBSERVED`; guarded mutations whose observed version is stale receive the backend's exact `Error: cannot <write-or-edit> "<path>": file changed since it was read` with code `FS_STALE_VERSION`. Observation state itself is never shown.
+
+**Token effect**: Zero tokens on allowed operations beyond the ordinary tool result. A denial adds the small retained error result and avoids any success payload.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **Observed state does not survive a session resume** — persistence of the `WeakMap` record is deferred, so a resumed session must re-read files before guarded writes/edits.
+- **Actors without an agent session can never satisfy the policy** — their edits throw `FS_NOT_OBSERVED` and their writes always resolve `createIfAbsent`, so a non-agent caller cannot overwrite an existing file through the gate.
+- **Direct `ctx.fs` reads emit no `fs/observed`** — a file read outside the `read` tool stays unobserved, and a later guarded edit rejects with `FS_NOT_OBSERVED` until the tool reads it.
+- **Authorization is version freshness, not view completeness** — any windowed read authorizes a full-file overwrite of an unchanged file, deliberately weaker than a full-view rule ([seam-split RFC](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/simplification/2026-06-26-fsspec-style-fs-seam.md)).

packages/fs/fs/README.md

@@ -42,3 +42,14 @@ This package declares three events (see the generated [events catalog](../../../
 ## Vocabulary
 
 `FsTargetKey` / `FsVersion` are branded opaque ids ([the branded-ids RFC](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/architecture/2026-06-20-branded-ids.md)) — consumers must not parse `targetKey` or interpret `version`; only `displayPath` is for model/UI output. `FsWriteIntent` is the explicit GUARDED write intent (`createIfAbsent` creates a missing target and rejects an existing one with `FS_NOT_OBSERVED`; `replaceIfVersion` replaces only at the observed version, else `FS_STALE_VERSION`); omitting it from `writeText` is the third, unconditional state. Failures throw `FsError` (extends `HarnessError`, [the structured error taxonomy RFC](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/architecture/2026-06-11-structured-error-taxonomy.md)) carrying a stable `FsErrorCode` (`FS_NOT_FOUND`, `FS_NOT_DIRECTORY`, `FS_NOT_TEXT`, `FS_NOT_REGULAR_FILE`, `FS_PERMISSION_DENIED`, `FS_IO_ERROR`, `FS_STALE_VERSION`, `FS_NOT_OBSERVED`, `FS_AMBIGUOUS_EDIT`, `FS_EDIT_NOT_FOUND`, `FS_ABORTED`); the tool registry surfaces `{ name, code }` on `isError` results. See `src/types.ts` for the full contracts.
+
+## Model Experience
+
+Indirectly, through `dsh-tool-fs`, which renders provider text and errors as bounded, retained filesystem tool results.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **Text-only by contract** — backends reject binary/non-UTF-8 content with `FS_NOT_TEXT`; binary-safe operations are a deliberate deferral of [the tool-schemas RFC](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/feature/2026-06-17-filesystem-tool-schemas.md).
+- **Seven primitives only** — no delete, rename/move, copy, or watch; `listDir` is single-level, with recursion, globbing, pagination, and search out of scope per [the directory-listing RFC](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/architecture/2026-07-03-filesystem-directory-listing-seam.md).
+- **No IO deadline** — the seam arms no timeout; cancellation is a best-effort optional `AbortSignal` per primitive (the deliberate [fs-family stance](../README.md)).
+- **Resolve-then-operate costs a remote backend two round-trips per tool call** — folding or caching resolution is left to such a backend.

packages/fs/tool-fs/README.md

@@ -47,3 +47,59 @@ The tool passes `exec` (the tool-execution context) as the opaque `actor` on eve
 `fs/observed` fires AFTER the read/write/edit already succeeded, via a plain `ctx.emit`. A listener is contractually a synchronous, side-effect-only recorder (`@deepseek-ai/dsh-fs-policy`'s is a `WeakMap.set`); the tool does not guard the emit, so a listener that throws would surface as the tool's `isError` result — async or fallible observation does not belong on this event.
 
 The read rendering (line windowing + output formatting) lives in `src/read-render.ts` (Cordis-free, independently unit-tested); `src/read.ts`/`write.ts`/`edit.ts` are the tool executors and `src/index.ts` composes them.
+
+## Model Experience
+
+### System prompt
+
+**What the model sees**: Every request in this plugin's registration scope receives the independently registered read, write, and edit guidance below. Scoped tool restrictions can hide schemas without removing these sections.
+
+**Token effect**: Fixed guidance cost per request while the plugin is active, even when a restriction hides one or more tools.
+
+#### Read guidance
+
+```markdown
+Use the read tool — not shell commands like cat — to inspect text files. Results include line numbers. Use offset and limit to continue reading large files.
+```
+
+#### Write guidance
+
+```markdown
+Use the write tool to create files or completely replace file contents. Existing files are overwritten, so read an existing file first (the default fs-policy requires it) and prefer edit for targeted changes.
+```
+
+#### Edit guidance
+
+```markdown
+Use the edit tool for targeted changes to existing UTF-8 text files. It replaces literal old_string with new_string; by default old_string must appear exactly once. If old_string appears multiple times, provide a more specific old_string or set replace_all to true. Read the file first (the default fs-policy requires it), unless you just created or edited it in this session.
+```
+
+### Tool schemas
+
+**What the model sees**: The model sees the generated [`read`, `write`, and `edit` schemas](../../../docs/tool-catalog.md#deepseek-aidsh-tool-fs), with snake_case arguments. Scoped tool restrictions can remove any definition for one agent.
+
+**Token effect**: Fixed schema cost on every request in that tool view.
+
+### Read result
+
+**What the model sees**: A successful read is exactly `<path><displayPath></path>`, newline, `<type>file</type>`, newline, `<content>`, numbered lines as `<lineNumber>: <text>`, a blank line, one footer, and `</content>`. The footer is exactly `(Output capped. Showing lines <start>-<end>. Use offset=<next> to continue.)`, `(Showing lines <start>-<end> of <total>. Use offset=<next> to continue.)`, or `(End of file - total <total> lines)`. A long line ends exactly `... (line truncated to <max> chars)`.
+
+**Token effect**: Read output is capped by `readLimit`, `readMaxLineLength`, and `readMaxBytes`; the retained call and result are resent until compaction.
+
+### Write and edit results
+
+**What the model sees**: Write returns the exact five-line envelope `<path><displayPath></path>`, `<type>file</type>`, `<content>`, `Created file` or `Updated file`, then `</content>`. Edit returns exactly `The file <displayPath> has been updated successfully.` or, for `replace_all`, `The file <displayPath> has been updated. All occurrences were successfully replaced.` The full write or replacement text remains in the assistant tool-call arguments.
+
+**Token effect**: Success text is small, but large mutation arguments and any result are resent until compaction.
+
+### Tool errors
+
+**What the model sees**: Failures are normalized as `Error: <message>`. This package's stable validation and read messages are `file_path must be a non-empty string`, `limit must be less than or equal to <max>`, `old_string must be a non-empty string`, `old_string and new_string must differ`, `cannot read "<path>": not found`, `cannot read "<path>": not a regular file`, and `offset <offset> is out of range for "<path>" (<total> lines)`; provider and policy templates are quoted in their package READMEs.
+
+**Token effect**: Only a failing call adds these retained tokens.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **No directory-listing, glob, grep, or search tools ship** — a deferral of [the tool-schemas RFC](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/feature/2026-06-17-filesystem-tool-schemas.md); `ctx.fs.listDir` serves provider code such as skill discovery but still has no model-facing consumer, so models fall back to `bash`.
+- **`read` handles UTF-8 text files only** — binary-safe reads and PDF/image/multimodal content are deferred; a directory target is `FS_NOT_REGULAR_FILE`.
+- **No timeout surface** — `read`/`write`/`edit` take no timeout argument and declare no `timeout-policy` budget; cancellation rides `exec.signal` only (the deliberate [fs-family stance](../README.md)).

packages/guard/repeat-tool-guard/README.md

@@ -35,3 +35,42 @@ Reminders ride the post-execute decision's `additionalContext` (source `{kind: '
 ## Testing
 
 Unit suites drive a real agent loop against a mock adapter (no network) and cover the chain semantics above to per-file 100%. The snapshot tier owns the transcript surface: a scripted-replay scenario repeats a call five times and pins both reminder tiers (gentle at 3, detailed at 5) as `context/message`s in the ACP transcript.
+
+## Model Experience
+
+### First-threshold context message
+
+**What the model sees**: At the first configured consecutive-repeat threshold, that agent receives the reminder below. No tool schema or normal-call text is added.
+
+**Token effect**: Zero tokens before the threshold. The reminder is retained history for that agent.
+
+#### First-threshold reminder
+
+```markdown
+You are repeating the exact same tool call with identical arguments. Carefully analyze the previous result before calling again: if the task is not complete, try a different approach or different arguments instead of repeating the call.
+```
+
+### Later-threshold context message
+
+**What the model sees**: A later threshold receives the detailed reminder template below. A capped argument preview ends exactly `… (+<omitted> more chars)`.
+
+**Token effect**: Each reminder is retained history; `argumentsPreviewChars` bounds its data-dependent argument text, while agents keep independent counters.
+
+#### Later-threshold reminder
+
+```markdown
+Repeated tool call detected:
+- tool: <toolName>
+- consecutive_calls: <count>
+- arguments: <canonicalArguments>
+The repeated calls are not making progress. Do not call this tool with these exact arguments again. Inspect the latest result and choose a different action, different arguments, or finish the task if enough evidence has been gathered.
+```
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **Exact-match detection only** — canonicalization is a deep key-sort, so near-identical variants (a tweaked path, extra whitespace inside a value) evade the chain; fuzzy matching is rejected pending evidence of need.
+- **Compaction does not reset chains** — a chain spanning a compaction checkpoint keeps counting.
+- **Advisory only** — escalating to `block` at a high threshold is not implemented, though `PostToolDecision` already supports blocking.
+- **No subagent chain-sharing** — chains stay isolated per agent; a parent and its subagent repeating the same call never combine.
+- **Legitimate idempotent polling still draws nudges** past the thresholds — the pressure valves are `thresholds`/`exclude` config.
+- **Past the highest threshold a chain goes silent** — reminders fire only at exact configured counts, never beyond them.

packages/hooks/hook-protocol/README.md

@@ -29,6 +29,11 @@ Declaration-merged into `SessionEventMap` (log-only, like `compact/*` — NOT a
 
 Like every event they must sit inside an open turn. The mid-turn points (`PreToolUse`/`PostToolUse`/`UserPromptSubmit`/`Stop`) fire inside the loop's open turn by construction; `SessionStart` gets no `hook/*` record (its injected `context/message` is the durable evidence) — see the hooks RFC.
 
-## Input rewrite is parsed but not honored
+## Model Experience
 
-`HookOutput.updatedInput` carries a hook's requested tool-input rewrite (CC `updatedInput`), but the harness does not honor it yet — input rewrite is a deferred consistency-design problem ([the pre-tool-input-rewrite RFC](../../../docs/rfc/proposed/feature/2026-06-30-pre-tool-input-rewrite.md)). A bridge logs + warns when a hook sets it. See `src/types.ts` for the full contracts.
+Indirectly, through `dsh-hooks-claude` and `dsh-hooks-codex`, which can turn parsed hook output into prompt context, blocked outcomes, or continuation feedback.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **`HookOutput.updatedInput` is parsed but not honored** — input rewrite is a deferred consistency-design problem ([the pre-tool-input-rewrite RFC](../../../docs/rfc/proposed/feature/2026-06-30-pre-tool-input-rewrite.md)); a bridge logs + warns when a hook sets it. See `src/types.ts` for the full contracts.
+- **An invalid matcher regex matches nothing, silently** — `matchesMatcher` never throws; surfacing the error needs a diagnostic-returning variant or parse-time validation (`TODO(matcher-diagnostics)`).

packages/hooks/hooks-claude/README.md

@@ -1,8 +1,8 @@
 # @deepseek-ai/dsh-hooks-claude
 
-A cordis plugin that runs a user's existing **Claude Code** hook config (a `hooks.json`, or a settings file's `hooks` key) on the harness's canonical interception seams. It is the **CC dialect** half of the hooks subsystem: it owns CC's per-event stdin payloads, CC's env + `${CLAUDE_PLUGIN_ROOT}`/`${CLAUDE_PROJECT_DIR}` substitution, and the mapping from a hook's neutral outcome onto the harness's typed Decisions. The dialect-agnostic primitives (matcher, exit-code/stdout codec, `ctx.bash` execution, most-restrictive merge, the `hook/*` events) come from [`@deepseek-ai/dsh-hook-protocol`](../hook-protocol/README.md).
+A cordis plugin that runs the supported command-hook subset of a user's existing **Claude Code** hook config (a `hooks.json`, or a settings file's `hooks` key) on the harness's canonical interception seams. It is the **CC dialect** half of the hooks subsystem: it owns the bridge's CC-shaped per-event stdin payloads, CC's env + `${CLAUDE_PLUGIN_ROOT}`/`${CLAUDE_PROJECT_DIR}` substitution, and the mapping from a hook's neutral outcome onto the harness's typed Decisions. The dialect-agnostic primitives (matcher, exit-code/stdout codec, `ctx.bash` execution, most-restrictive merge, the `hook/*` events) come from [`@deepseek-ai/dsh-hook-protocol`](../hook-protocol/README.md).
 
-A native cordis plugin could do everything this bridge does — more powerfully, with typed returns and no serialization boundary. **The bridge exists only to run UNMODIFIED external CC hooks faithfully**; anything bespoke should be a native plugin on the same seams (see [the interception-seams RFC](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/feature/2026-06-30-interception-seams.md)).
+A native cordis plugin could do everything this bridge does — more powerfully, with typed returns and no serialization boundary. **The bridge exists only as a compatibility path for the mapped CC command-hook subset**; anything bespoke should be a native plugin on the same seams (see [the interception-seams RFC](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/feature/2026-06-30-interception-seams.md)).
 
 ## Config
 
@@ -26,7 +26,7 @@ In a `cordis.yml`:
     projectDir: .
 ```
 
-The config is parsed **once** at load. `configPath` is **process-level**: a relative path resolves against the process's launch cwd at load time, so a single config applies to the whole process — there is no per-session (`session/new.cwd`) config discovery yet (`TODO(per-session-hook-config)`). A read/parse failure is contained — the bridge logs a warning and registers nothing rather than crashing boot (a typo'd path must not take the agent down). Only `type: 'command'` hooks run; a `prompt`/`agent`/HTTP hook is parsed-and-skipped with a warning. A hook with no per-hook `timeout` runs under the protocol's reference default (`DEFAULT_HOOK_TIMEOUT_MS` from `dsh-hook-protocol`, 10 minutes — the CC default).
+The config is parsed **once** at load. `configPath` is **process-level**: a relative path resolves against the process's launch cwd at load time, so a single config applies to the whole process — there is no per-session (`session/new.cwd`) config discovery yet (`TODO(per-session-hook-config)`). A read/parse failure is contained — the bridge logs a warning and registers nothing rather than crashing boot (a typo'd path must not take the agent down). Only shell-form `type: 'command'` hooks run; an `http`/`mcp_tool`/`prompt`/`agent` hook is parsed-and-skipped with a warning. A hook with no per-hook `timeout` runs under the protocol's reference default (`DEFAULT_HOOK_TIMEOUT_MS` from `dsh-hook-protocol`, 10 minutes — the CC default).
 
 The hooks **themselves** run in the agent's session workspace: for the agent-scoped points the bridge passes the session's `cwd` (the `session/new.cwd`) as the hook process's working directory, so a hook's `pwd`/relative-path/marker operates in the user's project tree, not the server launch dir.
 
@@ -50,8 +50,28 @@ The matcher subject is the tool name (`PreToolUse`/`PostToolUse`), the session s
 
 Injected context carries an explicit `{ kind: 'plugin', plugin: 'hooks-claude' }` source. `agent.inject()` defaults a missing source to `{ kind: 'user' }`, which would mislabel plugin context as a user prompt — so the bridge always names itself.
 
-## Deferred (faithful-but-degraded)
+## Model Experience
 
-- **`updatedInput` (tool-input rewrite)** is logged + warned, **not honored** — input rewrite is a deferred consistency-design problem ([the pre-tool-input-rewrite RFC](../../../docs/rfc/proposed/feature/2026-06-30-pre-tool-input-rewrite.md)).
-- **`systemMessage`** (a hook's user-facing warning) is logged + warned, **not surfaced** — there is no user-message channel on these seams yet (only model-facing `additionalContext`). The shared merge collects it; the bridge does not yet render it.
-- **Stop loop-guard.** CC breaks an infinite force-continue with `stop_hook_active` (true once a Stop hook has fired this run) plus a max-consecutive cap; both are deferred (`TODO(stop-loop-guard)`). Today `stop_hook_active` is always `false`, so a Stop hook that unconditionally blocks would force-continue every step — a hook author must self-limit until the guard lands.
+### Hook-provided context
+
+**What the model sees**: `SessionStart`, accepted prompt, post-tool, and live in-process subagent-start hooks can add source-attributed context messages; a blocking `Stop` hook adds its reason as next-step steering. Remote-child injection has no local target.
+
+**Token effect**: No cost when hooks return no context. Hook text is data-dependent, logged, and resent in later conversation requests until compaction.
+
+### Blocked prompt or tool outcome
+
+**What the model sees**: Provider-supplied reasons pass through verbatim. When absent, a blocked prompt uses exactly `blocked by UserPromptSubmit hook`, a denied tool becomes `Error: blocked by PreToolUse hook`, blocked post-tool feedback is exactly `blocked by PostToolUse hook`, and a blocking stop adds steering exactly `continue: blocked by Stop hook`. `systemMessage` and `updatedInput` are logged or warned but are not model-visible in this implementation.
+
+**Token effect**: Blocking a prompt removes that prompt's request tokens; denial or feedback adds the retained fallback or provider text; forced continuation pays another full request.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **Unsupported hook events (23 of Claude Code's current 30):** `Setup`, `InstructionsLoaded`, `UserPromptExpansion`, `MessageDisplay`, `PermissionRequest`, `PostToolUseFailure`, `PostToolBatch`, `PermissionDenied`, `Notification`, `TaskCreated`, `TaskCompleted`, `StopFailure`, `TeammateIdle`, `ConfigChange`, `CwdChanged`, `FileChanged`, `WorktreeCreate`, `WorktreeRemove`, `PreCompact`, `PostCompact`, `SessionEnd`, `Elicitation`, and `ElicitationResult`. Config for these events is parsed but never dispatched. The comparison baseline is Claude Code's [official hook-event reference](https://code.claude.com/docs/en/hooks#hook-events).
+- **`SessionStart` is partial:** JSON `additionalContext` is consumed, but plain stdout context, `initialUserMessage`, `sessionTitle`, `watchPaths`, `reloadSkills`, and `CLAUDE_ENV_FILE` are unsupported. The hook runs detached, so context can miss the first request (`TODO(session-start-gating)`), and the payload omits current optional fields such as `model`, `agent_type`, and `session_title`.
+- **`UserPromptSubmit` is partial:** blocking and JSON `additionalContext` work, but plain stdout context, `sessionTitle`, and `suppressOriginalPrompt` are unsupported. Unless overridden, the bridge also uses its 600-second default instead of Claude Code's event-specific 30-second command timeout.
+- **`PreToolUse` is partial:** `deny` and `ask` decisions work; `allow` does not pre-approve, `defer` is unsupported, `additionalContext` is ignored, and `updatedInput` is logged + warned but not honored ([the pre-tool-input-rewrite RFC](../../../docs/rfc/proposed/feature/2026-06-30-pre-tool-input-rewrite.md)).
+- **`PostToolUse` is partial:** blocking feedback and JSON `additionalContext` work, but `updatedToolOutput` and `updatedMCPToolOutput` are unsupported and `tool_response` is flattened to text.
+- **`SubagentStart` and `SubagentStop` are partial:** both report a constant `agent_type` of `general-purpose` and use the child session id where Claude Code reports the parent session. Start context is best-effort and can only reach a live in-process child, while stop is observe-only and cannot block the subagent or feed it context. Start omits `transcript_path`; stop also omits `agent_transcript_path`, `last_assistant_message`, `background_tasks`, and `session_crons` and always reports `stop_hook_active: false`.
+- **`Stop` is partial:** blocking forces another model turn, but `stop_hook_active` is always `false`, `last_assistant_message`, `background_tasks`, and `session_crons` are omitted, and the consecutive-block cap is not implemented (`TODO(stop-loop-guard)`). An unconditionally blocking hook therefore force-continues every step unless it self-limits.
+- **Common payload and output fields are partial:** mapped event payloads omit `prompt_id`, `transcript_path`, `permission_mode`, and `effort` where Claude Code would provide them. `systemMessage` is logged + warned but not surfaced; `{"continue": false}` is recorded but does not halt the run; `suppressOutput`, `stopReason`, and `terminalSequence` are not applied (`TODO(hook-continue-false)`).
+- **Handler and config support is partial:** only shell-form command handlers run. `http`, `mcp_tool`, `prompt`, and `agent` handlers are skipped; command-handler options such as `args`, `async`, `asyncRewake`, `shell`, `if`, `once`, and `statusMessage` are not honored. Matching handlers run serially and are not deduplicated, whereas Claude Code runs them in parallel and deduplicates identical handlers. One process-level `configPath` is parsed once at load; Claude Code's layered project, user, plugin, and policy discovery and live reload are not implemented (`TODO(per-session-hook-config)`).

packages/hooks/hooks-claude/src/config.ts

@@ -1,11 +1,11 @@
 /**
- * Parse a Claude Code hook config file into the shared {@link MatcherGroup}
- * shape, faithfully to CC's `hooks.json` / settings `hooks` key format.
+ * Parse the bridge-supported subset of a Claude Code hook config file into the
+ * shared {@link MatcherGroup} shape.
  *
  * A CC config maps each event name to an array of matcher groups, each holding
  * an array of typed hooks. Only `type: 'command'` hooks run here; other types
- * (`prompt`/`agent`/`http`) are PARSED but skipped with a warning (faithful-but-
- * degraded — the same stance Codex takes). The `command` string undergoes
+ * (`http`/`mcp_tool`/`prompt`/`agent`) are parsed but skipped with a warning.
+ * The `command` string undergoes
  * `${CLAUDE_PLUGIN_ROOT}` substitution at parse time so the runner sees a literal.
  *
  * @module @deepseek-ai/dsh-hooks-claude/config

packages/hooks/hooks-claude/src/index.ts

@@ -9,14 +9,13 @@
  * merge, the `hook/*` events) come from `@deepseek-ai/dsh-hook-protocol`.
  *
  * A native cordis plugin could do everything this bridge does — more powerfully,
- * with typed returns and no serialization boundary. The bridge exists only to
- * run UNMODIFIED external CC hooks faithfully; anything bespoke should be a
- * native plugin on the same seams.
+ * with typed returns and no serialization boundary. This bridge is a
+ * compatibility path for the mapped CC command-hook subset; anything bespoke
+ * should be a native plugin on the same seams.
  *
  * Scope: the seven in-scope hook points (`SessionStart`, `UserPromptSubmit`,
  * `PreToolUse`, `PostToolUse`, `Stop`, `SubagentStart`, `SubagentStop`). Only
- * `type: 'command'` hooks run; the matcher group config + exit-code/stdout
- * protocol are byte-faithful to CC. `updatedInput` (tool-input rewrite) is
+ * shell-form `type: 'command'` hooks run. `updatedInput` (tool-input rewrite) is
  * logged + warned, not honored (deferred — see the interception-seams RFC).
  *
  * @module @deepseek-ai/dsh-hooks-claude

packages/hooks/hooks-codex/README.md

@@ -1,16 +1,16 @@
 # @deepseek-ai/dsh-hooks-codex
 
-A cordis plugin that runs a user's existing **Codex** `hooks.json` on the harness's canonical interception seams. The **Codex dialect** half of the hooks subsystem. The dialect-agnostic primitives come from [`@deepseek-ai/dsh-hook-protocol`](../hook-protocol/README.md); this bridge owns the Codex-specific payloads, matcher mode, and decision mapping.
+A cordis plugin that runs the supported subset of a user's existing **Codex** hook config on the harness's canonical interception seams. The **Codex dialect** half of the hooks subsystem. The dialect-agnostic primitives come from [`@deepseek-ai/dsh-hook-protocol`](../hook-protocol/README.md); this bridge owns the Codex-shaped payloads, matcher mode, and decision mapping.
 
-Codex's hook protocol is a deliberate **subset** of Claude Code's (same `hooks.json` shape):
+This bridge implements a deliberate subset of Codex's current hook protocol:
 
-- **Five hook points only:** `PreToolUse`, `PostToolUse`, `SessionStart`, `UserPromptSubmit`, `Stop` — no subagent / notification / compaction hooks.
+- **Five of ten hook points:** `PreToolUse`, `PostToolUse`, `SessionStart`, `UserPromptSubmit`, and `Stop`.
 - **Regex-only matchers** (no literal fast path; the matcher is always an unanchored regex).
 - **snake_case stdin payloads** with `turn_id`/`model` extras, written **without** a trailing newline.
-- **No env vars and no command substitution** (a literal `${…}` in a command survives verbatim).
-- **A block-only decision model** — `allow`/`ask` are not honored; a hook can only block, never pre-approve.
+- **No Codex plugin env injection and no config-time placeholder substitution** (the command still receives the executor's environment and runs through its shell).
+- **No pre-tool approval or rewrite path** — a hook can block, but the bridge does not pre-approve or replace tool input.
 
-A native cordis plugin could do everything this bridge does, more powerfully; the bridge exists only to run UNMODIFIED external Codex hooks faithfully (see [the interception-seams RFC](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/feature/2026-06-30-interception-seams.md)).
+A native cordis plugin could do everything this bridge does, more powerfully; the bridge exists only as a compatibility path for the mapped Codex subset (see [the interception-seams RFC](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/feature/2026-06-30-interception-seams.md)).
 
 ## Config
 
@@ -32,7 +32,7 @@ In a `cordis.yml`:
     model: deepseek-v4
 ```
 
-The config is parsed **once** at load. `configPath` is **process-level** — a relative path resolves against the process launch cwd at load time, not per-session (`TODO(per-session-hook-config)`). A read/parse failure is contained (logs + registers nothing). Only sync `type: 'command'` hooks run — a non-command or `async: true` hook is parsed-and-skipped with a warning. A hook accepts `timeout` or the `timeoutSec` alias; one that sets neither runs under the protocol's reference default (`DEFAULT_HOOK_TIMEOUT_MS` from `dsh-hook-protocol`, 10 minutes). Events outside the five Codex points are dropped at parse.
+The config is parsed **once** at load. `configPath` is **process-level** — a relative path resolves against the process launch cwd at load time, not per-session (`TODO(per-session-hook-config)`). A read/parse failure is contained (logs + registers nothing). Only sync `type: 'command'` hooks run — a non-command or `async: true` hook is parsed-and-skipped with a warning. A hook accepts `timeout` or the `timeoutSec` alias; one that sets neither runs under the protocol's reference default (`DEFAULT_HOOK_TIMEOUT_MS` from `dsh-hook-protocol`, 10 minutes). Events outside the five bridge-supported points are dropped at parse.
 
 The hooks themselves run in the agent's session workspace: for the agent-scoped points the bridge passes the session's `cwd` as the hook process's working directory, so a hook operates in the user's project tree, not the server launch dir.
 
@@ -54,8 +54,27 @@ A tool call's payload carries the real `tool_name` (the same value the matcher t
 
 Injected context carries an explicit `{ kind: 'plugin', plugin: 'hooks-codex' }` source (`agent.inject()` would otherwise default it to `{ kind: 'user' }`).
 
-## Deferred
+## Model Experience
 
-**Stop loop-guard** (`TODO(stop-loop-guard)`): as in CC, a Stop hook that unconditionally blocks would force-continue every step (`stop_hook_active` is always `false` here); the loop-guard is deferred. A hook author must self-limit until it lands.
+### Hook-provided context
 
-**`systemMessage`**: a hook's user-facing warning is logged + warned, not surfaced — there is no user-message channel on these seams yet (only model-facing `additionalContext`).
+**What the model sees**: `SessionStart`, accepted prompt, and post-tool hooks can add source-attributed context messages; a blocking `Stop` hook adds its reason as next-step steering.
+
+**Token effect**: No cost when hooks return no context. Hook text is data-dependent, logged, and resent until compaction.
+
+### Blocked prompt or tool outcome
+
+**What the model sees**: Provider-supplied reasons pass through verbatim. When absent, a blocked prompt uses exactly `blocked by UserPromptSubmit hook`, a denied tool becomes `Error: blocked by PreToolUse hook`, blocked post-tool feedback is exactly `blocked by PostToolUse hook`, and a blocking stop adds steering exactly `continue: blocked by Stop hook`. Codex `systemMessage` is not surfaced.
+
+**Token effect**: Blocking a prompt removes its request tokens; denial or feedback adds the retained fallback or provider text; forced continuation pays another full request.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **Unsupported hook events (5 of Codex's current 10):** `PermissionRequest`, `PreCompact`, `PostCompact`, `SubagentStart`, and `SubagentStop`. Config for these events is silently dropped during parsing. The comparison baseline is Codex's [official hook reference](https://learn.chatgpt.com/docs/hooks).
+- **`SessionStart` is partial:** plain stdout and JSON `additionalContext` work, but the hook runs detached, so context can miss the first request (`TODO(session-start-gating)`).
+- **`UserPromptSubmit` is partial:** blocking plus plain-stdout or JSON context work, but the common `systemMessage` and `{"continue": false}` controls are not enforced.
+- **`PreToolUse` is partial:** blocking works, but `additionalContext`, `permissionDecision: "allow"`, and `updatedInput` are ignored. Every tool is represented as `tool_input: { command }`, so non-shell tool arguments are not faithfully exposed to the hook.
+- **`PostToolUse` is partial:** blocking feedback and JSON `additionalContext` work, but `{"continue": false}` is not enforced, non-shell tool arguments are reduced to `{ command }`, and structured tool output is flattened to text in `tool_response`.
+- **`Stop` is partial:** blocking forces another model turn, but `stop_hook_active` is always `false`, `last_assistant_message` is always `null`, and `{"continue": false}` is not enforced. An unconditionally blocking hook therefore force-continues every step unless it self-limits (`TODO(stop-loop-guard)`).
+- **Common payload and output fields are partial:** every mapped event reports `transcript_path: null`, the statically configured `model`, and `permission_mode: "default"` instead of current Codex runtime values. `systemMessage` is logged + warned but not surfaced, and `{"continue": false}` is recorded but does not apply Codex's event-specific stop behavior (`TODO(hook-continue-false)`).
+- **Config loading and execution are partial:** one process-level `configPath` is parsed at load; Codex's active user, project, session, system/managed, and plugin layers, trust controls, and inline `config.toml` hook form are not implemented (`TODO(per-session-hook-config)`). Only synchronous `command` handlers run, current metadata such as `statusMessage` and `commandWindows` is ignored, and matching handlers run serially rather than with Codex's concurrent launch semantics.

packages/hooks/hooks-codex/src/config.ts

@@ -1,17 +1,16 @@
 /**
- * Parse a Codex `hooks.json` into the shared {@link MatcherGroup} shape. Codex's
- * config format is a SUBSET of Claude Code's: the same event-name → matcher-group
- * structure and the same `{ type: 'command', command, timeout?/timeoutSec? }`
- * hook shape, but only five events and NO command-string substitution (Codex sets
- * no hook env vars and does not expand `${…}`). Non-command hooks (and Codex's
- * `async: true` commands) are parsed-and-skipped with a warning.
+ * Parse the bridge-supported subset of a Codex `hooks.json` into the shared
+ * {@link MatcherGroup} shape. The bridge accepts five events and the
+ * `{ type: 'command', command, timeout?/timeoutSec? }` hook shape, performs no
+ * config-time placeholder substitution or plugin-env injection, and skips
+ * non-command and `async: true` handlers with a warning.
  *
  * @module @deepseek-ai/dsh-hooks-codex/config
  */
 
 import type { MatcherGroup } from '@deepseek-ai/dsh-hook-protocol'
 
-/** The five hook points Codex's engine supports. */
+/** The five current Codex hook points this bridge supports. */
 export const CODEX_EVENTS = ['PreToolUse', 'PostToolUse', 'SessionStart', 'UserPromptSubmit', 'Stop'] as const
 
 /** A parsed Codex config: event name → its matcher groups (command hooks only). */
@@ -37,10 +36,10 @@ function asObject(value: unknown): Record<string, unknown> | undefined {
 
 /**
  * Parse a raw Codex `hooks.json` object into runnable {@link MatcherGroup}s.
- * Only the five {@link CODEX_EVENTS} are honored; an unknown event is dropped.
+ * Only the five bridge-supported {@link CODEX_EVENTS} are honored; another event is dropped.
  * `type !== 'command'` and `async: true` command hooks are skipped (recorded in
  * `skipped`). Malformed entries are ignored rather than thrown — a bad config
- * must not crash boot. No command substitution (Codex does none).
+ * must not crash boot. No config-time placeholder substitution is performed.
  * @param raw - the parsed JSON config: a `{ hooks: … }` wrapper or the bare event map.
  * @returns the runnable per-event groups plus the skipped hooks with their reasons.
  */

packages/hooks/hooks-codex/src/index.ts

@@ -3,14 +3,13 @@
  * `hooks.json` on the harness's canonical interception seams. The CODEX DIALECT
  * half of the hooks subsystem.
  *
- * Codex's hook protocol is a deliberate SUBSET of Claude Code's: five hook points
- * (`PreToolUse`, `PostToolUse`, `SessionStart`, `UserPromptSubmit`, `Stop` — no
- * subagent/notification/compaction), regex-only matchers, snake_case stdin
- * payloads with `turn_id`/`model` extras and NO trailing newline, no env vars and
- * no command substitution, and a block-only decision model (allow/ask are not
- * honored — a hook can only block, never pre-approve). The dialect-agnostic
+ * This bridge supports five of Codex's ten current hook points (`PreToolUse`,
+ * `PostToolUse`, `SessionStart`, `UserPromptSubmit`, and `Stop`), regex-only
+ * matchers, snake_case stdin payloads with `turn_id`/`model` extras and no
+ * trailing newline, no config-time placeholder substitution or plugin-env
+ * injection, and no pre-tool approval or rewrite path. The dialect-agnostic
  * primitives come from `@deepseek-ai/dsh-hook-protocol`; this bridge owns the
- * Codex-specific payloads + matcher mode + decision mapping.
+ * Codex-shaped payloads, matcher mode, and decision mapping.
  *
  * @module @deepseek-ai/dsh-hooks-codex
  */
@@ -263,9 +262,9 @@ export function apply(ctx: Context, config: Config): void {
   })
 
   // Stop → ContinuationDecision. A blocking Stop hook forces continuation.
-  // TODO(stop-loop-guard): like CC, a Stop hook that unconditionally blocks would
-  // force-continue every step (`stop_hook_active` is always false here); the
-  // loop-guard (stop_hook_active + a max-consecutive cap) is deferred.
+  // TODO(stop-loop-guard): Codex supplies `stop_hook_active` so a Stop hook can
+  // avoid continuing the same turn indefinitely. It is always false here, so an
+  // unconditionally blocking hook force-continues every step until it self-limits.
   ctx.on('agent/turn-continuation', async (agent, turn, _default, next): Promise<ContinuationDecision> => {
     const merged = await runPoint('Stop', '', { ...turnBase(agent, 'Stop', model), stop_hook_active: false, last_assistant_message: null }, { agent, turn })
     /* jscpd:ignore-end */

packages/hooks/hooks-codex/tests/bridge.spec.ts

@@ -117,10 +117,10 @@ describe('hooks-codex bridge', () => {
     expect(JSON.stringify(adapter.requests[1]!.messages)).toContain('keep going: address the goal')
   })
 
-  it('only the five Codex events are honored — a SubagentStop entry is ignored', async () => {
+  it('only the five bridge-supported Codex events are honored — a SubagentStop entry is ignored', async () => {
     const dir = configDir()
     const s = script(dir, 'x.sh', '#!/usr/bin/env bash\nexit 2\n')
-    // SubagentStop is NOT a Codex event; it must be dropped (no crash, no effect).
+    // SubagentStop is a current Codex event that this bridge drops (no crash, no effect).
     writeHooks(dir, { SubagentStop: [{ hooks: [{ type: 'command', command: s }] }] })
 
     const adapter = new MockAdapter([textResponse('fine')])

packages/hooks/hooks-codex/tests/config.spec.ts

@@ -2,11 +2,11 @@ import { describe, expect, it } from 'vitest'
 import { parseCodexConfig, CODEX_EVENTS } from '@deepseek-ai/dsh-hooks-codex/src/config.ts'
 
 describe('parseCodexConfig', () => {
-  it('honors only the five Codex events, dropping unknown ones', () => {
+  it('honors only the five bridge-supported Codex events, dropping the rest', () => {
     const { config } = parseCodexConfig({
       PreToolUse: [{ hooks: [{ type: 'command', command: 'a.sh' }] }],
-      SubagentStop: [{ hooks: [{ type: 'command', command: 'b.sh' }] }], // not a Codex event
-      Notification: [{ hooks: [{ type: 'command', command: 'c.sh' }] }], // not a Codex event
+      SubagentStop: [{ hooks: [{ type: 'command', command: 'b.sh' }] }], // current Codex event, unsupported by this bridge
+      Notification: [{ hooks: [{ type: 'command', command: 'c.sh' }] }], // unknown to current Codex
     })
     expect(Object.keys(config)).toEqual(['PreToolUse'])
     expect(CODEX_EVENTS).toContain('PreToolUse')
@@ -18,7 +18,7 @@ describe('parseCodexConfig', () => {
       Stop: [{ hooks: [{ type: 'command', command: '${NOT_SUBSTITUTED}/s.sh', timeout: 10 }] }],
       UserPromptSubmit: [{ hooks: [{ type: 'command', command: 'u.sh', timeoutSec: 20 }] }],
     })
-    // Codex does NO substitution — the literal ${…} survives.
+    // The parser performs no config-time substitution; shell expansion happens later.
     expect(config.Stop).toEqual([{ hooks: [{ command: '${NOT_SUBSTITUTED}/s.sh', timeoutSec: 10 }] }])
     expect(config.UserPromptSubmit).toEqual([{ hooks: [{ command: 'u.sh', timeoutSec: 20 }] }])
   })

packages/llm/llm-deepseek/README.md

@@ -34,10 +34,6 @@ Every request carries the shared attribution header from dsh-llm's `attributionH
 - **Reasoning passback rule**: on assistant turns that carried tool calls, `reasoning_content` is serialized back in history (required by the API in thinking mode); on tool-call-free turns it is dropped (ignored anyway — saves tokens).
 - Cache accounting: `cacheReadTokens` ← `prompt_cache_hit_tokens` / `prompt_tokens_details.cached_tokens`; DeepSeek reports no cache-write metric.
 
-## Limitations (MVP, documented deliberately)
-
-- `tool_choice` is not mapped (not part of the core vocabulary).
-
 ## Errors
 
 Non-2xx responses throw `LlmError` with stable codes: `AUTH` (401/403), `RATE_LIMIT` (429), `INVALID_REQUEST` (400), `SERVER` (5xx), `HTTP_<status>` otherwise. Protocol violations throw `STREAM_CLOSED` (no `[DONE]`) or `MALFORMED_RESPONSE` (bad JSON payload). Unknown wire `finish_reason`s (e.g. `content_filter`, `insufficient_system_resource`) become `finish {kind: 'error', code: <REASON>}` chunks.
@@ -45,3 +41,23 @@ Non-2xx responses throw `LlmError` with stable codes: `AUTH` (401/403), `RATE_LI
 ## Testing
 
 Unit suites run against a local `node:http` mock SSE server (no network). Real-API coverage lives in `tests/adapter.e2e.ts` (`pnpm run test:e2e`, key-gated): V4 Flash + V4 Pro across thinking enabled/disabled and both official effort levels, including the thinking+tools round trip with reasoning passback.
+
+## Model Experience
+
+### DeepSeek request
+
+**What the model sees**: The selected DeepSeek model receives the harness system prompt, message history, tool schemas, stop sequences, and call config without adapter-authored prompt prose. On a prior assistant turn with tool calls, its reasoning content is passed back as required; reasoning from tool-call-free turns is omitted.
+
+**Token effect**: Provider tokenization governs exact input. Conditional reasoning passback increases tool-round-trip context, while dropping other reasoning avoids paying those tokens again; cache-read usage is reported when available.
+
+### DeepSeek response
+
+**What the model sees**: Reasoning, text, and raw-string tool arguments are translated into harness chunks for the loop to log and assemble.
+
+**Token effect**: Generated tokens follow provider thinking and effort settings plus the request's `maxTokens`; only loop-retained blocks affect later input.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **`tool_choice` is not mapped** — not part of the core vocabulary (MVP cut, shared with the pi-ai twin).
+- **Requests use raw `fetch`, not `@cordisjs/plugin-http`** — no shared proxy/interception configuration; adoption is deferred until a second adapter wants it (`TODO(http)`).
+- **Serialization flattens user and tool-result content to text blocks** — plugin-added block types are skipped, and empty tool output crosses the wire as the literal `(no output)`.

packages/llm/llm-pi-ai/README.md

@@ -33,10 +33,28 @@ Every request carries the shared attribution header from dsh-llm's `attributionH
 
 pi-ai declares the openai/anthropic/google/mistral/AWS SDKs as install-time dependencies. They are lazy-loaded — only the openai SDK actually loads for this adapter — but they do land in `node_modules`. Accepted for a package whose purpose is design verification.
 
-## Limitations
-
-Same MVP contract as llm-deepseek: `tool_choice` is not mapped.
-
 ## Testing
 
 Unit suites run against a local `node:http` mock SSE server (pi-ai's openai SDK happily talks to any base URL). Real-API coverage in `tests/adapter.e2e.ts` (`pnpm run test:e2e`, key-gated): V4 Flash + V4 Pro across all exposed reasoning levels (off/high/xhigh), the thinking+tools round trip, and a cross-adapter structural-equivalence check against llm-deepseek.
+
+## Model Experience
+
+### DeepSeek request through pi-ai
+
+**What the model sees**: The selected model receives the same logical system prompt, history, tools, stop sequences, and raw replayed tool arguments as the hand-written adapter. This package adds no prompt prose and removes pi-ai's own per-tool `strict` default to preserve that contract.
+
+**Token effect**: Provider tokenization governs exact input. Reasoning level changes generated and passback content; pi-ai reports reasoning inside output usage rather than as a separate count.
+
+### DeepSeek response
+
+**What the model sees**: pi-ai events become harness reasoning, text, tool-call, usage, and finish chunks; parsed tool arguments are restored to raw JSON strings at the harness boundary.
+
+**Token effect**: Generated content affects later inputs only after the loop records it; adapter conversion adds no model-visible text.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **`tool_choice` is not mapped** — same MVP contract as llm-deepseek.
+- **In-history `system`-role messages fold into `user`-role wire messages** — pi-ai exposes a single `systemPrompt` slot, diverging from the hand-rolled twin's `role: 'system'` passthrough.
+- **`LlmError.status` is never set** — pi-ai reports failures as in-stream events with no HTTP status, so error codes are regex-classified from the error text.
+- **`buildModel` hardcodes descriptor metadata** — `contextWindow: 128000`, `maxTokens: 64000`, zero cost, identically for every registered model name; not configurable.
+- **pi-ai's built-in retries are disabled (`maxRetries: 0`)** — failures surface immediately; retry policy belongs to `llm/stream` listeners.

packages/llm/llm/README.md

@@ -47,3 +47,16 @@ Every product adapter must identify the application on every provider HTTP reque
 ### Real adapters
 
 Two adapters implement `LlmAdapter` against this vocabulary, deliberately built on different internals to keep the contract honest (see [the twin LLM adapters](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/architecture/2026-06-13-twin-llm-adapters.md)): [`@deepseek-ai/dsh-llm-deepseek`](../llm-deepseek) (hand-rolled fetch/SSE) and [`@deepseek-ai/dsh-llm-pi-ai`](../llm-pi-ai) (via `@earendil-works/pi-ai`). The pair pinned down the `StreamChunk` conventions now documented in `types.ts` (usage before finish, raw-string tool arguments, the two sanctioned error paths).
+
+## Model Experience
+
+None, as this adapter registry forwards an already assembled request without adding or changing any model-bound text, schema, or message.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **No retry/caching/rate-limit layer ships** — `llm/stream` is the intended wrap seam and has no production listener, so provider 429/5xx failures surface immediately.
+- **`GenerateOptions` sampling is `temperature`/`maxTokens`/`stop` only** — no `tool_choice`, `top_p`, or penalty fields; the vocabulary grows when a producer lands ([dropped inert knobs](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/simplification/2026-07-04-drop-inert-request-knobs.md)).
+- **Producer-gated variants stay out until produced** — `prefill`, per-tool `strict`, block `cache` hints, and the `agent` message-source variant were pruned as producerless ([RFC](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/simplification/2026-07-04-prune-producerless-vocabulary-variants.md)).
+- **`BlockAssembler` handles core block kinds only** — a plugin-added block type whose stream is never closed by `block-end` makes `blocks()` throw.
+- **`APP_IDENTITY.url` names a repository that does not exist yet** — `FIXME`: creating the public `deepseek-ai/deepseek-harness-sdk` repo gates the first release.
+- **`GenerateOptions.sessionId` is a locally-declared brand** — importing dsh-session's `SessionId` would cycle; a future ids-owning package would dissolve the workaround.

packages/sandbox/sandbox-local/README.md

@@ -16,3 +16,15 @@ Every rung has its keyless world-proof (`tests/bwrap.e2e.ts`, `tests/landlock.e2
 ```
 
 Consumers: [`@deepseek-ai/dsh-bash-sandbox`](../../bash/bash-sandbox/); see [the acp-agent example](../../../examples/acp-agent/) for the runnable default composition.
+
+## Model Experience
+
+Indirectly, through `dsh-bash-sandbox` and `dsh-tool-bash`, which render this provider's enforcement dialect as the exact `[sandbox: file access denied under <mode> mode]` marker or the [`dsh-sandbox`](../sandbox/README.md) `SANDBOX_UNAVAILABLE` text while keeping runner selection and profiles outside context.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **Windows has no runner** — `win32` fails closed with `SANDBOX_UNAVAILABLE`; an AppContainer-family backend is deferred.
+- **Landlock may be partial** — older supported kernel ABIs confine only the access classes they expose, reported as `enforcement: 'partial'` rather than overstated as full.
+- **Seatbelt depends on deprecated `sandbox-exec`** — macOS still ships it, but this provider cannot replace or probe that private policy engine if Apple removes it.
+- **Runner selection is cached for the provider lifetime** — installing, removing, or repairing a runner requires reloading the plugin before selection changes.
+- **`runnerCommand` is an operator assertion** — a configured custom runner skips functional probes and is assumed to implement the bwrap-shaped profile honestly.

packages/sandbox/sandbox/README.md

@@ -9,3 +9,14 @@ Policy rides the call, not the provider: two consumers may confine under differe
 **Same-world confinement only.** A backend shares the host's filesystem and kernel (`bwrap`, Landlock, Seatbelt); `workspaceRoot` names a real host path. Containers, microVMs, and remote executors are NOT backends of this seam — they replace whole capability implementations (`ctx.bash`, `ctx.fs`) as environment-coherent groups. The boundary and its rationale: [the sandbox RFC](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/feature/2026-07-06-sandbox.md).
 
 Implementations: [`@deepseek-ai/dsh-sandbox-local`](../sandbox-local/) (Linux: `bwrap`, else the per-platform Landlock launcher; macOS: `sandbox-exec`/Seatbelt). Consumers: [`@deepseek-ai/dsh-bash-sandbox`](../../bash/bash-sandbox/) (wraps `['bash', '-c', command]`).
+
+## Model Experience
+
+Indirectly, through [`dsh-bash-sandbox`](../../bash/bash-sandbox/README.md) and `dsh-tool-bash`, which render this seam's enforcement facts as the exact denial or `SandboxUnavailableError` text documented by the consumer, with retained tokens added only for a denial or failed confinement.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **File effects are the whole policy vocabulary** — the seam expresses no network, process, syscall, device, or credential restrictions.
+- **Same-world confinement only** — containers, microVMs, and remote execution require replacing capability implementations rather than adding a provider here.
+- **Denial reporting is a stderr dialect** — the seam returns backend signatures instead of a typed runtime denial channel, so consumers that need classification must infer it from the child process's output.
+- **One provider per context** — composing different sandbox mechanisms simultaneously requires a provider-level ladder or separate Cordis contexts; callers choose policy per call, not backend identity.

packages/session-persistence/session-persistence-jsonl/README.md

@@ -21,12 +21,26 @@ The JSONL durable session-persistence backend — a concrete `SessionPersistence
 
 ## Durability and crash semantics
 
-- **Lazy materialization.** `create(meta)` writes nothing; the `.jsonl` (header + first batch) is written atomically (temp-write + `fsync` + rename) on the first `append`. A created-but-never-appended session leaves nothing on disk and is absent from `list`.
+- **Lazy materialization.** `create(meta)` writes nothing; on the first `append`, the backend writes and `fsync`s a temporary file, publishes it without overwrite via a hard link, then `fsync`s the directory. A created-but-never-appended session leaves nothing on disk and is absent from `list`.
 - **Append-only.** Committed events (at or below a flushed `turn/end`) are never rewritten. Subsequent appends are line appends at EOF + `fsync`.
 - **Crash recovery — close, don't truncate.** A crash can leave a log whose final turn never closed (real events after the last `turn/end`). `load` PRESERVES those events (a turn can be huge — they are real work) and closes the orphaned turn by durably appending synthetic boundary events: an error `tool/result` for every `tool-call` the crash left unanswered (the loop logs the assistant message before running the tools, so a mid-tool crash leaves dangling calls — and `deriveMessages()` would replay an assistant tool-call with no result, which providers reject), then a `step/end` if a step was open, then `turn/end {kind:'interrupted'}`, returning a balanced log. Only a never-fully-written **torn tail fragment** (a final line with no newline / unparseable) is `ftruncate`d away before the closers are written. See [session persistence](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/architecture/2026-06-14-session-persistence.md).
 - **Contiguous-seq.** `load` rejects a mid-log parse error or `seq` gap (unloadable); `append` rejects a batch whose first `seq` does not continue the stored log, and rejects non-JSON-serializable `event.data` naming the offending event type.
-- **Format version.** Only the current `SESSION_FORMAT_VERSION` (v0) is supported; `load` rejects any other version. While the harness is unreleased the on-disk format is pre-release/unstable: a breaking format change is absorbed at v0 (no bump until the first tagged release) and non-current logs are rejected — there is no migration (no persisted user data to preserve).
 
 ## Write path
 
 The plugin generalizes the example `session-jsonl.ts`: it subscribes to `session/created` (capture the header; persist a fork's seed once), `session/event` (copy each already-frozen event into the persistence-owned write-behind buffer), and `session/flush`/dispose (drain that buffer through `append`). A per-session write cursor means a resumed session never re-appends already-stored events. Existing live sessions are seeded on plugin apply (HMR does not replay `session/created`). All backend operations for one session are serialized, and disposal awaits quiescence (every init + final drain) before returning, so no write lands after teardown.
+
+## Model Experience
+
+### Resumed conversation history
+
+**What the model sees**: JSONL storage contributes no live prompt or schema. Loading restores stored surface history and preserves prior request headers for reconstruction; the new loop composes its current envelope. Each unanswered call in an interrupted tail is balanced with the exact error text `Tool call interrupted by a crash; no result was recorded.` Raw `assistant/chunk` records do not duplicate messages.
+
+**Token effect**: Zero live-request tokens. A resumed agent pays for retained history and its current envelope, plus the quoted repair result for each interrupted call.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **Only the current `SESSION_FORMAT_VERSION` (v0) loads** — the on-disk format is pre-release/unstable: a breaking format change is absorbed at v0 and non-current logs are rejected; there is no migration.
+- **Nothing deletes session files** — logs accumulate under `root` until removed externally (the seam has no deletion surface).
+- **Single-process assumption** — per-session serialization and the write cursor live in this process; two processes appending to the same `root` are not coordinated.
+- **Initial materialization requires hard-link support** — first append uses `link()` so same-id races fail instead of overwriting a committed log; a filesystem that cannot create hard links cannot host this backend.

packages/session-persistence/session-persistence-jsonl/src/index.ts

@@ -189,7 +189,7 @@ export class SessionPersistenceJsonl extends SessionPersistence implements Persi
 
   // --- materialization / append / repair (file mechanics) ---
 
-  /** Atomically write the header line + first batch (temp-write, fsync, rename). */
+  /** Atomically write the header line + first batch (temp-write, fsync, collision-safe hard-link publish). */
   private async materialize(meta: SessionHeader, events: readonly SessionEvent[]): Promise<void> {
     const dir = sessionDir(this.root, meta.cwd)
     await mkdir(this.root, { recursive: true, mode: 0o700 })
@@ -246,7 +246,7 @@ export class SessionPersistenceJsonl extends SessionPersistence implements Persi
     }
   }
 
-  /** fsync a directory so a just-created/renamed entry inside it is crash-durable. */
+  /** fsync a directory so a just-created or published entry inside it is crash-durable. */
   private async syncDir(dir: string): Promise<void> {
     const handle = await open(dir, 'r')
     try {

packages/session-persistence/session-persistence-sqlite/README.md

@@ -28,3 +28,19 @@ interface Config {
 ## Write path
 
 Like the JSONL backend, the plugin also installs the `session/event` → buffer → `session/flush` drain: it copies each already-frozen event into a persistence-owned buffer, persists a fork's seed once on `session/created`, keeps a per-session write cursor so a resumed session never re-appends stored events, and seeds existing live sessions on apply (HMR does not replay `session/created`). Dispose awaits every in-flight init + final drain and then closes the database, so no write lands after teardown.
+
+## Model Experience
+
+### Resumed conversation history
+
+**What the model sees**: SQLite storage contributes no live prompt or schema. Loading restores the same surface history as JSONL and preserves prior headers for reconstruction; the new loop composes its current envelope. Each unanswered call in interrupted rows is balanced with the exact error text `Tool call interrupted by a crash; no result was recorded.` Row metadata and raw chunks are not messages.
+
+**Token effect**: Zero live-request tokens. Resume restores retained history and pays the current envelope, plus the quoted repair result for each interrupted call.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **Raw `node:sqlite`, pending a cordis database service** — the backend holds a `DatabaseSync` directly; if a `cordis/db` / `@cordisjs` SQL driver is adopted, the storage driver routes through it (the `SessionPersistence` contract would not change) — a marked TODO.
+- **`DatabaseSync` is synchronous** — every append transaction blocks the event loop for its duration; acceptable for local stores, a throughput ceiling for busy multi-session servers.
+- **Write contention has no wait or retry policy** — the backend sets no busy timeout and retries no locked-database error, so another connection holding a write transaction makes the operation reject immediately.
+- **Only the current `SCHEMA_VERSION` opens** — a database with any other schema version is rejected rather than migrated (unreleased software; no persisted user data to preserve).
+- **Nothing deletes stored sessions** — rows accumulate until removed externally (the seam has no deletion surface; `ON DELETE CASCADE` is wired for such out-of-band cleanup).

packages/session-persistence/session-persistence/README.md

@@ -24,7 +24,7 @@ The persisted unit IS the existing `SessionEvent` (event-sourced model — the l
 
 The two first-party backends were byte-identical (or same-algorithm) for ALL of their write-path orchestration — the in-memory bookkeeping (per-id state, write-behind buffers, per-id serialization chains, per-session init promises), the `session/event` → buffer → `session/flush` drain, lazy materialization, crash-tail repair on load, the four `session/created` adoption cases (new / HMR-adopt / collision / ownerless-claim), and dispose-time quiescence. Only the STORAGE primitives differed (write bytes vs. INSERT rows).
 
-`PersistenceCoordinator` owns that orchestration once. A first-party backend composes one (`new PersistenceCoordinator(ctx, this)`), implements the small `PersistenceBackend` hook interface, and delegates its four public service methods to the coordinator. This keeps the duplicated, correctness-heavy orchestration in a single place (it used to receive the same fixes twice).
+`PersistenceCoordinator` owns that orchestration once. A first-party backend composes one (`new PersistenceCoordinator(ctx, this)`), implements the small `PersistenceBackend` hook interface, and delegates its four public service methods to the coordinator. The correctness-heavy orchestration therefore has one implementation and one place for fixes.
 
 The `PersistenceBackend<TornMarker>` hooks (the only seam between the coordinator and storage):
 
@@ -49,3 +49,17 @@ Three backends run these suites: an in-memory reference (in `tests/`), `dsh-sess
 ## Metadata types
 
 Re-exported from `dsh-session`: `SessionHeader` (immutable session metadata: `version`, `id`, `createdAt`, `cwd?`, `parentSession?`, `seedLength?`).
+
+## Model Experience
+
+### Resumed conversation history
+
+**What the model sees**: This seam adds no prompt or schema. Resume restores stored surface events as message history; stored request headers reconstruct earlier calls, while the new loop composes the current system prompt, tools, and session prefix for its next request. Crash repair inserts exactly `Tool call interrupted by a crash; no result was recorded.` as the error result for each unanswered tool call.
+
+**Token effect**: Zero tokens during ordinary persistence. Resume restores retained history cost and pays the current request envelope normally; each repaired call adds the quoted retained error text.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **No deletion or retention surface** — the seam is `create`/`append`/`load`/`list` only; pruning stored sessions is out-of-band backend maintenance.
+- **`list()` is unpaginated and unfiltered** — it returns every stored session's header; fine for local stores, unindexed at scale.
+- **Repair-time synthetic closers are the only crash story** — a backend must synthesize `tool/result`/`step/end`/`turn/end` closers on load; there is no partial-turn resume that continues an interrupted turn instead of closing it.

packages/session-query/session-query/README.md

@@ -2,8 +2,6 @@
 
 Exact session-history retrieval through `ctx.sessionQuery`. The service presents live `ctx.sessions` and an optional, dynamically mounted `ctx.sessionPersistence` as one logical corpus. Matching ids produce one record: live events win, while `live` and `persisted` report both source availabilities. Conflicting immutable headers fail with `SESSION_QUERY_SOURCE_CONFLICT`.
 
-This is trusted context-wide infrastructure. It performs no caller authorization; a future model tool or UI must constrain which sessions its caller may inspect.
-
 ## Reads
 
 - `listSessions()` reads current persistence metadata, merges live records with live precedence, and returns cloned records in deterministic newest-first order.
@@ -20,4 +18,11 @@ Persistence is optional and may mount or unmount dynamically. A cross-corpus lis
 |---|---:|---|
 | `readWindowMax` | `50` | Maximum `before` or `after` raw-event count. |
 
-This phase deliberately has no filters, lineage/provenance traversal, extraction registry, search-provider protocol, index synchronization, or model-facing tool. Full-text search belongs beside its first real implementation; the proposed SQLite package and its single transaction/reconciliation owner are described in the [phase-two RFC](../../../docs/rfc/proposed/feature/2026-07-10-sqlite-session-query-provider.md).
+## Model Experience
+
+None, as this trusted query service returns cloned session records only to its callers and registers no model-facing prompt, schema, tool, or message.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **No caller authorization** — this is trusted context-wide infrastructure; a future model tool or UI must constrain which sessions its caller may inspect.
+- **Exact retrieval only** — filters, lineage/provenance traversal, extraction, search-provider protocol, index synchronization, and a model-facing tool are absent. Full-text search belongs beside its first implementation; the proposed SQLite package and its single transaction/reconciliation owner are described in the [phase-two RFC](../../../docs/rfc/proposed/feature/2026-07-10-sqlite-session-query-provider.md).

packages/skill/skill-local/README.md

@@ -28,10 +28,21 @@ Default roots are resolved in this provider's rank order:
 | 400 | `user-dsh` | `<dshHome>/skills` |
 | 500 | `user-agents` | `<agentsHome>/skills` |
 
-The project root is the nearest ancestor containing `.git`; without one, the current cwd is used. The user DSH root skips its `.system` child so system-owned directories are not accidentally treated as normal user skills. DeepSeek Harness no longer ships built-in system skills from this provider; additional built-ins can be supplied later by another provider.
+The project root is the nearest ancestor containing `.git`; without one, the current cwd is used. The user DSH root skips its `.system` child so system-owned directories are not accidentally treated as normal user skills. This provider ships no built-in system skills; another provider can supply embedded or remote built-ins.
 
 When `ctx.fs` is available, discovery lists roots through `ctx.fs.listDir`, reads skill files through `ctx.fs.readText`, and probes `.git` through the filesystem service. Full skill loads forward the lookup abort signal to filesystem metadata and content reads. Without a filesystem service, the provider falls back to abortable Node filesystem I/O so minimal local contexts can still load skills. Missing, unreadable, or malformed skill files warn and skip instead of failing the whole request.
 
 ## Skill Format
 
 Skills can be single-level directory bundles (`<name>/SKILL.md`) or flat Markdown files (`<name>.md`). Nested `**/SKILL.md` discovery is intentionally not part of v1. Frontmatter is parsed as YAML with the `yaml` package; it requires `name` and `description`, while `whenToUse`, `disableModelInvocation`, and `metadata` are optional. Names must be kebab-case.
+
+## Model Experience
+
+Indirectly, through `dsh-tool-skill`, which renders this provider's invocable names and capped descriptions into the session-prefix catalog and a selected instruction body plus resource-base guidance into retained tool history while paths, provider ranks, and disabled skills remain hidden.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **Discovery is one level deep** — only `<root>/<name>/SKILL.md` and `<root>/<name>.md` are recognized; nested skill trees and package manifests are ignored.
+- **Project scope is the nearest `.git` ancestor** — workspaces without that marker fall back to the supplied cwd, with no alternate project-root marker or monorepo subproject selection.
+- **Unreadable or malformed entries disappear with a warning** — the model catalog receives no per-skill diagnostic and cannot distinguish an absent skill from a skipped one.
+- **No filesystem watching** — edits rely on the registry cache being evicted or invalidated by provider reload before a previously collected cwd is rediscovered.

packages/skill/skill/README.md

@@ -34,3 +34,14 @@ Parsed candidate and loaded-definition fields are validated at the provider boun
 ## Consumer boundary
 
 The registry does not render model guidance or register model-facing tools. [`@deepseek-ai/dsh-tool-skill`](../tool-skill) consumes `ctx.skills` to provide the session-prefix catalog and `skill` tool, so providers remain independent of the model surface.
+
+## Model Experience
+
+Indirectly, through `dsh-tool-skill`, which renders provider summaries into the session prefix and loaded instructions into retained tool results.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **Completed catalogs have no TTL or watcher invalidation** — a provider's underlying files or remote data can change without a registration revision, so a cached cwd stays stale until eviction or provider/runtime reload.
+- **Providers are queried sequentially** — one slow cooperative provider delays every provider registered after it; cancellation stops the caller's wait but cannot terminate work an uncooperative provider keeps running.
+- **A provider-list failure removes that whole source for the request** — the registry logs and skips it, with no model-visible diagnostic or partial-catalog recovery contract.
+- **Duplicate resolution is first-wins** — later lower-priority candidates are logged and hidden; there is no API to inspect all shadowed definitions.

packages/skill/tool-skill/README.md

@@ -19,3 +19,92 @@ The plugin contributes one user-role `<system-reminder>` catalog through `agent/
 Execution uses the calling agent's `session.header.cwd` so workspace-sensitive providers can resolve the right winning skill. A successful call returns one text tool result with `<skill_content name="...">`, containing `<skill_resources>` followed by `<skill_instructions>`. Resource guidance resolves paths or URLs explicitly referenced by the loaded instructions against `resourceBase`; referenced scripts, references, and assets load only when needed, and the tool does not enumerate a skill directory. Local filesystem skills provide a base directory, while remote or embedded providers can provide a URL or opaque provider-managed guidance. A name that cannot be resolved reports that the skill is unknown or no longer available; invalid names and skills marked `disableModelInvocation: true` retain distinct `isError` results.
 
 The tool does not call `agent.inject()` in v1. Its result is already recorded as the tool result and becomes available to the next model step without duplicating the content as synthetic context.
+
+## Model Experience
+
+### Session prefix
+
+**What the model sees**: If model-invocable skills exist and this exact `skill` tool is visible, the agent receives the catalog template below, with one data-dependent entry per sorted skill. The catalog is a frozen user-role session prefix.
+
+**Token effect**: Repeated input cost scales with skill count and `catalogDescriptionMaxLength`; no catalog tokens are sent when the list is empty or the tool is hidden or shadowed.
+
+#### Skill catalog template
+
+```markdown
+<system-reminder>
+A skill is a reusable set of task-specific instructions. The following skills are available in this session:
+
+<available_skills>
+- `<name>`: <normalized-and-capped-description>
+</available_skills>
+
+If the user names a skill, or the task clearly matches a skill's description, call the `skill` tool with the exact skill name before taking task actions. Load all applicable skills, then follow their full instructions. This catalog contains summaries only; do not infer or follow a skill's instructions until it has been loaded.
+</system-reminder>
+```
+
+### Tool schema
+
+**What the model sees**: The model sees the generated [`skill` schema](../../../docs/tool-catalog.md#deepseek-aidsh-tool-skill).
+
+**Token effect**: Fixed schema cost per request where the tool is visible.
+
+### Tool result
+
+**What the model sees**: A successful call uses the result template and the provider-managed, directory, URL, or opaque resource guidance below.
+
+**Token effect**: Loaded instructions are data-dependent tool-result tokens, resent on later steps until compaction; no duplicate `agent.inject()` copy is made.
+
+#### Skill result template
+
+```markdown
+<skill_content name="<escaped-name>">
+<skill_resources>
+<resource-guidance>
+</skill_resources>
+
+<skill_instructions>
+<provider-owned-instruction-body>
+</skill_instructions>
+</skill_content>
+```
+
+#### Provider-managed resource guidance
+
+```markdown
+Resources for this skill are managed by provider "<provider>".
+Load referenced resources only as needed.
+```
+
+#### Directory resource guidance
+
+```markdown
+Base directory for this skill: <path>
+Resolve relative paths mentioned by this skill against the base directory before using them. Load referenced resources only as needed.
+```
+
+#### URL resource guidance
+
+```markdown
+Base URL for this skill: <url>
+Resolve relative URLs mentioned by this skill against the base URL before using them. Load referenced resources only as needed.
+```
+
+#### Opaque resource guidance
+
+```markdown
+Resources for this skill: <description>
+Load referenced resources only as needed.
+```
+
+### Tool errors
+
+**What the model sees**: Invalid or stale selections return exactly `Error: invalid skill name "<name>"`, `Error: skill "<name>" is unknown or no longer available`, or `Error: skill "<name>" is not available for model invocation`. Provider-thrown lookup text is data-dependent and receives the same `Error: <message>` wrapper.
+
+**Token effect**: Only a failing call adds these retained tokens.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **The catalog omits `whenToUse`, source, and provider metadata** — routing is based only on name and a capped description; `whenToUse` remains provider metadata and is not rendered by the loaded wrapper either.
+- **Loaded instruction bodies have no size cap** — a provider can return a skill large enough to consume substantial next-step context; only catalog descriptions are truncated.
+- **Resources are guidance, not attachments** — the tool reports a base directory/URL/opaque hint but neither enumerates nor fetches referenced files for the model.
+- **Loading is one-shot text** — there is no partial, streaming, or cached-content handle when a remote provider is slow or a skill body is large.

packages/subagent/subagent-acp/README.md

@@ -58,3 +58,25 @@ The child environment is built by [`buildChildEnv`](../subagent-subprocess/READM
 The package has no default export. Cordis loader unwrapping would otherwise hide the named `inject` metadata; see [postmortem 0001](../../../docs/postmortem/0001-acp-default-export-drops-inject.md).
 
 Keyless tests drive a scripted ACP subprocess over real stdio. The with-key e2e drives the repository's real ACP agent and self-skips without `DEEPSEEK_API_KEY`.
+
+## Model Experience
+
+### Child-agent request
+
+**What the model sees**: The remote child receives the standalone task content through ACP plus its own process's configured system prompt, tools, and fresh session. It receives no parent conversation. This provider advertises no optional start-time capabilities, so the local service rejects requests for persona, tool filtering, depth enforcement, or structured output instead of silently omitting them.
+
+**Token effect**: The child pays for an independent full context and its own multi-step history. These tokens never enter the parent's context.
+
+### Parent tool result, indirectly
+
+**What the model sees**: Through `dsh-tool-subagent`, the parent receives only the child's final streamed assistant text or that consumer's exact stop-reason error, not intermediate messages or tool traffic. A request already cancelled before publication becomes exactly `Error: subagent request was aborted before the ACP child started`; other start failures pass through as `Error: <message>`.
+
+**Token effect**: Parent input grows only by the final result or error, which is data-dependent and retained until compaction. This provider adds no parent schema itself.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **A fresh process per run** — persistent-process pooling is a future optimization ([the seam RFC](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/feature/2026-06-21-subagent-capability-seam.md)).
+- **No optional start-time capabilities** — this provider cannot apply the local harness's `outputSchema`, depth cap, tool filter, or persona inside the remote process, so it advertises none and the service rejects requests that require them.
+- **Only `agent_message_chunk` text is collected** — the child's tool-call activity, thought chunks, and plan updates are not surfaced to the parent.
+- **Permission prompts are auto-answered** (`permission: allow | reject`) — no human is surfaced a child's `session/request_permission` in this cut.
+- **No snapshot-tier replay coverage** (`TODO(acp-subagent-replay)`) — an ACP child is its own process with its own replay shape, deferred.

packages/subagent/subagent-fork/README.md

@@ -21,3 +21,23 @@ Fork advertises `{ outputSchema: true, depthLimit: true, toolFilter: true, perso
 | Key | Meaning |
 |---|---|
 | `providerName` | Registry name on `ctx.subagents` (default `fork`). |
+See [`dsh-subagent-spawn`](../subagent-spawn/README.md) for the run lifecycle, model inheritance, and depth tracking — all shared.
+
+## Model Experience
+
+### Child-agent history and envelope
+
+**What the model sees**: The child receives the parent's balanced completed-turn surface prefix, then the new task content verbatim. A configured persona shadows prompt text in the child's fresh scope; a tool restriction filters its global wire schemas, executable lookup, and Code Mode SDK bindings but not standalone guidance. The parent's tool view and authority are not inherited. An optional structured-output request adds its child-only contract. The parent's current in-flight turn is excluded.
+
+**Token effect**: Forking duplicates retained completed history into separate child requests; the child then accumulates its own tokens independently. Persona changes repeated prompt cost, filtering changes schema or generated SDK cost, and a first-turn fork has no inherited history.
+
+### Parent tool result, indirectly
+
+**What the model sees**: The parent receives only the child's own final output through `dsh-tool-subagent`, not the inherited prefix or intermediate work.
+
+**Token effect**: Parent input grows by one data-dependent final result retained until compaction.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **Runs expose no `sendMessage`/`resume`** — the optional runtime capabilities are absent on in-process runs.
+- **The seed is a one-time snapshot** — the child sees the parent's completed turns as of the fork and nothing the parent logs afterwards; there is no live context sharing.

packages/subagent/subagent-inprocess/README.md

@@ -39,3 +39,40 @@ Depth enforcement is internal to `startInProcessRun`: it reads `AgentOptions.sub
 - A monotonic tool guard blocks later calls after capture, and `agent/turn-stop` ends the turn after the structured result commits.
 
 A clean turn that never commits the required structured value reports `error`; the driver does not re-prompt. All registrations ride the child fiber and disappear with it.
+
+## Model Experience
+
+### Child-agent request
+
+**What the model sees**: The shared driver sends the task verbatim as the child's user message and, when requested, shadows the persona and restricts global tool schemas, lookup, execution, and Code Mode SDK bindings in the unpublished child's fresh scope; parent restrictions are not inherited, and standalone tool-guidance sections remain. Spawn supplies no history; fork supplies its balanced seed.
+
+**Token effect**: Child input is isolated from the parent and grows through the child's own steps. A persona changes repeated prompt text; filtering changes schema or generated SDK cost but not independently registered guidance.
+
+### Structured-output system prompt, schema, and results
+
+**What the model sees**: A structured run adds the structured-output instruction below. It also adds a child-scoped `structured_output` definition with exact description `Report your final structured result. Call this exactly once, when your answer is complete; the arguments must match this tool's parameter schema exactly.` and the requested schema. This runtime-only definition is outside the generated shipped [tool package map](../../../docs/tool-catalog.md#tool-package-map). Success returns `Structured output recorded.`; a later call becomes ``Error: structured output already recorded: the run is complete, so `<tool>` is not executed``.
+
+**Token effect**: Fixed instruction and capability tokens are paid only by that child. Result text enters the child history, while the captured value alone becomes the parent result.
+
+#### Structured-output instruction
+
+```markdown
+When you have your final answer, you MUST report it by calling the `structured_output` tool with arguments matching its parameter schema exactly. Do not finish with a plain text answer: only the tool call counts as your result.
+```
+
+### Parent start error, indirectly
+
+**What the model sees**: Through `dsh-tool-subagent`, invalid depth state becomes exactly `Error: agent subagentDepth must be a non-negative safe integer`, `Error: subagent child depth exceeds the safe-integer range`, or `Error: subagent depth <attempted> exceeds maxDepth <max>`. A pre-publication cancellation passes its abort reason through the registry's `Error: <message>` wrapper.
+
+**Token effect**: Zero tokens on a successful start; only the failed parent tool call retains this text.
+
+### Parent result, indirectly
+
+**What the model sees**: The driver extracts only the child's own last assistant output or captured structured value; seeded parent messages and intermediate child work do not become the result.
+
+**Token effect**: The parent receives one data-dependent result through the consumer; all other child tokens stay in the child session.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **Runs expose no `sendMessage`/`resume`** — the optional runtime capabilities are absent on in-process runs.
+- **Structured capture accepts the `defineTool` schema subset only** — unsupported JSON Schema constructs fail before the child is created; a provider needing a broader schema vocabulary requires a different runtime.

packages/subagent/subagent-spawn/README.md

@@ -17,3 +17,22 @@ Spawn advertises `{ outputSchema: true, depthLimit: true, toolFilter: true, pers
 | Key | Meaning |
 |---|---|
 | `providerName` | Registry name on `ctx.subagents` (default `spawn`). |
+
+## Model Experience
+
+### Child-agent request
+
+**What the model sees**: The fresh child receives the standalone task content verbatim, inherits the parent model and workspace by default, and sees the global prompt with any configured child-scoped persona shadow. A tool filter removes global wire schemas, executable lookup, and Code Mode SDK bindings for that child but leaves independently registered guidance. It receives zero parent conversation messages; the filter is visibility/composition, not an authority grant inherited from the parent.
+
+**Token effect**: The child pays for a new independent context and history; no parent-history tokens are duplicated. Persona changes this child's repeated prompt cost, while filtering changes its schema or generated SDK cost.
+
+### Parent tool result, indirectly
+
+**What the model sees**: Through `dsh-tool-subagent`, the parent receives only the child's final output or stop-reason error.
+
+**Token effect**: Parent input grows by one data-dependent result retained until compaction.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **Runs expose no `sendMessage`/`resume`** — the optional runtime capabilities are absent on in-process runs.
+- **Fresh means no parent transcript** — the child inherits cwd, lineage, model, and explicitly configured persona/tool restrictions, but none of the parent's conversation; use the fork provider when completed-turn context is required.

packages/subagent/subagent-subprocess/README.md

@@ -36,3 +36,14 @@ A per-run isolated config directory for an external CLI child (the target of `CL
 ## Testing
 
 `tests/subagent-subprocess.spec.ts`: the env scrub and config-dir helpers run against the real process env and real filesystem (the rm-failure path injects its rejection at the fs boundary — a real recursive-rm failure is not portably provokable, and root ignores permission bits); the exit waits and the dispose ladder run against a scriptable fake child, driving each escalation tier deterministically. The [ACP backend suite](../subagent-acp/README.md) exercises the same ladder against real subprocesses (EOF-cooperative, EOF-ignoring, and SIGTERM-trapping children) end to end.
+
+## Model Experience
+
+Indirectly, through process-based subagent backends, whose child composition is constrained by credential scrubbing and isolated config directories.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **The credential scrub is name-based** — only variables matching `KEY` / `SECRET` / `TOKEN` are removed; differently named secrets such as `PASSWORD` pass through unless the backend supplies a stricter environment.
+- **Signals target the direct child only** — teardown relies on a cooperative CLI to reap its descendants before exit; a re-parented or independently detached grandchild can outlive the ladder.
+- **Fresh config-dir cleanup is best-effort** — an `rm` failure leaves private state under the OS temp root rather than failing disposal.
+- **Pinned config directories are wholly operator-owned** — the helper neither creates, validates, locks, nor removes them, so concurrent runs may share and race on that state.

packages/subagent/subagent/README.md

@@ -61,3 +61,12 @@ Provider additions and removals also emit `subagent/provider-added` and `subagen
 ## Collection model
 
 The current model-facing tool collects synchronously: it awaits the child result and disposes the run before returning. Background collection and polling remain outside this seam. See the [capability-seam RFC](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/feature/2026-06-21-subagent-capability-seam.md) and `src/types.ts` for the complete contracts.
+
+## Model Experience
+
+Indirectly, through `dsh-tool-subagent`, which retains only a provider's data-dependent final output or exact `Error: no subagent provider registered for "<name>"`, `Error: subagent provider "<name>" does not support the "<capability>" capability`, and `Error: <message>` start failures in the parent while child working tokens remain child-only.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **The current consumer collects synchronously** — the model-facing tool starts a run and awaits `result`; steering (`sendMessage`) is part of the seam but intentionally unused, and background/poll/spill semantics are deferred to a future long-running-runtime design.
+- **The lifecycle events are observe-only** — a run-affecting `subagent/end` continuation or decision surface is deferred until a consumer needs one.

packages/subagent/tool-subagent/README.md

@@ -26,3 +26,41 @@ A non-`completed` stop reason becomes an `isError` tool result; partial child ou
 | `maxDepth` | Absolute delegation-depth cap; requires provider `depthLimit` capability. |
 
 `toolFilter` changes the child's visible global tool layer; it is not a parent-derived authority ceiling. See the [agent-scope security non-goal](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/architecture/2026-07-08-agent-scope-contexts.md#security-and-authority-are-explicit-non-goals).
+
+## Model Experience
+
+### Standalone-provider schema
+
+**What the model sees**: While a fresh-context provider exists, the configured tool uses the generated default [`subagent` schema](../../../docs/tool-catalog.md#deepseek-aidsh-tool-subagent); the catalog also records how `toolName` changes the visible name.
+
+**Token effect**: Fixed schema cost per parent request while mounted. Removing the provider removes the whole schema.
+
+### Inherited-context-provider schema
+
+**What the model sees**: Relative to the generated default [`subagent` schema](../../../docs/tool-catalog.md#deepseek-aidsh-tool-subagent), a provider that seeds completed turns replaces only the tool and `prompt` parameter descriptions with the text below; the shape and `description` parameter stay unchanged.
+
+**Token effect**: Fixed schema cost per parent request while mounted. Exposing multiple providers adds one independently named schema per load.
+
+#### Inherited-context-provider tool description
+
+```markdown
+Delegate a task to a subagent that INHERITS this conversation: a child agent seeded with all completed turns so far (it does not see the current in-flight turn), returning only its final result. Use this when the subtask builds on this conversation's context — a follow-up analysis, a review, a continuation — without consuming this conversation's context for the work itself. You receive only its final answer, not its intermediate steps.
+```
+
+#### Inherited-context-provider prompt description
+
+```markdown
+The task for the subagent. It already sees this conversation's completed turns, so build on them freely and state only what is new.
+```
+
+### Tool-call history and result
+
+**What the model sees**: The task description and full prompt remain in the parent assistant tool call. Success contains only the child's data-dependent final text. Other stop reasons become exactly `Error: subagent run was cancelled`, `Error: subagent run failed`, `Error: subagent run hit its token limit before finishing`, `Error: subagent declined the task`, or `Error: subagent run ended abnormally (<reason>)`; a call without an owning agent becomes `Error: subagent tool requires a calling agent (exec.agent was undefined)`. Intermediate child steps never enter the parent.
+
+**Token effect**: Prompt and final output are data-dependent retained tokens. All child working context is paid in the child and omitted from the parent.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **Delegation blocks the parent turn** — synchronous collect only; background start and poll collection are deferred to the long-running-runtime redesign.
+- **Duplicate `toolName` across waiting loads is detected late** (`TODO(subagent-dup-toolname)`) — two loads waiting on providers collide only when a provider arrives, and the throw rolls back the provider's fiber rather than the misconfigured tool's; config-time detection needs a cross-fiber registry of intended names.
+- **Child policy is fixed per tool registration** — `model`, persona, tool filter, and depth cap come from this plugin load's config, not model-call arguments; exposing another policy requires another distinctly named tool.

packages/support/README.md

@@ -5,8 +5,8 @@ Packages that exist to serve development, testing, and the examples rather than
 | Package | Role | ctx key |
 |---|---|---|
 | `acp-snapshot/` | ACP test kit: shared subprocess/client launcher + snapshot harness, normalizers, and suite factory | (library — imported by ACP e2e and `*.snapshot.ts` suites) |
-| `invariants/` | Dev-mode event-contract assertions | (listens on `session/*`, `agent/*`) |
+| `invariants/` | Runtime event-contract assertions for development diagnostics | (listens on `session/*`, `agent/*`) |
 | `llm-replay/` | Record/replay adapter: short-circuits `llm/stream` from a recorded session JSONL (keyless snapshot tests) | (listens on `llm/stream`) |
 | `subagent-mock/` | Scripted `SubagentProvider` for deterministic seam/tool tests | (registers on `ctx.subagents`) |
 
-`invariants` runs only in dev mode (contract checks, not runtime behavior). `llm-replay` backs the demos and the snapshot test tier under the per-file coverage gate. `acp-snapshot` carries the ACP subprocess/client boundary plus the snapshot harness, normalizers, and suite machinery, so e2e tests share one launcher and every snapshot suite is a scenario table over one gate-covered implementation. `subagent-mock` exercises the real `ctx.subagents` load path without a model or child agent. A package graduates OUT of `support/` into a product group only when it gains documented product consumers.
+`invariants` is development support but has no environment guard: it runs wherever registered, and the default `dsh-agent-core` bundle mounts it unconditionally. `llm-replay` backs the demos and the snapshot test tier under the per-file coverage gate. `acp-snapshot` carries the ACP subprocess/client boundary plus the snapshot harness, normalizers, and suite machinery, so e2e tests share one launcher and every snapshot suite is a scenario table over one gate-covered implementation. `subagent-mock` exercises the real `ctx.subagents` load path without a model or child agent. A package graduates OUT of `support/` into a product group only when it gains documented product consumers.

packages/support/acp-snapshot/README.md

@@ -41,3 +41,12 @@ A scenario booting a differently-composed tree sets its own `configPath` (an ove
 The example also ships a `cordis.snapshot.yml` replay overlay next to its `cordis.yml` (the bin swaps them under `DSH_SNAPSHOT=replay` — [single-source replay config RFC](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/testing/2026-07-04-single-source-acp-replay-config.md)); replay fixtures are served by [`dsh-llm-replay`](../llm-replay/README.md), which this package points at via the `DSH_SNAPSHOT_*` env vars it sets on the child. `pnpm run test:snapshot:record` calls the live LLM and rewrites the recorded scenarios' model fixtures; `pnpm run test:snapshot:refresh` stays keyless, runs the replay overlay, and rewrites stdout, comparable session-log goldens, and each pin's Markdown prompt snapshot from the committed model scripts. Fixture roles, record/replay/refresh semantics, and scenario-table fields are documented on `Scenario` and in the [snapshot RFC](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/testing/2026-06-19-acp-snapshot-tests.md).
 
 Constraints: `suite.ts` imports vitest, so the package entry is importable only inside a vitest run (the launcher, harness, and normalizers have no such dependency but ship from the same entry). ACP-specific by design — the launcher speaks the SDK's `ClientSideConnection`. Permission round-trips are scriptable: `InputScript.permissionAnswers` is a FIFO queue of option-kind selections (`allow_once`, `reject_once`, …) the client maps to the agent-issued `optionId` at answer time; an absent or exhausted queue answers `cancelled`, and a kind the request never offered rejects the run (the agent is answered `cancelled`, so a tolerant agent cannot absorb the scenario bug). Session config options are scriptable too: the `setConfigOption` step switches a knob over `session/set_config_option`, and `setConfigOptionExpectError` asserts the bridge rejects an unknown id or out-of-vocabulary value (the error frame stays in the transcript).
+
+## Model Experience
+
+None, as this test-only harness records, normalizes, and compares ACP transcripts without changing the agent's assembled model request.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **Session harvest is JSONL-only** — `runScenario` collects persisted `.jsonl` logs, so an example composed over the SQLite persistence backend has no snapshot path.
+- **The subprocess boots the unbuilt tsx/Loader path only** — the built-bin artifact is guarded by the separate `built-bin` e2e smokes, never by this tier.

packages/support/acp-snapshot/src/launcher.ts

@@ -178,14 +178,13 @@ export function launchAcpTestAgent(options: AcpTestLaunchOptions): LaunchedAcpTe
   // `closed` follows parser exhaustion. Capture both eagerly so a caller that
   // invokes close after process exit still joins the complete drain boundary.
   const stdioClosed = new Promise<void>(resolve => child.once('close', () => { resolve() }))
-  const drained = Promise.allSettled([stdioClosed, client.closed]).then(async ([, clientResult]) => {
+  const drained = Promise.all([stdioClosed, client.closed]).then(async () => {
     // The ACP SDK's readable loop dispatches client callbacks without awaiting
     // them. Once `closed` settles no new callbacks can start, but callbacks
     // already in flight still belong to this launch's teardown boundary.
     while (inFlightClientCallbacks.size > 0) {
       await Promise.allSettled([...inFlightClientCallbacks])
     }
-    if (clientResult.status === 'rejected') throw clientResult.reason
   })
   // A caller may await a pending update without calling close(). Make natural
   // stream exhaustion terminal for those waiters too, but only after the
@@ -207,7 +206,7 @@ export function launchAcpTestAgent(options: AcpTestLaunchOptions): LaunchedAcpTe
       try {
         await spawned
       } catch (error: unknown) {
-        await drained.catch(() => undefined)
+        await drained
         closeUpdateStream()
         throw error
       }

packages/support/invariants/README.md

@@ -1,8 +1,8 @@
 # dsh-invariants
 
-Dev-mode event-contract assertions. This pure-listener plugin checks relationships among session events, agent states, scoped dispatches, and model requests at runtime; it does not own or change product behavior.
+Runtime event-contract assertions intended for development diagnostics. This pure-listener plugin checks relationships among session events, agent states, scoped dispatches, and model requests; it does not own or change product behavior.
 
-**Off in production.** Enable it in tests and the demos, where a contract violation should fail loudly. It costs nothing when not registered, and doubles as executable documentation of the event taxonomy — the assertions *are* the contract.
+The plugin has no environment guard: it is active wherever it is registered. The default [`dsh-agent-core`](../../core/agent-core/README.md) bundle mounts it unconditionally; a custom composition can omit it when the runtime cost is undesirable. It doubles as executable documentation of the event taxonomy — the assertions *are* the contract.
 
 Session itself owns immutable log storage in every composition: it takes one lossless JSON snapshot of each accepted event, deep-freezes that record, and exposes the log through immutable array snapshots. The invariants plugin checks the cross-record and cross-seam rules that storage immutability cannot express.
 
@@ -45,8 +45,17 @@ On any violation it throws `InvariantError` (`code: 'INVARIANT'`).
 
 ## Why runtime assertions remain useful
 
-Session enforces the per-record storage boundary at runtime, where a cast cannot bypass it. Pervasive `DeepReadonly<SessionEvent>` types would add noise across consumers without expressing relationships such as turn/step nesting, subject-correct scoped dispatch, or equality between a request and its log reconstruction. This plugin checks those relationships in development while `dsh-session` keeps history immutable in every composition. See [source-owned session immutability and dev-mode invariants](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/architecture/2026-06-11-dev-invariants-over-deep-readonly.md).
+Session enforces the per-record storage boundary at runtime, where a cast cannot bypass it. Pervasive `DeepReadonly<SessionEvent>` types would add noise across consumers without expressing relationships such as turn/step nesting, subject-correct scoped dispatch, or equality between a request and its log reconstruction. This plugin checks those relationships wherever it is mounted while `dsh-session` keeps history immutable in every composition. See [source-owned session immutability and dev-mode invariants](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/architecture/2026-06-11-dev-invariants-over-deep-readonly.md).
 
 ## Seeded sessions
 
 A seeded or forked session arrives with events already in its log because construction does not emit `session/event` for each seed record. `Session` validates, snapshots, and freezes every seed record before accepting it; on `session/created`, this plugin replays the accepted log only to rebuild and check its relational trace state.
+
+## Model Experience
+
+None, as this observer only validates events and frozen requests and never rewrites prompts, schemas, messages, or streams.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **The request-reconstructability assertion covers loop-built requests only** — hand-built one-shots (e.g. compaction's summarize call) carry no live `sessionId` marker and are skipped.
+- **Merge-extended event families get no family-specific assertions** — `compact/*` lock pairing and `hook/*` invoked/result pairing are not checked here; only the core turn/step/chunk/tool-result contract is.

packages/support/invariants/package.json

@@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
 {
   "name": "@deepseek-ai/dsh-invariants",
-  "description": "Dev-mode event-contract assertions for the DeepSeek Harness",
+  "description": "Runtime event-contract assertions for DeepSeek Harness development diagnostics",
   "version": "0.0.1",
   "private": true,
   "type": "module",

packages/support/invariants/src/index.ts

@@ -1,13 +1,15 @@
 /**
- * Dev-mode invariants: a pure-listener plugin that asserts relationships in
- * the harness event contract at runtime.
+ * Runtime invariants: a pure-listener plugin that asserts relationships in
+ * the harness event contract. It is intended for development diagnostics but
+ * has no environment guard, so it is active in every composition that mounts
+ * it (including the default `dsh-agent-core` bundle).
  *
  * Everything is a plugin — this is just listeners on `session/created`,
  * `session/event`, `agent/status`, and the scoped dispatch and request seams.
- * It is **off in production**: enable it in tests and demos, where a contract
- * violation should be a loud failure rather than a subtle one. It doubles as
- * executable documentation of the event taxonomy: the assertions below are
- * the contract.
+ * Custom compositions can omit it when the runtime assertion cost is
+ * undesirable. When mounted, a contract violation is a loud failure rather
+ * than a subtle one. It doubles as executable documentation of the event
+ * taxonomy: the assertions below are the contract.
  *
  * Session owns immutable log storage: it snapshots and deep-freezes every
  * accepted event at the source. This plugin checks relationships that one
@@ -344,7 +346,7 @@ function checkTransition(from: AgentStatus | undefined, to: AgentStatus): void {
 }
 
 /**
- * Register the dev-mode invariants. Contributions are effect-scoped, so
+ * Register the runtime invariants. Contributions are effect-scoped, so
  * disposing the plugin fiber removes all listeners (HMR-safe). On (re-)apply
  * the trace state is rebuilt by replaying each existing session's log, so a
  * hot reload mid-turn does not falsely reject the next event.

packages/support/llm-replay/README.md

@@ -43,3 +43,12 @@ Replay keys every call by its calling session id (`GenerateOptions.sessionId`, s
 ## Plugin export shape
 
 Named `name` / `inject` / `Config` / `apply`, with **no default export**: the cordis Loader's `unwrapExports` does `exports.default ?? exports`, so a stray default would collapse the module to the bare function and drop the `inject` namespace (see [docs/postmortem/0001](../../../docs/postmortem/0001-acp-default-export-drops-inject.md)).
+
+## Model Experience
+
+None, as this keyless test adapter sends no request to a provider model; it only replays recorded assistant chunks into the test loop.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **First-call-order script binding assumes sequential delegation** — a cut that runs sibling subagents concurrently (or a compaction summarize call landing mid-run) would bind live sessions to recorded scripts non-deterministically; a stronger keying is deferred until such a scenario exists (`XXX(concurrent-subagents)`).
+- **Only chunk-producing calls are derivable** — a pure pre-chunk throw or a cancel/hang scenario needs the `replay.override.json` sidecar; the override replaces the PRIMARY session's script only.

packages/support/subagent-mock/README.md

@@ -18,3 +18,12 @@ Load it as a plugin (functional shape: `name`/`inject`/`Config`/`apply`, no defa
 | `structured` | `{ reply }` | Structured value surfaced when a request carries an `outputSchema` and the capability is on. |
 
 Aborting the required request signal or disposing before `result` settles flips the stop reason to `aborted`, so both holder-facing cancellation paths are observable.
+
+## Model Experience
+
+Indirectly, through `dsh-tool-subagent`, which renders this test provider's configured reply or stop-reason error into the parent test history.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **Scripted provider only** — it does not run a model, create a child agent, or exercise real prompt/tool-loop behavior.
+- **One synthetic outcome per run** — it models no multi-turn, streaming, steering, resume, or subprocess transport behavior.

packages/timeout/timeout-policy/README.md

@@ -32,3 +32,16 @@ The derived signal only **notifies**; termination stays with the tool and the ca
 ### Composing with other `tools/execute` wrappers
 
 Multiple `tools/execute` listeners compose by cordis registration order. Combined with a future retry/sandbox/metrics wrapper, registration order chooses the semantics — "timeout covers the whole retry operation" (timeout registered outer) versus "timeout covers each attempt" (timeout registered inner).
+
+## Model Experience
+
+### Conditional tool result
+
+**What the model sees**: This plugin adds no prompt or schema. If a declared deadline wins, it replaces the provider's outcome with `Error: tool call timed out after <ms>ms` plus structured `TOOL_TIMEOUT`; otherwise the original result passes through unchanged.
+
+**Token effect**: Zero tokens on non-timeout calls. A timeout adds one small retained error result and can prevent a larger late provider result from entering context.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **Cooperative, never a hard kill** — the deadline only notifies via `exec.signal`; a tool that ignores the signal does not stop on timeout (see § Cooperative, not a hard kill).
+- **No blanket budget** — only tools that declare `timeoutMs` on their `ToolDefinition` get a deadline; there is no registry-wide default for undeclared tools (the shipped `bash`/`read`/`write`/`edit` deliberately declare none).

packages/todo/tool-todo/README.md

@@ -23,3 +23,23 @@ The tool writes only the session event; it does not render. UIs subscribe to `se
 ## Export shape
 
 A function/namespace plugin: it exports `name` / `inject` / `apply` and NO default. A stray `export default` would collapse the module via the Loader's `unwrapExports` and drop `inject` (see [docs/postmortem/0001](../../../docs/postmortem/0001-acp-default-export-drops-inject.md)).
+
+## Model Experience
+
+### Tool schema
+
+**What the model sees**: The model sees the generated [`todo_write` schema](../../../docs/tool-catalog.md#deepseek-aidsh-tool-todo).
+
+**Token effect**: Fixed schema cost on every request where the tool is visible.
+
+### Tool-call history and result
+
+**What the model sees**: Each assistant tool call retains the entire replacement list in its arguments. Success returns exactly `Updated todo list: <pending> pending, <inProgress> in progress, <completed> completed.` Stable failures are ``Error: invalid todo: `content` must be a non-empty string``, `Error: invalid todos: duplicate content "<content>"`, `Error: invalid todos: at most one task may be in_progress, got <count>`, and `Error: todo_write requires an owning agent session`. The full `todo/write` session event is UI and replay state, not a second model message.
+
+**Token effect**: Token growth scales with every full list the model submits, and those call arguments remain until compaction. The result itself is small and fixed-shape.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **Single-owner scope only** — the list belongs to the one calling agent session; subagent/shared/swarm scopes are a deliberate cut (see § Single owner), and a non-agent caller is rejected.
+- **The item shape is deliberately minimal** — `content` plus three-state `status`; no id, priority, or active-form fields, and the ACP bridge synthesizes the `priority` ACP requires.
+- **Whole-list replacement is the only operation** — no partial updates, no read-back tool; the model must resend the entire list each call.

packages/ui/acp-agent/README.md

@@ -15,6 +15,7 @@ stdout is the ACP JSON-RPC channel, so the cluster is defined as much by what it
 | `@deepseek-ai/dsh-session-persistence-jsonl` | durable JSONL session log (the bridge advertises `loadSession`) |
 | `@deepseek-ai/dsh-acp` | the bridge that owns stdout for JSON-RPC and provides ACP-backed user answers when a leaf explicitly exposes a user-question tool |
 | ~~`@deepseek-ai/dsh-tool-ask-user`~~ | **omitted by default** — ACP elicitation support is still client-dependent, so leaves must opt in deliberately |
+| ~~`@deepseek-ai/dsh-user-approval`~~ | **omitted by default** — permission policy is deployment-specific; sandbox/approval leaves opt in and the ACP bridge then supplies the answerer |
 | ~~console logger~~ | **omitted** — it writes to stdout and would corrupt the protocol frames ([the stdout-purity footgun](../acp/README.md)) |
 | ~~`hmr`~~ | **omitted** — the editor owns the subprocess |
 
@@ -27,6 +28,8 @@ Because the package wires no logger entry, an ACP leaf has **nothing to get wron
 | `model` | (required) | the per-session agent template the bridge creates agents from |
 | `persona` | — | the deployment persona template (may reference `{{model}}`/`{{cwd}}`), routed to `dsh-system-prompt` |
 | `toolOrder` | — | explicit model-facing tool order (a name list with one `'<unlisted-tools>'` rest entry; absent — lexicographic; an unregistered name fails each turn at prompt assembly), routed to `dsh-system-prompt` |
+| `tools` | `{ mode: 'native' }` | tool-registry presentation config (`native` / `code` / `both`), routed through `dsh-agent-core` |
+| `skills` | owner defaults | registry-cache, local-provider, and model-facing skill-tool config, routed through `dsh-agent-core` |
 | `persistenceRoot` | `./.sessions` | the JSONL backend's root directory |
 
 The leaf supplies the swappable backends: an LLM adapter (`llm-deepseek` for the real model, `llm-replay` for keyless snapshot replay) and a bash executor.
@@ -42,3 +45,13 @@ The leaf supplies the swappable backends: an LLM adapter (`llm-deepseek` for the
 Run it under `node --expose-internals`: the cordis Loader resolves the config's bare plugin specifiers through its internal module loader, active only under that flag. (`demo:acp` runs under tsx, whose tsconfig `paths` map resolves them instead.)
 
 All diagnostics go to **stderr** — stdout is the protocol.
+
+## Model Experience
+
+Indirectly, through `dsh-agent-core` and `dsh-acp`, which compose each ACP agent's prompt, tools, and message history; this app bundle adds no model-bound content itself.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **JSONL persistence is baked in** — config chooses its root but cannot select a different backend; that requires a sibling entry or differently composed app package.
+- **User-question and approval mechanisms are omitted by default** — the bridge can answer both when their services/tools are composed, but this front door does not enable those deployment policies itself.
+- **A leaf can still corrupt stdout** — the app mounts no console logger, but it cannot prevent a sibling leaf entry from writing non-protocol bytes to the ACP channel.

packages/ui/acp/README.md

@@ -46,7 +46,7 @@ Background-task isolation rides on `dsh-tool-bash`: bash task ids are global and
 
 ## Per-session cwd
 
-Each session runs in its own workspace, recorded as the session's `SessionHeader.cwd`. On `session/new` the (absolute) request `cwd` becomes that header cwd; on `session/load` the resumed session keeps its PERSISTED header cwd and the request `cwd` must be absolute and equal to it, so the editor and bash executor agree on the workspace before an agent is constructed. A load whose persisted session has no absolute cwd is REJECTED up front via a metadata-only `list()` check, BEFORE resume constructs an agent (else bash would silently fall back to the server's launch dir, and a post-resume reject would leak the registered agent). `dsh-tool-bash` then defaults the bash workdir to the calling agent's `session.header.cwd` (an explicit model `workdir` still wins; a relative one resolves against the session cwd; with no session cwd the executor falls back to its own config / `process.cwd()`). So the server no longer has to be launched in the workspace — an editor can open any project folder, and N sessions over one connection can each target a different directory. (`additionalDirectories` is still rejected: widening the tool/filesystem scope beyond the single cwd is a separate sandbox concern.)
+Each session runs in its own workspace, recorded as the session's `SessionHeader.cwd`. On `session/new` the (absolute) request `cwd` becomes that header cwd; on `session/load` the resumed session keeps its PERSISTED header cwd and the request `cwd` must be absolute and equal to it, so the editor and bash executor agree on the workspace before an agent is constructed. A load whose persisted session has no absolute cwd is REJECTED up front via a metadata-only `list()` check, BEFORE resume constructs an agent (else bash would silently fall back to the server's launch dir, and a post-resume reject would leak the registered agent). `dsh-tool-bash` then defaults the bash workdir to the calling agent's `session.header.cwd` (an explicit model `workdir` still wins; a relative one resolves against the session cwd; with no session cwd the executor falls back to its own config / `process.cwd()`). The server may be launched outside every workspace: an editor can open any project folder, and N sessions over one connection can each target a different directory. (`additionalDirectories` is still rejected: widening the tool/filesystem scope beyond the single cwd is a separate sandbox concern.)
 
 ## Tool-call presentation
 
@@ -67,7 +67,7 @@ A tool whose call IS a shell command (`bash`) can render as a real **terminal ca
 - `tool_call`: `content:[…, {type:'terminal', terminalId}]` + `_meta.terminal_info.{terminal_id, cwd}` — the terminal id is the harness `callId`; the cwd is the card's explicit absolute `cwd`, else a relative `cwd` resolved against the session cwd, else the session's workspace cwd (the bridge fills the default, since the pure tool presenter can't see it). The card's `description` renders as a content block BEFORE the terminal block, so the description sits above the card.
 - `tool_call_update`: `_meta.terminal_output.{terminal_id, data}` (the terminal card's `output`) plus `_meta.terminal_exit.{terminal_id, exit_code | signal}` when the card reported a structured `exitCode`/`signal`. In terminal mode the update's `content` is OMITTED — an ACP `tool_call_update.content` REPLACES the call's content, so sending the fenced text block would clobber the terminal content block from the call.
 
-When the client does NOT advertise the capability, none of the `_meta`/terminal content is emitted: the `tool_call` shows the `description` content block and the `tool_call_update` carries a ` ```console ` text block the bridge DERIVES by fencing the terminal result's `output` (the tool no longer double-encodes the fences) — so a non-Zed client is never worse off. The `_meta` object is ACP's spec-blessed extensibility point; the specific `terminal_info`/`terminal_output`/`terminal_exit` keys are a Zed convention, not the ACP `terminal/create` sub-protocol (which would make the editor execute the command, bypassing `dsh-bash`'s sandbox/env-scrub/ownership/cwd). Live incremental streaming and command classification are follow-ups. See [the terminal-rendering RFC](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/feature/2026-06-18-acp-terminal-and-tool-rendering.md) and [the render-intent-union RFC](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/architecture/2026-07-02-tool-render-intent-union.md).
+When the client does NOT advertise the capability, none of the `_meta`/terminal content is emitted: the `tool_call` shows the `description` content block and the `tool_call_update` carries a ` ```console ` text block the bridge DERIVES by fencing the terminal result's unfenced `output` — so a non-Zed client is never worse off. The `_meta` object is ACP's spec-blessed extensibility point; the specific `terminal_info`/`terminal_output`/`terminal_exit` keys are a Zed convention, not the ACP `terminal/create` sub-protocol (which would make the editor execute the command, bypassing `dsh-bash`'s sandbox/env-scrub/ownership/cwd). Live incremental streaming and command classification are follow-ups. See [the terminal-rendering RFC](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/feature/2026-06-18-acp-terminal-and-tool-rendering.md) and [the render-intent-union RFC](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/architecture/2026-07-02-tool-render-intent-union.md).
 
 ## Settle-exactly-once
 
@@ -81,10 +81,6 @@ The bridge registers an `approval/request` waterfall listener — the ACP answer
 
 Teardown reaches quiescence: for EVERY live session settle any pending prompt as `cancelled`, then run that session's [`AgentHandle`](../../core/agent/README.md) `dispose()` — which stops the loop (sets `disposed` + aborts the in-flight step), `await`s the loop's exit (the final `turn/end` + `session/flush` are captured while the session is still attached), unregisters the agent, and removes its session from the store. A turn cut off mid-flight by teardown ends with reason `disposed` (not `aborted` — `dispose()` uses the disposed path, not `session/cancel`'s queue-aware `cancel()`). The per-session disposes run in parallel. The same teardown runs on a **client disconnect** (`conn.closed` resolves when the editor quits / the transport EOFs), so a vanished client never leaves an orphaned running — or idled-but-still-registered — agent whose `session/update` writes are silently swallowed. The two paths are idempotent and memoized (the first clears the `sessions` map; a second caller awaits the same teardown promise).
 
-## Known limitations (tracked TODOs)
-
-- **`additionalDirectories`** — rejected. A session operates in its single `cwd` (see Per-session cwd); widening the tool/filesystem scope to extra roots is a separate sandbox concern, not yet implemented.
-
 ## stdout is the protocol
 
 The JSON-RPC frames go on stdout, so this plugin MUST run in an example that loads **no stdout logger** (the console logger writes to stdout and would corrupt the frames). The guarantee is config-only — see `examples/acp-agent` (no console logger) and [ACP support risks](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/feature/2026-06-14-acp-agent-client-protocol.md#risks). A stderr exporter is fine for logging.
@@ -103,3 +99,37 @@ The JSON-RPC frames go on stdout, so this plugin MUST run in an example that loa
   }
 }
 ```
+
+## Model Experience
+
+### User messages
+
+**What the model sees**: Each ACP `session/prompt` becomes an agent user message: text passes through verbatim and each `resource_link` becomes exactly a leading newline, `[resource_link name=<JSON-string> uri=<JSON-string>]`, and a trailing newline. Unsupported image, audio, and embedded-resource blocks are rejected rather than silently omitted.
+
+**Token effect**: Prompt tokens are data-dependent and remain in that session's history until compaction. Concurrent ACP sessions keep separate contexts.
+
+### Human answers and permission decisions
+
+**What the model sees**: When optional consumers are loaded, ACP form answers become the exact JSON shape documented by `dsh-tool-ask-user`. Failures become `Error: ACP user questions must come from an agent-owned request`, `Error: ACP user question has no matching session`, `Error: ACP elicitation request failed`, `Error: ask_user_question was cancelled by the user`, `Error: ask_user_question returned no answer`, or `Error: ask_user_question was aborted before the user answered`. Permission decisions control whether another tool yields success or denial. ACP tool cards, terminal output, diffs, and streamed session updates are UI-only.
+
+**Token effect**: Answer, error, and denial text enters context only through the owning tool result; presentation metadata adds zero model tokens.
+
+### Permission preset switches
+
+**What the model sees**: `session/set_config_option` emits no model message itself. When `dsh-permission` is composed, the bridge writes the selected preset through that service; the resulting model-visible policy prompt and change notice belong to [`dsh-user-approval`](../user-approval/README.md), while sandbox-mode effects belong to [`dsh-tool-bash`](../../bash/tool-bash/README.md). The ACP `Permissions` select, its option descriptions, pending idle value, and refreshed config response remain client-only.
+
+**Token effect**: Zero direct tokens from the ACP option or the log-only `permission/preset` event. Downstream cost is limited to the owning plugins' policy prompt, conditional retained change notice, and any changed tool outcome.
+
+### Loaded sessions
+
+**What the model sees**: `session/load` resumes the persisted log, after which the loop sends its reconstructed history and request header. Replaying that log to the editor is not an extra model message.
+
+**Token effect**: Restored context has the persistence and session packages' normal retained cost; ACP replay to the client adds none.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **`additionalDirectories`** — rejected. A session operates in its single `cwd` (see Per-session cwd); widening the tool/filesystem scope to extra roots is a separate sandbox concern, not yet implemented.
+- **Prompt content is `text` + `resource_link` only** — image, audio, and embedded-resource blocks are rejected, as is a non-empty `mcpServers` list at `session/new`.
+- **One configured `model` for every created session** — per-session model selection has no config or protocol surface here yet.
+- **Terminal cards render completed output** — live incremental streaming and command classification are named follow-ups of [the terminal-rendering RFC](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/feature/2026-06-18-acp-terminal-and-tool-rendering.md).
+- **Permission answers are one-shot only** — the bridge offers `allow_once` / `reject_once`; durable `allow_always` grants and their storage/revocation policy remain deferred to the approval seam.

packages/ui/app-boot/README.md

@@ -13,3 +13,13 @@ Shared boot glue for the app bins ([`dsh-stdio-agent`](../stdio-agent/README.md)
 Two failure classes the guards handle: `loader.await()` swallows init rejections (`Promise.allSettled`) — Node still exits non-zero on the resulting unhandled rejection, and `installFailLoud` replaces the noisy dump with one labelled line and a guaranteed `exit(1)`; a failed plugin IMPORT is only logged by the Loader (the process would otherwise exit 0 on a usable config typo), leaving a fiber-less entry that `assertEntriesLoaded` turns into a `boot()` rejection.
 
 Bare plugin specifiers in a config (`@deepseek-ai/dsh-*`) resolve through the cordis Loader's internal module loader, active only under `node --expose-internals`; the bins' subprocess smokes exercise that path, while this package's unit suite drives `boot()` in-process against configs with relative specifiers.
+
+## Model Experience
+
+Indirectly, through the plugin tree it loads, which determines the prompts, schemas, messages, and model adapter in the resulting application.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **Bare package specifiers depend on Loader internals** — production bins need `node --expose-internals`; an in-process caller without it must use resolvable relative/file specifiers or tsx path mapping.
+- **Snapshot replay swapping is basename-specific** — only a config ending in `cordis.yml` or `cordis.yaml` maps to the sibling `cordis.snapshot.yml`; custom config names require caller-managed selection.
+- **Environment loading is cwd-scoped and optional** — the helper loads one `.env` file and warns on failure; it does not search parents, merge profiles, or validate required variables.

packages/ui/jsonrpc-agent/README.md

@@ -15,3 +15,13 @@ The bin owns the PROCESS-level exits: stdin EOF (the SDK client is gone — an i
 ## stdout is the protocol
 
 stdout carries only JSON-RPC frames; the bin and the app-boot guards write diagnostics to stderr only, and the booted config must load no stdout logger (see the `dsh-jsonrpc` README).
+
+## Model Experience
+
+Indirectly, through the plugins loaded from the external `cordis.yml`, which own every model-bound prompt, schema, message, and result; this bin adds none of its own.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **The bin cannot prove that the config serves JSON-RPC** — a valid config with no `dsh-jsonrpc` entry boots successfully and serves nothing.
+- **No built-in or default config exists** — every launch must provide `DSH_CORDIS_CONFIG` or a positional path, and deployment owns the complete plugin tree and stdout discipline.
+- **stdin EOF cuts off in-flight work** — client disappearance disposes the root immediately; callers that need orderly completion use the protocol-level `shutdown` request.

packages/ui/jsonrpc/README.md

@@ -21,3 +21,17 @@ The plugin owns the PROTOCOL-level exit: a `shutdown` request is answered first
 ## Wire notes
 
 `initialize.serverInfo.name` is the wire-stable `deepseek-harness-sdk-runtime` (SDK clients key on it, independent of this package's name). A session accepts at most one in-flight `session/prompt`; an overlapping prompt for the same `sessionId` fails immediately through the standard handler-error response, while other sessions remain independent and the same session can be reused after the active prompt settles. Persistence roots and the deployment persona come from `cordis.yml`; the wire exposes only parameters the server applies.
+
+## Model Experience
+
+### SDK user message
+
+**What the model sees**: For each accepted `session/prompt`, the conversation model receives the caller-supplied `contentBlocks` verbatim as one user message in that SDK session. This package adds no system-prompt prose or tool schema; those come from the plugins in the surrounding `cordis.yml`.
+
+**Token effect**: Data-dependent user-message tokens enter retained session history and are resent on later turns until another package compacts them. The JSON-RPC frames, session notifications, and server bookkeeping add zero model-context tokens.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **The wire has no per-session close or prompt-cancel method** — SDK-created agents remain live until process shutdown, and one accepted prompt runs to agent idle before that session accepts another.
+- **stdout purity is deployment-enforced** — a surrounding config can still load a stdout logger and corrupt the JSON-RPC channel; this plugin does not inspect or veto sibling loggers.
+- **Automatic adapter mounting is DeepSeek-specific** — `initialize` can reuse any pre-registered model adapter, but its only fallback mounts `dsh-llm-deepseek`.

packages/ui/permission/README.md

@@ -5,3 +5,13 @@ User-facing permission presets. Owns the `ctx.permission` service ([`PermissionS
 A switch WRITES THROUGH: `set(session, name)` appends one log-only `permission/preset` event when the name differs from the session's current preset (the audit fact reverse-mapping cannot recover — two presets may share knob values and differ only in composed policy, the planned `agent` preset being the standing example), then each knob event through its own THE-write-path setter, skipping values the session already effectively has — a net-zero switch appends nothing. The current preset DERIVES from the effective knob values (fold ?? composition default per knob): the last-chosen preset when its bundle still matches (presets may share bundles — the fold breaks the tie), else the first matching table entry, else the reserved `custom` — the honest not-a-preset state, shown as the current value only while it holds, switchable FROM and never a target. Every existing knob consumer (executor stamping, the approval gate, narrators, resume) keeps reading its own fold, untouched.
 
 Composing it requires a confining `ctx.bash` executor and the `ctx.approval` seam; a table entry named `custom` throws at load (the name is reserved), while composition defaults outside the table are not an error — a zero-event session simply derives `custom`. See [the acp-agent example's default tree](../../../examples/acp-agent/) for the composed leaf and [the sandbox RFC § Per-session modes](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/feature/2026-07-06-sandbox.md) for the switching design this layers over.
+
+## Model Experience
+
+Indirectly, through `dsh-user-approval` and `dsh-tool-bash`, which render the approval-policy prompt, switch notice, and sandboxed tool outcomes selected by this service's knob events; `permission/preset` itself is log-only.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **Only two mechanism knobs are bundled** — presets select sandbox mode and approval policy; an agent/profile choice is not part of `PresetSpec` yet.
+- **`custom` is derived-only** — callers can switch away from an unmatched knob combination but cannot target or persist a named custom preset through this service.
+- **The preset table is process-level** — configuration is fixed for the plugin lifetime; changing available presets requires reloading the plugin.

packages/ui/stdio-agent/README.md

@@ -26,8 +26,10 @@ The leaf `cordis.yml` supplies only the **swappable backends** — an LLM adapte
 | Key | Default | Routed to |
 |---|---|---|
 | `model` | (required) | the pre-created agent's model |
-| `persona` | — | the deployment persona template (may reference `{{model}}`), routed to `dsh-system-prompt` |
+| `persona` | — | the deployment persona template (may reference `{{model}}`/`{{cwd}}`), routed to `dsh-system-prompt` |
 | `toolOrder` | — | explicit model-facing tool order (a name list with one `'<unlisted-tools>'` rest entry; absent — lexicographic; an unregistered name fails each turn at prompt assembly), routed to `dsh-system-prompt` |
+| `tools` | `{ mode: 'native' }` | tool-registry presentation config (`native` / `code` / `both`), routed through `dsh-agent-core` |
+| `skills` | owner defaults | registry-cache, local-provider, and model-facing skill-tool config, routed through `dsh-agent-core` |
 | `persistenceRoot` | `./.sessions` | the JSONL backend's root directory |
 | `welcome` | `ready.` | the stdin-chat banner |
 | `resumeSessionId` | — | resume a persisted session id instead of starting fresh (sourced from an env var in the leaf) |
@@ -63,3 +65,23 @@ Fresh stdio sessions use the process launch directory as `session.header.cwd` an
 ```
 
 Swap `llm-deepseek` for a `mock-llm` leaf plugin and you have the echo demo — "swap the backend, keep the app".
+
+## Model Experience
+
+### Composed terminal agent request
+
+**What the model sees**: Through `dsh-agent-core`, the `main` agent receives the harness identity, configured persona, skill catalog, and visible tools; this app also composes the generated [`ask_user_question` schema](../../../docs/tool-catalog.md#deepseek-aidsh-tool-ask-user). Each readline submission becomes a user message.
+
+**Token effect**: Child prompt and schema costs repeat per request; user input and tool history grow until compaction. The welcome banner, logger output, and rendered transcript are terminal-only and add zero model tokens.
+
+### Human-answer result
+
+**What the model sees**: Through `dsh-tool-ask-user`, successful terminal answers use that package's exact compact JSON shape. Interruption becomes exactly `Error: ask_user_question was interrupted before the user answered`; a closed stdin becomes `Error: ask_user_question cannot be answered because stdin is closed`.
+
+**Token effect**: Only a completed or failed tool call adds retained result tokens; prompts printed while waiting are terminal-only.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **One pre-created `main` agent drives the readline UI** — there is no multi-session or concurrent-agent surface in this app; a run is one conversation.
+- **The front-door cluster is fixed in code** — the JSONL persistence backend and the ask-user tooling are baked; a different composition is a leaf-level sibling entry or another app package.
+- **The question tool is not an approval answerer** — this app mounts `user-interaction` and `ask_user_question`, but not `ctx.approval`; a `tools/pre-execute` `ask` therefore fails closed unless the leaf composes an approval service and terminal answerer.

packages/ui/tool-ask-user/README.md

@@ -18,3 +18,22 @@ The tool calls `ctx.userInteraction.ask()` and returns JSON text shaped as `{ "a
 ## Role
 
 This is the consumer package for the user-interaction seam. It does not render UI and does not know how input is collected; it only translates model arguments into `AskUserQuestionRequest` and returns the human answer to the agent loop.
+
+## Model Experience
+
+### Tool schema
+
+**What the model sees**: The model sees the generated [`ask_user_question` schema](../../../docs/tool-catalog.md#deepseek-aidsh-tool-ask-user), including question ids, prompts, headings, options, and multi-select flags.
+
+**Token effect**: Fixed schema cost on every request where the tool is visible.
+
+### Tool-call history and result
+
+**What the model sees**: The model's full questions remain in the assistant tool-call arguments. After the human answers, the next step sees compact JSON in the exact shape `{"answers":[{"id":"<id>","selected":["<label>"],"custom":"<text>"}]}`; `custom` is omitted when unused and `selected` can contain zero, one, or several labels. UI interaction while the call is pending is not model context.
+
+**Token effect**: Arguments and answer JSON are data-dependent retained tokens; there is no token cost while waiting for the human.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **A pending question blocks the tool call until the human answers** — the tool declares no `timeout-policy` budget; cancellation rides the turn's `exec.signal` only.
+- **Answers return as JSON text** — the seam's structured `AskUserQuestionAnswer` is serialized into the tool result rather than carried as typed content blocks.

packages/ui/user-approval/README.md

@@ -11,3 +11,37 @@ The seam also owns the per-session POLICY tier ([the sandbox RFC § Per-session
 One seam serves both ask paths of [the sandbox RFC](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/feature/2026-07-06-sandbox.md): the `tools/pre-execute` `ask` decision (routed by [`@deepseek-ai/dsh-tools`](../../core/tools/) when this service is mounted; degrading to deny when it is not), and the sandbox post-denial escalated retry (the bash tool's `sandbox_permissions` gate in [`@deepseek-ai/dsh-tool-bash`](../../bash/tool-bash/) — [the sandbox RFC § Escalation](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/feature/2026-07-06-sandbox.md)). The full design: [the approval-seam RFC](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/feature/2026-07-06-approval-seam.md).
 
 Answerers today: the ACP bridge ([`@deepseek-ai/dsh-acp`](../../ui/acp/)) forwards to the editor's `session/request_permission` prompt for agents it owns. The audit events are log-only session records — the model only ever sees the tool result the asker derives from the outcome.
+
+## Model Experience
+
+### System prompt and policy notice
+
+**What the model sees**: Under `ask`, every agent request carries the ask-policy prompt section below. Under `never`, it carries the never-policy prompt section below. A policy switch injects exactly `The approval policy changed from "<old>" to "<new>" (changed by the user).` or `The approval policy changed from "<old>" to "<new>" (changed by the operator/config).` before the next step.
+
+**Token effect**: Small fixed per-request cost, larger under `never`; a change notice is conditional and retained in history.
+
+#### Ask-policy prompt section
+
+```markdown
+<!-- dsh-user-approval-policy:ask -->
+```
+
+#### Never-policy prompt section
+
+```markdown
+Approval prompts are disabled in this session: actions that require approval are rejected automatically — do not request sandbox escalation (do not set `sandbox_permissions`).
+<!-- dsh-user-approval-policy:never -->
+```
+
+### Tool outcome
+
+**What the model sees**: `approval/asked` and `approval/decided` are log-only. The model sees only the asking consumer's eventual allowed, rejected, cancelled, or unavailable tool outcome; the human permission UI is not context.
+
+**Token effect**: Zero duplicate audit tokens. A rejection may replace a normal tool result with a small retained error, while an allowance leaves the consumer's ordinary result.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **Requests are valid only inside an open turn** — an idle or between-turn caller throws before auditing; a durable out-of-turn approval workflow is deferred.
+- **Only one-shot grants exist** — the outcome vocabulary has `allowed-once` but no `allow-always`, remembered rule, revocation, or grant store; session policy is only `ask` / `never`.
+- **The request carries no tool arguments** — a UI must correlate `callId` with an already rendered tool call, and a call-less request cannot be presented by the shipped ACP answerer.
+- **No built-in answerer** — headless or incompletely composed deployments resolve `unavailable` and fail closed; the service itself never prompts a human.

packages/ui/user-interaction/README.md

@@ -22,3 +22,12 @@ When an answer includes `custom`, `selected` is empty; custom text is an overrid
 ## Role
 
 This is the interface package. Model-facing consumers such as `@deepseek-ai/dsh-tool-ask-user` depend on this seam; UI front doors such as the `stdio-agent` readline module and the `acp` bridge provide the provider. The loop stays unchanged: a tool call simply awaits a promise, and the tool result resumes the normal agent loop.
+
+## Model Experience
+
+Indirectly, through `dsh-tool-ask-user`, which retains a successful provider answer as compact JSON or the exact `Error: ask_user_question was aborted before the user answered`, `Error: ask_user_question requires at least one question`, `Error: no user-interaction provider is registered`, and `Error: <message>` failures while waiting for the human adds no tokens.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **One provider per context** — there is no routing or fan-out to multiple UIs; a second registration throws `DUPLICATE_PROVIDER`, and with none registered `ask()` throws `NO_PROVIDER` rather than degrading.
+- **The vocabulary is the question-form shape only** — selectable options plus optional custom text; richer interaction shapes (file pickers, diff-preview confirmations) have no seam vocabulary yet.

packages/util/timeout/README.md

@@ -40,3 +40,13 @@ Pass your own `code` to `timeoutOf` so classification composes under nesting: wh
 ## What does NOT get a timeout
 
 Local file `read`/`write`/`edit` take no `timeoutMs`: a syscall is best-effort-abortable at most, a timeout could not force `fsync`/`rename` to stop, and adding one would be an implicit default that violates explicit-over-implicit. See [`fs/`](../../fs/README.md).
+
+## Model Experience
+
+Indirectly, through consumers such as `dsh-timeout-policy`, which may replace a provider result with a retained timeout error or suppress a late result.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **Notification only** — a deadline cannot stop work that ignores its signal; every capability still needs its own socket/process/task termination path.
+- **`timeoutMs <= 0` is internal vocabulary** — it disables the local timer only after an owning backend has resolved policy, never as a public model/plugin knob.
+- **The first abort reason wins classification** — when an upstream cancellation beats the local timer, this layer cannot later report that its own timeout would also have elapsed.

packages/web/tool-web/README.md

@@ -33,3 +33,53 @@ Each tool is registered independently; a product that wants only one disables th
 Tool registration follows product **enablement**, not backend availability. A tool stays visible even when its selected provider is missing, misconfigured, ambiguous, or temporarily unavailable; the seam resolves the provider at execution time and execution fails with a structured `WebError` (e.g. `WEB_PROVIDER_UNAVAILABLE`, `WEB_PROVIDER_AMBIGUOUS`), which `ToolRegistry.execute()` turns into an error tool result the model can read and hooks/UI can route on. This keeps the model schema stable without making plugin load order, credential state, or HMR timing part of the model-facing contract. To remove a web tool entirely, disable it here in config.
 
 The tool never calls a provider's `status()` and never enumerates providers — its only execution path is `ctx.web.search()` / `ctx.web.fetch()`, and provider unavailability reaches it as the structured `WebError` codes selection throws at execution time. Provider selection stays entirely inside the seam, with one owner.
+
+## Model Experience
+
+### System prompt
+
+**What the model sees**: Search and fetch contribute the web-search and web-fetch guidance below. A scoped tool restriction does not remove these independently registered sections.
+
+**Token effect**: Fixed guidance cost per request for each config-enabled tool, even when a restriction hides its schema.
+
+#### Web search guidance
+
+```markdown
+Use the web_search tool to discover current information on the web. It returns an optional answer plus a list of source URLs. Follow up with web_fetch when you need the full content of a specific result, and cite the relevant URLs as markdown links.
+```
+
+#### Web fetch guidance
+
+```markdown
+Use the web_fetch tool to retrieve the content of a specific HTTP(S) URL (for example a result from web_search). It returns the page content decoded to text. Cite the URL as a markdown link when you use its content.
+```
+
+### Tool schemas
+
+**What the model sees**: The model sees the generated [`web_search` and `web_fetch` schemas](../../../docs/tool-catalog.md#deepseek-aidsh-tool-web). Result-count and timeout budgets are deployment settings, not model arguments.
+
+**Token effect**: Fixed schema cost per request; config disablement removes both schema and guidance, while a scoped restriction removes only the schema.
+
+### Search result
+
+**What the model sees**: The optional provider-owned answer is followed by `Sources:` and data-dependent lines shaped exactly `- [<title-or-url>](<url>)`, optionally suffixed ` — <snippet> (<publishedAt>)`. With neither answer nor sources the result says `No results found.` A capped list adds `(Showing the first <count> sources. Refine the query for more.)`; every result ends `Cite the relevant URLs above as markdown links in your answer.`
+
+**Token effect**: Data-dependent results are resent until compaction and sources are capped by `searchMaxResults`.
+
+### Fetch result
+
+**What the model sees**: A successful fetch is exactly `Fetched <finalUrl> (HTTP <statusCode>)`, a blank line, and the provider-owned decoded body. Truncation adds a blank line and `(Content truncated. Fetch a more specific URL or section for the full text.)`; failures become `Error: <message>`. Queries and URLs remain in call history.
+
+**Token effect**: Provider caps bound body size; retained call arguments and results are resent until compaction, and timeout policy can replace a late result with a short error.
+
+### Argument errors
+
+**What the model sees**: Blank inputs become exactly `Error: query must be a non-empty string` or `Error: url must be a non-empty string`.
+
+**Token effect**: Only the failing call adds these retained tokens.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **`htmlToMarkdown` is a minimal regex converter, not an HTML parser** — it strips script/style/noscript, keeps headings/bullets/links, and decodes about a dozen named entities; tables, images, and nested formatting are lost.
+- **The model-facing surface is minimal by design, with promotions deferred** — `max_results` stays a config bound (not a model argument), and `web_fetch` takes only `url` (no `format`/`prompt`/LLM-summarization mode); both are named later steps in [the seam RFC](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/architecture/2026-06-24-web-capability-seam.md).
+- **No web-specific permission policy** — both tools execute without requesting `ctx.approval`; a deployment that needs confirmation must add a `tools/pre-execute` policy, and the package does not define persistent URL/domain grants.

packages/web/web-fetch-local/README.md

@@ -33,6 +33,12 @@ The provider's `timeoutMs`/`maxTimeoutMs` is a **resource backstop** for direct
 
 The numeric limits are validated at plugin construction: every cap except `maxRedirects` must be a positive finite number, and `maxRedirects` must be a non-negative integer. An invalid value throws rather than silently constructing a provider with nonsensical limits.
 
-## Security note
+## Model Experience
 
-SSRF / private-network protection (blocking private, loopback, link-local, multicast, and otherwise non-public destinations, with DNS-resolve-then-validate and per-hop re-validation) is **deferred** — see the [web capability seam RFC](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/architecture/2026-06-24-web-capability-seam.md). Until it lands, this provider is an SSRF primitive and **must not be enabled** in a deployment that can reach sensitive internal network targets.
+Indirectly, through `dsh-tool-web`, which renders this provider's `maxBodyChars`-bounded decoded text or markdown-shaped HTML under the exact fetch header and its stable failures under `Error: <message>` into retained tool history while redirects, headers, and transport mechanics remain hidden.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **SSRF / private-network protection is deferred** — no blocking of private, loopback, link-local, multicast, or otherwise non-public destinations, no DNS-resolve-then-validate, no per-hop re-validation (see [the web capability seam RFC](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/architecture/2026-06-24-web-capability-seam.md)). Until it lands, this provider is an SSRF primitive and **must not be enabled** in a deployment that can reach sensitive internal network targets.
+- **Only textual content decodes** — html/xhtml and `text/*`-plus-JSON/XML families; a missing `Content-Type` or any binary type throws `WEB_UNSUPPORTED_CONTENT_TYPE`, and text-extractable PDF decoding is named deferred work.
+- **Charset comes only from the `Content-Type` header** (UTF-8 default) — an HTML `<meta charset>` declaration is ignored, and a declared-but-unrecognized charset label throws rather than falling back.

packages/web/web-search-deepseek/README.md

@@ -34,3 +34,24 @@ It reuses `$DEEPSEEK_API_KEY` (no new secret) but **not** `$DEEPSEEK_BASE_URL`:
 ## Mapping
 
 DeepSeek returns no provider-generated answer surface this provider trusts as `content`, so `content` is omitted. `sources[]` is built from the `web_search_result` items inside `web_search_tool_result` blocks: `url` ← `url`, `title` ← `title`, `publishedAt` ← `page_age`. The per-source `snippet` lives separately in a `text` block's `citations[]` (a `cited_text` keyed by `url`), so the provider joins the two — a result with no citation excerpt simply has no `snippet`. Results are deduped by `url` (a `maxUses > 1` request can surface the same URL across searches). DeepSeek's `web_search` has no result-count knob (only `maxUses`), so `maxResults` is enforced by the seam (truncating `sources[]` and setting `truncated`). Provider failures surface as `WebError` `WEB_PROVIDER_ERROR`; an aborted request surfaces as `WEB_ABORTED`.
+
+## Model Experience
+
+### Auxiliary DeepSeek search request
+
+**What the model sees**: A separate DeepSeek model receives exactly `Perform a web search for the query: <query>` as its user text and one native `web_search` server-tool definition. This request is not part of the conversation model's context.
+
+**Token effect**: Separate provider input and output tokens are incurred for each search; `maxTokens` caps generated output and `maxUses` caps native search uses.
+
+### Conversation tool result, indirectly
+
+**What the model sees**: Through `dsh-tool-web`, the conversation model sees deduplicated URLs, titles, dates, and citation snippets from structured search blocks; provider prose is not trusted as an answer. Provider failures become `Error: DeepSeek search aborted`, `Error: DeepSeek search request failed: <error>`, `Error: DeepSeek returned no web_search_tool_result blocks; the request may not have triggered native web search`, or `Error: DeepSeek returned an unprocessable response body: <error>`; HTTP failures pass through their provider message after `Error:`.
+
+**Token effect**: Zero direct conversation tokens from registration. Result tokens scale with returned sources and snippets, then the seam enforces the requested source bound.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **One search costs a full Messages model turn** — latency plus generated tokens, with up to `maxUses` server-side searches; DeepSeek exposes no dedicated retrieval endpoint.
+- **Over-returned sources still cost tokens** — with no result-count knob on the wire, `maxResults` is enforced only post-hoc by seam truncation.
+- **Uncited results carry no `snippet`** — a source gains one only when a `text` block citation (`cited_text`) matches its URL.
+- **Abort classification is error-shape-based** — only a `DOMException` named `AbortError` maps to `WEB_ABORTED`; an abort carrying a custom reason (e.g. `dsh-timeout`'s `TimeoutReason`) surfaces as `WEB_PROVIDER_ERROR`.

packages/web/web-search-exa/README.md

@@ -24,3 +24,13 @@ This is an **implementation** package: it registers a provider into `ctx.web`, i
 ## Mapping
 
 Exa returns a flat `results[]` and no generated answer, so `content` is omitted. Each result maps to a `WebSearchSource`: `url` ← `url`, `title` ← `title`, `snippet` ← the first non-empty `highlights[]` entry (a result with no highlight has no portable snippet and is dropped), `publishedAt` ← `publishedDate`. A request's `maxResults` wins over the configured `numResults` default and is sent as Exa's `numResults` for a cost/latency optimization; the final bound is enforced by the seam. Provider failures (HTTP errors, network failure, unparseable or wrong-shape bodies) surface as `WebError` `WEB_PROVIDER_ERROR`; an aborted request surfaces as `WEB_ABORTED`.
+
+## Model Experience
+
+Indirectly, through `dsh-tool-web`, which retains this provider's `maxResults`-bounded URLs, titles, first highlights, and publication dates or exact `Error: Exa search aborted`, `Error: Exa search request failed: <error>`, and `Error: Exa returned an unprocessable response body: <error>` failures while generated answers and provider-private fields remain outside context.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **A result with no non-blank highlight is dropped entirely** — no portable snippet to map, so fewer sources than the requested count can return.
+- **Only `searchType`/`numResults`/`highlightsPerResult` are exposed** — Exa's other controls (livecrawl, category, domain/date filters, full-text contents) wait on provider-neutral seam fields ([seam RFC](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/architecture/2026-06-24-web-capability-seam.md)).
+- **Abort classification is error-shape-based** — only a `DOMException` named `AbortError` maps to `WEB_ABORTED`; an abort carrying a custom reason (e.g. `dsh-timeout`'s `TimeoutReason`) surfaces as `WEB_PROVIDER_ERROR`.

packages/web/web-search-perplexity/README.md

@@ -24,3 +24,24 @@ This is an **implementation** package: it registers a provider into `ctx.web`, i
 ## Mapping
 
 `content` ← `choices[0].message.content` (the generated answer). `sources[]` prefers the structured `search_results[]` (`url`, `title`, `snippet`, `publishedAt` ← `date`), falling back to the URL-only `citations[]` array only when `search_results` is absent — those sources carry just a `url`, which is why `title`/`snippet`/`publishedAt` are optional on the seam. Provider failures surface as `WebError` `WEB_PROVIDER_ERROR`; an aborted request surfaces as `WEB_ABORTED`. Perplexity has no result-count control, so `maxResults` is enforced by the seam (truncating `sources[]` and setting `truncated`).
+
+## Model Experience
+
+### Auxiliary Perplexity request
+
+**What the model sees**: A separate Perplexity model receives `<query>` verbatim as its sole user message through the chat-completions endpoint. This request is not part of the conversation model's context.
+
+**Token effect**: Separate provider tokens are incurred per search; `maxTokens` caps the generated answer.
+
+### Conversation tool result, indirectly
+
+**What the model sees**: Through `dsh-tool-web`, the conversation model sees the generated answer plus structured result metadata or URL-only citations. Failures become `Error: Perplexity search aborted`, `Error: Perplexity search request failed: <error>`, or `Error: Perplexity returned an unprocessable response body: <error>`; HTTP failures pass through their provider message after `Error:`.
+
+**Token effect**: Zero direct conversation tokens from registration. Answer and source tokens are data-dependent, source count is seam-bounded, and the retained result or error is resent until compaction.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **Citation-fallback sources are URL-only** — when Perplexity omits structured `search_results[]`, sources carry no `title`/`snippet`/`publishedAt`, so the tool renders bare hostname labels.
+- **Over-returned sources still cost tokens and latency** — with no result-count control on the wire, `maxResults` is enforced only post-hoc by seam truncation.
+- **Only `model`/`maxTokens`/`searchRecency` are exposed** — Perplexity's other search controls (domain filters, `web_search_options` context size, images) wait on provider-neutral seam fields ([seam RFC](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/architecture/2026-06-24-web-capability-seam.md)).
+- **Abort classification is error-shape-based** — only a `DOMException` named `AbortError` maps to `WEB_ABORTED`; an abort carrying a custom reason (e.g. `dsh-timeout`'s `TimeoutReason`) surfaces as `WEB_PROVIDER_ERROR`.

packages/web/web/README.md

@@ -42,3 +42,14 @@ The failure branches throw `WebError`, whose structured code (plus message detai
 ## Vocabulary
 
 `WebSearchRequest` (`query`, `maxResults?`) → `WebSearchResult` (`providerId`, `query`, `content?`, `sources[]`, `truncated`); each `WebSearchSource` has a required `url` and optional `title`/`snippet`/`publishedAt` (Perplexity citations may be URL-only). `WebFetchRequest` (`url`, `timeoutMs?`) → `WebFetchResult` (`providerId`, final `url`, `statusCode`, `body`, `truncated`); `WebFetchBody` is a CLOSED discriminated union (`html` | `text`) owned here — consumers `switch` to exhaustiveness so a new kind breaks their compilation until handled. See `src/types.ts` for the full contracts and the `WebError` code taxonomy.
+
+## Model Experience
+
+Indirectly, through `dsh-tool-web`, which retains bounded normalized provider data or the exact configured-provider, unavailable-provider, no-provider, multiple-provider, and `Error: <message>` failures while this registry contributes no prompt or schema itself.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **No observation surface** — no provider-change event and no capability-status query; availability is observed only by executing `search()`/`fetch()` and routing the thrown `WebError` codes, and the no-provider failure is the generic `WEB_PROVIDER_UNAVAILABLE` with no per-provider reason enumeration ([RFC](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/simplification/2026-07-04-drop-unconsumed-web-observation-surface.md)).
+- **`WebSearchRequest` carries only `query` + `maxResults`** — provider-neutral controls (recency, domain filters, regional hints, search depth) are deferred until Exa and Perplexity can both honor them honestly ([seam RFC](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/architecture/2026-06-24-web-capability-seam.md)).
+- **`WebFetchBody` has no `pdf` arm** — text-extractable PDF support is named deferred work; the closed union makes adding it a compile-enforced change across the three web packages.
+- **Provider-backed page extraction is out of scope of `fetch()`** — a Firecrawl/Tavily-style `web_extract` capability is deferred rather than widening the fetch seam.

packages/workflow/tool-workflow/README.md

@@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
 # @deepseek-ai/dsh-tool-workflow
 
-The model-facing **`workflow` tool**: run a JavaScript orchestration script that fans out subagents, and return the script's final value. Pure schema + lifecycle shaping over [`ctx.workflows`](../workflow/README.md) — script parsing, execution, caps, and cancellation live behind the seam, so a hardened engine swaps in without touching what the model sees.
+The model-facing **`workflow` tool**: run a JavaScript orchestration script that fans out subagents, and return the script's final value. This package owns schema and lifecycle shaping over [`ctx.workflows`](../workflow/README.md); script parsing, execution, caps, and cancellation live behind the seam, while the consumer retains ownership of the parent-facing schema and result envelope.
 
 ## What the model sees
 
@@ -20,3 +20,35 @@ Decided up front (per the [render-intent RFC](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/arch
 |---|---|---|
 | `toolName` | `workflow` | The model-facing tool name to register. |
 | `maxResultChars` | `50000` | Rendered-result ceiling; longer JSON is truncated with a notice. |
+
+## Model Experience
+
+### System prompt
+
+**What the model sees**: Every parent request in this plugin's registration scope receives the workflow guidance below. A scoped tool restriction can hide the schema without removing this independently registered guidance.
+
+**Token effect**: Small fixed guidance cost per request while the plugin is active.
+
+#### Workflow guidance
+
+```markdown
+Use the <toolName> tool ONLY when the user explicitly asks for a workflow or for large multi-agent orchestration: you write a JavaScript script (the tool description documents the exact format) that fans work out across many subagents with phases and structured results. For one or two delegations, prefer plain subagent calls.
+```
+
+### Tool schema
+
+**What the model sees**: When visible, the generated default [`workflow` schema](../../../docs/tool-catalog.md#deepseek-aidsh-tool-workflow) carries the complete JavaScript hook and metadata contract; `toolName` can rename the definition, and the model submits script, metadata, and optional args.
+
+**Token effect**: Substantial fixed schema cost on each request where the tool is visible.
+
+### Tool-call history and result
+
+**What the model sees**: The full model-written script, metadata, and args remain in the assistant tool call. Success is exactly `workflow "<name>" completed (<count> agent<optional-s>).`, newline, `Return value:`, newline, and pretty-printed data-dependent JSON; a cap adds `… [truncated: <omitted> more characters]` on a new line. Failures are exactly `Error: workflow run was cancelled`, optionally suffixed ` (<error>)`, `Error: workflow run failed: <error-or-unknown error>`, or defensively `Error: workflow run ended abnormally (<reason>)`; a call without an owning agent becomes `Error: workflow tool requires a calling agent (exec.agent was undefined)`. Intermediate child messages are omitted.
+
+**Token effect**: Call tokens can be large and remain until compaction. Result rendering is capped by `maxResultChars`; child-model tokens are separate from the parent's retained context.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **The parent turn blocks until the whole workflow settles** — there is no background start/poll surface, and cancellation discards partial output as an error.
+- **`args` must be an object and the result is bounded text** — callers wrap top-level arrays/scalars in a field, and JSON beyond `maxResultChars` is truncated rather than stored behind a retrieval handle.
+- **Workflow policy is fixed per tool registration** — provider selection, caps, and tool name are deployment config, not model-call arguments.

packages/workflow/workflow-workerthread/README.md

@@ -78,3 +78,25 @@ The host keeps a ledger of forwarded child starts. A graceful worker supplies th
 | `maxItemsPerCall` | `4096` | Items accepted by one `parallel()` or `pipeline()` call. |
 | `syncTimeoutMs` | `5000` | VM timeout for the script's initial synchronous slice. |
 | `disposeGraceMs` | `5000` | Bound before force-settlement/termination and for public disposal. |
+
+## Model Experience
+
+### Child-agent requests
+
+**What the model sees**: Every script `agent()` call sends its prompt verbatim and optional model or structured-output schema to a subagent provider. Each child sees that provider's own context; phase and log narration stays on observer events.
+
+**Token effect**: Potentially many independent child contexts are paid, bounded by `maxConcurrentAgents`, `maxTotalAgents`, and `maxItemsPerCall`; they never join the parent history directly.
+
+### Parent tool result, indirectly
+
+**What the model sees**: Through `dsh-tool-workflow`, success exposes only the materialized final JSON value and child count in that consumer's exact wrapper. An engine failure becomes exactly `Error: workflow run failed: <engine-error>`; stable engine-error shapes include `workflow script does not parse: <error>`, `invalid meta: <violations>`, `agent() requires a non-empty prompt string`, `agent() could not start a child: <error>`, `child agent run failed: <error>`, and the exact `parallel()`, `pipeline()`, `phase()`, option, schema, and JSON-boundary validation messages from this package. Intermediate child outputs are available to the script but not the parent model.
+
+**Token effect**: Zero direct parent tokens from this engine. Final result size is capped by the tool consumer and retained until compaction.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **The worker/vm is not a security boundary** — model-written code can escape `node:vm` and reach the worker's process authority; a hostile-code deployment needs a separate-process or container engine.
+- **One worker thread is paid per run** — there is no pool, warm runtime, or cross-run script cache.
+- **No ambient timers, filesystem, or network are injected, but escaped code can still reach Node** — the missing globals are portability API, not containment.
+- **Termination can only report host-observed starts** — `agentsStarted` excludes worker-side calls still queued behind concurrency when a forced termination makes them unknowable.
+- **Cross-realm errors fail `instanceof Error` inside scripts** — workflow authors must branch on stable fields such as `name` and `code`.

packages/workflow/workflow/README.md

@@ -38,6 +38,16 @@ Same-process event payloads are borrowed immutable values. Every listener is ind
 
 A child that resolves normally with a non-completed stop reason is not an infrastructure exception: `agent()` returns `null`, allowing the script to handle an ordinary child failure.
 
-## Non-goals
+## Model Experience
 
-Background collection, journaling/resume, saved workflows, nested `workflow()`, and token budgets are deferred. See the [dynamic-workflows RFC](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/feature/2026-07-05-dynamic-workflows.md).
+Indirectly, through `dsh-tool-workflow` and a workflow engine, which create child-agent requests and return a retained parent tool result.
+
+## Known Limitations and Deferred Work
+
+- **Foreground collection only** — the caller owns one live run and awaits it; background start/poll, spill handles, and detached collection are deferred.
+- **No journaling or resume** — scripts, child progress, and intermediate values are not checkpointed, so a process restart cannot continue a run.
+- **No saved or nested workflows** — the seam starts caller-supplied scripts only, and a workflow script receives no `workflow()` hook for recursive orchestration.
+- **No token-budget vocabulary** — engines cap concurrency, items, and children, but neither the request nor result accounts for model tokens across children.
+- **Runs are holder-owned, not service-tracked** — unloading the engine does not discover independent live handles; every consumer must dispose the run it started.
+
+See the [dynamic-workflows RFC](../../../docs/rfc/implemented/feature/2026-07-05-dynamic-workflows.md) for the deferred workflow surface.

scripts/markdown.ts

@@ -5,6 +5,22 @@ import { gfmFromMarkdown } from 'mdast-util-gfm'
 import { gfm } from 'micromark-extension-gfm'
 import type { Nodes } from 'mdast'
 
+/** One authored Markdown line outside fenced code and rendered-away HTML comments. */
+export interface MarkdownProseLine {
+  /** 1-based source line number. */
+  index: number
+  /** Source text without normalization. */
+  raw: string
+}
+
+/** One parsed Markdown heading, retaining its authored first line and rendered text. */
+export interface MarkdownHeadingLine extends MarkdownProseLine {
+  /** Parsed ATX or Setext heading depth. */
+  depth: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6
+  /** Rendered heading text, excluding raw HTML such as comments. */
+  text: string
+}
+
 /** Parse GitHub-flavored Markdown with the repository's standard extensions. */
 export function parseMarkdown(source: string): Nodes {
   return fromMarkdown(source, { extensions: [gfm()], mdastExtensions: [gfmFromMarkdown()] })
@@ -21,3 +37,107 @@ export function visitMarkdown(node: Nodes, visitor: (node: Nodes) => boolean | v
     for (const child of node.children) visitMarkdown(child, visitor)
   }
 }
+
+/** Text a reader sees from one Markdown node; raw HTML itself contributes none. */
+function renderedText(node: Nodes): string {
+  if (node.type === 'text' || node.type === 'inlineCode') return node.value
+  if (node.type === 'image' || node.type === 'imageReference') return node.alt ?? ''
+  if (node.type === 'break') return ' '
+  if ('children' in node) return node.children.map(child => renderedText(child)).join('')
+  return ''
+}
+
+/** Return every parsed Markdown heading with its rendered text and source line. */
+export function markdownHeadingLines(source: string): MarkdownHeadingLine[] {
+  const rawLines = source.split('\n')
+  const headings: MarkdownHeadingLine[] = []
+  visitMarkdown(parseMarkdown(source), (node) => {
+    if (node.type !== 'heading' || node.position === undefined) return
+    headings.push({
+      depth: node.depth,
+      index: node.position.start.line,
+      raw: rawLines[node.position.start.line - 1] ?? '',
+      text: renderedText(node),
+    })
+  })
+  return headings
+}
+
+type ColumnRange = readonly [start: number, end: number]
+type OffsetRange = readonly [start: number, end: number]
+
+/** Source-column ranges occupied by parsed HTML comments, keyed by source line. */
+function htmlCommentRanges(source: string, rawLines: readonly string[]): Map<number, ColumnRange[]> {
+  const comments: OffsetRange[] = []
+  visitMarkdown(parseMarkdown(source), (node) => {
+    if (node.type !== 'html' || node.position?.start.offset === undefined) return
+    let cursor = 0
+    while (true) {
+      const start = node.value.indexOf('<!--', cursor)
+      if (start < 0) break
+      const close = node.value.indexOf('-->', start + '<!--'.length)
+      const end = close < 0 ? node.value.length : close + '-->'.length
+      comments.push([node.position.start.offset + start, node.position.start.offset + end])
+      cursor = end
+    }
+  })
+
+  const ranges = new Map<number, ColumnRange[]>()
+  let lineOffset = 0
+  rawLines.forEach((raw, index) => {
+    const lineEnd = lineOffset + raw.length
+    for (const [start, end] of comments) {
+      const from = Math.max(start, lineOffset)
+      const to = Math.min(end, lineEnd)
+      const coversEmptyLine = raw.length === 0 && start <= lineOffset && end > lineOffset
+      if (from < to || coversEmptyLine) {
+        const lineRanges = ranges.get(index + 1) ?? []
+        lineRanges.push([from - lineOffset, to - lineOffset])
+        ranges.set(index + 1, lineRanges)
+      }
+    }
+    lineOffset = lineEnd + 1
+  })
+  return ranges
+}
+
+/** Whether a source line retains non-whitespace text after HTML comments disappear. */
+function hasRenderedTextOutsideComments(raw: string, ranges: readonly ColumnRange[] | undefined): boolean {
+  if (ranges === undefined) return true
+  let cursor = 0
+  let visible = ''
+  for (const [start, end] of [...ranges].sort((left, right) => left[0] - right[0])) {
+    visible += raw.slice(cursor, start)
+    cursor = Math.max(cursor, end)
+  }
+  visible += raw.slice(cursor)
+  return visible.trim().length > 0
+}
+
+/**
+ * Return source lines outside backtick or tilde fences and HTML comments.
+ * @param source - Markdown source whose prose should be retained verbatim.
+ * @returns unfenced lines with their original 1-based locations.
+ */
+export function markdownProseLines(source: string): MarkdownProseLine[] {
+  let fence: { marker: '`' | '~'; length: number } | undefined
+  const kept: MarkdownProseLine[] = []
+  const rawLines = source.split('\n')
+  const comments = htmlCommentRanges(source, rawLines)
+  rawLines.forEach((raw, i) => {
+    const token = /^ {0,3}(`{3,}|~{3,})/.exec(raw)?.[1]
+    if (token !== undefined) {
+      const marker = token[0] as '`' | '~'
+      if (fence === undefined) {
+        fence = { marker, length: token.length }
+      } else if (marker === fence.marker && token.length >= fence.length) {
+        fence = undefined
+      }
+      return
+    }
+    if (fence === undefined && hasRenderedTextOutsideComments(raw, comments.get(i + 1))) {
+      kept.push({ index: i + 1, raw })
+    }
+  })
+  return kept
+}