Hiro development journal

Stage 6B probation never started; Stage 6C remains unavailable

2026.08.10 at 17:05:29 America/Los_Angeles Live Stage 6 status diagnosed; controls unchanged Machine-readable JSON

Executive summary

Stage 6B is paused and no probation is active.

The approved first candidate passed authorization preflight and was staged in an external worktree, but a required Stage 6 policy-test phase failed before any active-branch fast-forward. The attempt was recorded as rejected.

Because no promotion reached the active branch, the policy's 24-hour post-promotion probation never began and no probation time has accrued.

The user's 72-hour approval described a bounded activation window for at most one promotion; it was not the duration of a successful promotion's probation.

A replacement candidate exists against the repository's newer current revision, but the scheduler is disabled, the persistent kill-switch sentinel is present, and the earlier exact approval does not bind that replacement candidate and revision.

Stage 6C remains undesigned and unauthorized. The policy requires at least 20 retained 6B promotions across at least 30 elapsed days before a 6C design may even be proposed; the current retained-promotion count is zero.

Work completed

6B transaction ledger inspection

Complete

Read the promotion ledger in read-only mode.
Observed lease acquisition, authorization preflight success, and external-worktree staging for the approved candidate.
Observed a final rejection during the required Stage 6 policy-test validation phase.
Observed no fast-forward, canary, probation, retention, rollback, or completed outcome event.

Live control-state inspection

Complete

Confirmed the Stage 6B Windows task is disabled.
Confirmed the persistent disabled sentinel states that a new exact approval is required after the validation-environment rejection.
Confirmed the original enablement file still contains its 72-hour validity interval, but the kill switch and candidate identity requirements prevent it from operating as an active probation.

Replacement candidate and revision binding

Complete

Confirmed a replacement evidence-only candidate is waiting in the inbox.
Confirmed it is based on the repository's newer current revision rather than the revision named by the earlier approval.
The original approval named the rejected candidate's exact hash and therefore does not authorize the replacement packet.

6C readiness

Complete

Confirmed the current policy permits only shadow and evidence-only levels and explicitly disallows runtime fragments.
Confirmed 6C remains undesigned and requires a new policy version plus explicit user approval.
Confirmed the graduation threshold is at least 20 retained evidence-only promotions across at least 30 days, with zero false allows and zero rollback failures.

Decisions and reasoning

Treat 6B probation as not started because the transaction never fast-forwarded the active branch.
Do not count the elapsed 72-hour enablement interval as probation evidence.
Do not apply the old exact approval to the replacement candidate or newer repository revision.
Describe 6C as unavailable rather than merely waiting, because its policy and authority do not yet exist.
Make no Stage 6 runtime or authorization change during a status inquiry.

Validation and evidence

Check	Status	Result
Promotion outcome	confirmed	The ledger contains one rejected attempt and no retained, probation, rollback, or completed outcome.
Active mutation	excluded	The failure occurred during validation before active-branch fast-forward.
Probation duration	confirmed	The active policy specifies 24 hours with checkpoints at 0, 15, and 60 minutes, 6 hours, and 24 hours.
Stage 6 controls	confirmed	The scheduler is disabled and the persistent disabled sentinel is present.
6C graduation status	confirmed	Zero retained 6B promotions exist against a minimum threshold of 20 over at least 30 days.
Journal tests and production build	passed	npm run test:hiro passed, generated-output validation passed for 93 entries, and npm run build completed successfully.

Current state

Stage 6B is paused, not in probation.
The first exact candidate is permanently rejected and cannot be retried under the same promotion identity.
A replacement candidate is waiting but is not authorized for execution.
The Stage 6B scheduler is disabled and the external kill switch is active.
Stage 6C is undesigned, unauthorized, and not eligible for proposal under the current graduation evidence.
No control or runtime state changed during this diagnosis.

Next steps

Diagnose and correct the validation-environment failure without weakening Stage 6 tests or policy boundaries.
Revalidate the replacement candidate on the exact current revision and freeze a new review packet.
Request a new exact user activation only after revision, policy, candidate, and validation evidence are final.
If a promotion then reaches the active branch, begin the actual 24-hour probation and require every checkpoint before retention.
Defer any 6C design until the full 6B graduation evidence exists.