Epiphany/eval-plan.md

Eval Plan

The first question is not whether this protocol is elegant. The first question is whether it helps.

Conditions

1. Plain prompting with no explicit map
2. Plain prompting with a pinned architecture map in context
3. External typed state with no verifier stack
4. External typed state with verifier checks

Candidate Metrics

• task success
• regression rate after follow-up edits
• total diff size
• revert rate
• contradiction rate between map and final patch
• branch kill rate
• human rating of architectural coherence

Good First Tasks

• fix a bug without regressing adjacent behavior
• refactor a medium file while preserving invariants
• add one feature that touches multiple connected modules

Failure Smells

• the map and the code disagree
• scratch grows without being summarized or deleted
• branches accumulate but are never killed
• tests pass while architectural coherence gets worse

Exit Criteria For The Prototype

The prototype is worth keeping if it reliably reduces drift or makes failure easier to diagnose without adding absurd overhead.