Maintain the collection-owned analysis method

Draft instruction for authors changing analysis instructions, shared contracts, local types or worker packets. Preserve executable composition and update all consumers of changed rules. Intended destination: kb/agentic-system-analyses/instructions/maintain-analysis-method.md.

Consumption and authority

The method author loads this instruction before an applicable edit, together with the owning collection and selected instruction/type-spec contract. Promotion must add this mandatory route to the method's maintainer-facing editing entry point and affected type-authoring guidance. A navigation-only link is insufficient. Analyst job packets do not load it. This draft authorizes no live edit.

Composition

Use executability and precision as the quality goal. State goal, authority, inputs, result, acceptance and stop conditions. Keep the goal first and retain reasons only when an edge case needs them. Put transferable explanations in notes. Use imperative instruction titles and trigger descriptions. Plain procedures use the instruction type; shared definition contracts may use the note type.

An instruction is complete for its declared consumption path. Inherit doctrine, collection/type contracts and skills only when the runtime supplies them with binding force. Carry exceptions explicitly. Give delegated packets purpose, consequential choices, authority, inputs, owned output, coordination, acceptance and return conditions beyond the verified baseline. Delegation grants no extra authority; scheduling, integration and recovery remain with the parent. Unstated consequential choices follow an inherited default, deliberately delegated judgment from evidence, or return as a gap. Use clean context for a named benefit.

Editing and verification

Name each consumer and its loading channel before changing a rule. Search this collection and generic instructions for exact filenames, skill names and result literals. Read direct callers, callees, conditional loads and argument/result consumers. Update affected interfaces together or report the unresolved mismatch. A changed inherited rule reopens the packets commissioned against that baseline.

Execution does not depend on incidental link following. Instruction links provide context transfer, conditional deviations or maintainer context; keep chains shallow and never add reciprocal links only to mirror an edge. Search local method/types and generic instructions, notes, reference and tags as needed. Workflow execution inputs enter through declared dependencies. Do not make reviews, archives or workshops execution inputs.

Edit canonical instructions. Inspect projection, promotion and stub generation when names, skill metadata or promotion status change. Test the affected loading, authority, validation and result paths. Commit method changes before a new run; never rewrite the opening method commit of an existing run.