Lamprey Failure Archaeology

When to use / when not

• Use before investigating any bug (the class may be settled), when old docs mention machinery you can't find in the tree, or when a "new idea" might be a rejected old one.
• Don't use for live triage steps (see lamprey-debugging-playbook) or the methodology of investigations (see lamprey-proof-and-analysis-toolkit).

Caveat on SHAs: main was rewritten 2026-06-28 (501 → 112 commits, authorship unified, roster codes stripped). Commit SHAs quoted in docs written before that date may not resolve. Use git log --oneline --all | grep -i <keyword> to relocate a commit by subject.

Quick index by symptom keyword

Keyword	Entry
"no column named", schema, migration	#1 v0.9.2 schema bootstrap crash
reviewer, CHANGES verdict, packet	#2 v0.11.1 reviewer packet inversion
keys wiped, settings empty	#3 JM-13 atomic writes
debug log, plaintext secrets	#4 JM-1 forceDebugTraceOn
loop never ran, wake-up, duplicate iteration	#5 loop scaffold & JM Track A
hung turn, no reply, ghost	#6 turn settlement & ghost replies
deepseek 400, retired model	#7 DeepSeek retirement
multi-agent, planner, router, proof gate, composer	#8 Unburdening deletions
F1–F15, playbook failures	#9 the F-code catalog
plans that never shipped	#10 unshipped plans

---

#1 — v0.9.2: schema bootstrap crash (SETTLED)

• Symptom: every chat send in v0.9.1 returned table messages has no column named proof_status.
• Root cause chain: conversation_rag_attachments DDL in electron/services/schema-init.ts used PRIMARY KEY (…, COALESCE(…)) — SQLite forbids expressions in table-level PRIMARY KEY/UNIQUE constraints. The throw aborted initLegacySchema partway; runMigrations(db) was never reached; user_version stayed 0; migration v16's proof_status column never existed.
• Amplifier: getDb() cached the partially-initialized handle, so nothing ever retried (fixed later, JM-16).
• Detection failure: the regression test in schema-init.test.ts silently skipped under the better-sqlite3 NODE_MODULE_VERSION mismatch (vitest's Node ABI ≠ Electron's) — on every CI and local run.
• Fix: move expression uniqueness to CREATE UNIQUE INDEX (legal in SQLite). Recovery was automatic and idempotent on next launch. Follow-ups: SP-9 made verify:proof print native-skip accounting; JM-27's Electron 43 bump aligned the ABIs so those tests actually run now.
• Lessons institutionalized: silent skips are incidents; migrations must be reachable and transactional; never cache a handle before init completes.

#2 — v0.11.1: reviewer packet inversion (SETTLED, subsystem since deleted)

• Symptom: every multi-agent turn — including casual questions — got a Reviewer verdict of CHANGES.
• Root cause: the pipeline passed the Coder's reply as builderNarrative, but the packet builder gated inclusion behind an includeBuilderNarrative flag no caller ever set. The Reviewer reviewed a packet with the work product missing and correctly said "no answer artifact to review."
• Detection failure: two unit tests asserted the wrong invariant ("…without builder narrative by default", "sends packet without coder narrative") — the suite was green because it codified the bug.
• Fix: invert the API — include whenever provided; flip both tests; add a positive assertion the content reaches the Reviewer.
• Lesson: a passing test suite can lock a defect in. When behavior contradicts intuition, read the assertions (adversarial test inversion, lamprey-proof-and-analysis-toolkit recipe 7).
• Note: the whole pipeline was deleted in v0.14.0 (#8), but the lesson is permanent.

#3 — JM-13: config-file wipe risk (SETTLED)

• Symptom (potential/latent): crash mid-write to keys.json/settings.json → torn JSON → reader silently healed to {} → next write persisted empty → all keys/settings permanently lost.
• Fix (v0.16.0): electron/services/atomic-json.ts — writeJsonAtomic (temp file + atomic rename) and readJsonGuarded (parse failure preserves the file as <path>.corrupt-<timestamp>, never overwrites it).
• Lesson: atomic temp+rename is mandatory for config files; corruption handling must preserve evidence, not destroy it.

#4 — JM-1 / SEC-3: forceDebugTraceOn shipped (SETTLED)

• Symptom: v0.15.x shipped with diagnostic tracing force-enabled in electron/main.ts; all tool arguments persisted to plaintext lamprey-debug.log (may include secrets).
• Fix: call removed; tracing is opt-in only.
• Lesson: debug-convenience paths never ship enabled. Grep for force-enables before any release.

#5 — Loop scaffold & JM Track A (SETTLED as of v0.16.0; live reliability = the current campaign)

• LP-0 / G1 (2026-06-14): a pre-existing, undocumented loop scaffold (loop-runner.ts, schedule_wakeup, loop_wakeups table) looked functional but never ran a turn — the renderer only reloaded the message list. LP-1 wired a headless turn runner (setLoopTurnRunner seam into runHeadlessTurn).
• JM audit P0s (all fixed v0.16.0):
  1. Iteration prompt never reached the model (persist-before-run was missing) — JM-2.
  2. No in-flight mutex: a slow turn spawned overlapping iterations — JM-3 (mutex + sequential wake-up drain).
  3. Watchdog abort signal dropped before reaching the turn — JM-4/5 (threaded end-to-end; stop/pause abort the running turn).
  4. schedule_wakeup bypassed loopsEnabled entirely with no ceiling — JM-5 (gated everywhere + 10-pending-wakeup cap per conversation).
• Also: wall-clock ceiling counted calendar time including pauses → migration v18 loops.active_ms counts working time (JM-6); crash-recovery sweep + transactional iteration commits (JM-7).
• Status: mechanisms fixed and source-locked (loop-safety.test.ts); live reliability at scale is the open frontier — lamprey-loop-reliability-campaign.

#6 — Turn settlement & ghost replies (SETTLED)

• History: pre-stream throws hung turns forever (JM-8, fixed: every failure path settles); turns that failed with no visible reply left the conversation blank (SP-4, fixed: ghost-reply-guard.ts persists a role:'system' notice, user cancels exempt); retry attempts duplicated streamed prefixes (JM-9, fixed: accumulators reset per attempt); persisted system rows never reached the API history, breaking the research fallback (JM-11, fixed).
• Lesson: every failure path must settle the turn and leave a visible trace.

#7 — DeepSeek model retirement (SETTLED, pattern recurs)

• Symptom: stale selections of deepseek-chat/deepseek-reasoner → unrecoverable HTTP 400 after the provider deprecated the endpoints.
• Fix (v0.15.6): RETIRED_MODEL_MAP in providers/registry.ts silently remaps (chat→v4-flash, reasoner→v4-pro, v3→v4-flash, r1→v4-pro); all hardcoded legacy defaults swept.
• Recurring pattern: providers retire models. When it happens again: add to the map, sweep hardcoded ids (grep -rn "<old-id>" electron/ src/), remove catalog entries.

#8 — The Unburdening deletions (SETTLED — do NOT rebuild)

Deleted deliberately in v0.14.0 (net −7,400 lines) on explicit user direction, after being fully built and measured. Anything below appearing in older docs/plans is historical record:

Deleted	What it was
agent-pipeline.ts + safety wrapper + reviewer evidence packet	Always-on Planner→Coder→Reviewer multi-agent pipeline
agent-router.ts + telemetry + After-action routing IPC	L8 heuristic auto-router (single vs multi per prompt)
proof-gate.ts, proof-rigor.ts, ProofGateBanner, implicit contracts, receipts scan	Runtime proof gate blocking "untrusted completions"
final-response-composer.ts	Composer rewriting the model's final reply (now: reply is the model's reply, byte-for-byte)
agent-store.ts, Agents settings tab, agentMode/agentRoster/proofGate/agenticCodingComposer keys	Settings/type surface for all of the above

Kept: the multi_agent_run model tool (Task-tool analog), coworker side chat, reasoning audit/trail/trace, ghost-reply guard, spill valve, sanitizer, verify:proof repo gate, and the DB tables (proof_receipts, change_contracts, failure_ledger) so historical rows stay readable. Retired settings keys ride through settings.json inert.

Why: the Opus 4.5-era product never had this machinery; it measurably degraded cheap-model output ("tortured"), and gating wasn't enough — deletion was.

#9 — The F-code catalog (playbook failures, v0.10–v0.12 era)

Failure codes from live runs of the LL smoke playbook. Where each stands now:

Code	What it was	Status now
F2	Pipeline bailed after Coder mutated files → broken files on disk, no chat reply	Moot (pipeline deleted); the surviving principle: never end a mutating turn without a visible reply (ghost-reply guard)
F4	Non-mutating turns tripping "Untrusted completion"	Moot (proof gate deleted)
F5	Reviewer verdict-line intermittent	Was a downstream symptom of #2, not a real regression — the fix hypothesis (CR-6) was correctly declared a NO-OP after evidence
F7	Repeated Unix-syntax failures on PowerShell	Contract bullet: adapt after ONE shell failure — lives on in the prompt contract
F9	File edits via shell pipelines → silent UTF-8 corruption	Contract bullet: patch-based edits only, never shell pipelines
F12	Reviewer volunteering unasked fixes	Resolved by v0.11.1; CR-7's second half correctly no-opped
F13	Building whole systems from terse clarifications	Contract bullet: smallest correct fix
F15	Stall watchdog tripping on progressing stages	Fixed by SP-5 activity-kick wiring; watchdog machinery survives in loop iterations

#10 — Drafted but never shipped (do not assume these exist)

Plan	Status
PLANNING/LAMPREY_HYBRID_CONTEXT_PLAN.md	Drafted, never approved/executed
PLANNING/LAMPREY_SANDBOX_PARITY_PLAN.md	Partially delivered piecemeal; full roster (platform sandbox profiles) never executed as a phase
PLANNING/LAMPREY_PERSISTENCE_AND_SEED_PLAN.md	Elements delivered piecemeal (atomic writes, backups, fork lineage); never run as the formal 24-prompt phase; fork-with-parameters remains partially stubbed
PLANNING/Lamprey_Data_Spine_Plan_and_Prompt_Timeline.md	Research doc; produced the undocumented agentic-infra layer (automations/workflow runners) that Loops later built on
PLANNING/LAMPREY_LIVE_AUDIT_HARDENING_PLAN.md	Drafted; elements exist; formal phase never executed

These lost the race to the era-lock/Unburdening direction. Reviving any of them = era-lock exception = explicit user authorization (lamprey-change-control).

Provenance and maintenance

Compiled from git log, DEVLOG.md, PLANNING/LAMPREY_JULY_2026_MAINTENANCE_AUDIT.md, PLANNING/LL_SMOKE_PLAYBOOK.md, and CLAUDE.md phase entries, at v0.16.0 (2026-07-02).

Re-verify:

• Incident fix presence: git log --oneline | head -40 (JM commits are the most recent block)
• Deleted modules stay deleted: ls electron/services | grep -E "agent-pipeline|agent-router|proof-gate|final-response-composer" (expect no output)
• Unshipped plans list: ls PLANNING/ + CLAUDE.md Current State
• New incidents since 2026-07-02: read DEVLOG.md entries above the JM-31 wrap