Why only Authority binds your agent
An agent reads exactly what it is handed, every run. If everything in the repository looks current, stale decisions steer it. States fix that.
For: Solo builder, Team developer, Product owner, Project lead, Tester, Admin, Evaluator, Security & compliance
The problem
A person reads a spec once and remembers what matters. An agent reads whatever it finds, every time, and treats it as current. A decision you dropped last month is as convincing to it as one you made today.
The four states
| State | For the agent |
|---|---|
| Draft | Work in progress; never binding. |
| Approved | Informative; the agent asks before relying on it. |
| Authority | Binding; followed and cited by code. |
| Retired | Never drives new work; out of every agent's context at once. |
What follows from it
- Retiring a record is how you stop an agent from following it.
- An agent can propose, but only a person moves a record to Authority.
- Requirements need at least one acceptance criterion before they can be Approved or Authority.