Tianyi Cui
e6fad266a6
Define the in-file RFC contract in docs/rfc/README.md § The file format: the header block (`# RFC: <title>` plus a dateless Status enum cross-checked against the lifecycle folder), the per-lifecycle body skeleton (a Problem opener everywhere; Proposal/Alternatives considered/ Acceptance criteria/Risks in proposed/; present-tense Decision/ Consequences with proposal-era headings banned in implemented/; the frozen proposal shape in rejected/), and a mandatory Alternatives considered section with a date-fenced grandfather comment for pre-format RFCs whose alternatives are not reconstructible from the record. Enforce it with a new doc-sync gate, scripts/verify-rfc-format.ts, and normalize all 112 RFCs to it: ~15 Status-line spellings collapse to the enum, 29 Context openers become Problem, the 39 legacy-format XXX debt markers are resolved and banned from reappearing, proposal-era sections in implemented RFCs are rewritten to shipped reality (including the web/fs/subagent seam RFCs' migration plans and test checklists, closing the doc-tiers deferred-work item on the web seam), every RFC gains an Alternatives considered section or the grandfather comment, and the bilingual pair is re-mirrored and re-recorded. Move the generated index tables out of README.md into a fully generated docs/rfc/INDEX.md — gen-rfc-index now writes the whole file, and verify-rfc-classification checks its freshness and rejects index-shaped rows in the curated README — which makes room for the format contract to live in the README front door instead of a separate FORMAT.md. The decision record, and the first RFC written in the new format, is docs/rfc/implemented/process/2026-07-05-uniform-rfc-format.md.
25 lines
3.0 KiB
Markdown
25 lines
3.0 KiB
Markdown
# RFC: Provider-neutral content-block vocabulary owned by dsh-llm
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Status: implemented
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## Problem
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The harness needs one internal language for messages that the loop, session log, and all plugins speak.
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## Decision
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Own the vocabulary: messages are arrays of typed content blocks (`text`, `reasoning`, `tool-call`, `tool-result`), with the union derived from the merge-extensible `ContentBlockMap` so plugins add block types via declaration merging. The same merge-extensible-map pattern types every "stringly" field (`MessageSource`, `FinishReason`, `TurnTrigger`, `TurnEndReason`). Streaming is a raw chunk protocol; `BlockAssembler` is the single shared assembly implementation. Adapters translate to provider wire formats — mapping cost lives in adapters, where it belongs.
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In-session context injection (`context/message`, `steering/message`) renders as tagged user-role envelopes (the system-reminder pattern) rather than a new role, so adapters carry zero burden. Live-adapter review has since validated the tagged-envelope rendering against current DeepSeek behavior; a future provider-specific mismatch should be handled in that adapter rather than by adding a new role to the canonical content vocabulary.
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## Alternatives considered
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- **Mirror the DeepSeek/OpenAI chat-completions shape** — zero mapping cost for the first provider, but awkward for rich content (reasoning, tool results as structured blocks).
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- **Adopt Anthropic's Messages block structure verbatim** — battle-tested, but the canonical types would mirror a third-party API the harness does not target first.
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## Consequences
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- Reasoning has a home without provider contortions. Multimodal content deliberately has NO core block type: the core set is limited to blocks every shipping path honors, and a multimodal feature adds its block type through the merge-extensible map in the same coordinated change that maps it in the adapters, surfaces it in the UI bridges, and prices it in compaction — see [the drop-image RFC](../simplification/2026-07-04-drop-image-content-block.md). Block cache hints likewise have no core field: DeepSeek prompt caching is automatic, so no shipping adapter can transmit a hint; a caching feature adds a `cache` field together with the adapter that honors it — see [the producer-less-variants RFC](../simplification/2026-07-04-prune-producerless-vocabulary-variants.md). Assistant-prefix continuation (prefill) likewise has no request field: DeepSeek's chat-prefix completion is a Beta feature on a base URL neither shipping adapter targets, so a prefill feature adds `GenerateOptions.prefill` together with the adapter that honors it — see [the inert-request-knobs RFC](../simplification/2026-07-04-drop-inert-request-knobs.md).
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- Every adapter pays a translation cost; the first real adapters have since validated the streaming protocol, and new adapters should continue proving their provider-specific mapping in adapter-local tests.
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- IDs that cross package boundaries are branded (`CallId`, `SessionId`, `AgentId`) — nominal typing at zero runtime cost.
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