idkmesh

ADR-0011 — Discovery Surface Completion Without a Pinning Gate

Status: Accepted

Date: 2026-08-29

Context

Issue #173 established a P0 discovery-surface checklist for IDKMesh. Repository description, focused topics, GitHub Discussions, the public Pages front door/homepage, and a stable research-preview release are now active and have durable repository evidence.

One acceptance item remained: independently verify that welcome discussion #302 is pinned. The available repository API does not expose a reliable pin mutation/verification surface, so keeping that presentation detail as the sole blocker would leave an otherwise completed discovery activation permanently open unless a separate UI witness is supplied.

The project must not fabricate that witness. At the same time, a pin is not an authority, correctness, security, reproducibility, or external-participation control. It is a presentation affordance.

Decision

Supersede the pinned welcome discussion requirement as a P0 completion gate for issue #173.

Discussion #302 may still be pinned through the GitHub UI as an optional presentation improvement, but the absence of independently observable pin evidence does not block completion of the discovery-surface activation.

This decision does not supersede any gate that carries real authority or evidence requirements. In particular it does not substitute for:

• independent review;
• protected integration;
• security controls;
• verified external community participation;
• ACE lineage/descendant evidence.

External first-contact and contributor-conversion evidence remains tracked by #9, #10, #23, and #109 and must remain zero until real external evidence exists.

Rationale

The distinction is material:

presentation affordance != authority/evidence gate

Keeping a non-observable presentation detail as a hard P0 blocker would create stale tracker debt without increasing safety or scientific validity. Conversely, silently marking the pin complete would violate the External Action Handoff principle in ADR-0010.

The professional resolution is therefore to change the requirement explicitly, record why, and leave the optional UI improvement visible without pretending it occurred.

Consequences

Positive

• #173 can close on the evidence it was intended to establish: public discovery surfaces are live and reproducibly documented;
• the repository does not fabricate a GitHub UI witness;
• external-participation metrics remain uncompromised;
• optional presentation polish is separated from safety/evidence gates.

Costs / risks

• discussion #302 may remain unpinned;
• a pinned welcome discussion could still improve first-contact usability and may be performed later;
• the project must continue checking that discovery links stay current.

Revisit conditions

Revisit if evidence shows that pinning materially affects newcomer conversion, or if GitHub exposes a reliable repository API for pin state and the project chooses to make it an observable operational invariant.

Implementation references

• docs/PAGES_SETUP.md

References

• issue #173 — discovery-surface activation
• discussion #302 — welcome announcement
• docs/PAGES_SETUP.md
• docs/decisions/ADR-0010-external-action-handoff.md
• issues #9, #10, #23, #109 — community-growth evidence

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