Contracts

Treat cross-boundary interfaces as promises that outlive the current edit.

Identify the Contract

Before changing a boundary, name the contract and its consumers:

• HTTP, RPC, GraphQL, or CLI request and response.
• Database schema, migration output, or persisted data shape.
• Event, queue message, webhook, or background job payload.
• Public module export or package API.
• Config, environment variable, feature flag, or file format.
• UI route, URL shape, or externally visible behavior.

If callers may exist outside the current repo, assume compatibility matters.

Classify the Change