inspect-deps — Isolated Dependency Upgrade & Trade-off Auditor

Operating Invariants

Isolated Worktree Boundary: Always stage and execute version upgrades inside a dedicated Git worktree (chore/deps-<slug>) via /worktree; forbid mutating root workspace files during dependency experiments.
Evidence-Backed Verification: Every proposed upgrade must be verified by native typecheck, linter, and full test suites before recommending merge.
Zero Hallucinated Targets: Target versions must exist on official registries; evaluate breaking changes against concrete changelogs rather than assumptions.

Target Selection (Best Fit vs. Latest Available):
- Best Fit (Recommended): Latest minor/patch release, or a mature major release with high ROI (fixes CVEs, supports new OS/runtime platform features like Node LTS, Android/iOS SDKs).
- Beyond Best Fit (Bleeding Edge): RC/Alpha builds or unproven majors that introduce high API churn without clear architectural benefits.
ROI & Breaking Change Evaluation:
- Assess whether migration costs (file changes, test repairs, API rewrites) justify the benefits (security patches, perf gains, unblocking platform APIs). If ROI is low, keep the current locked version.