Feature plan: Step 1 · Step 2 · Step 3 · Step 4

Debug mode: enabled Effort study: railspike-effort / v3/railspike_feature_gating — ledger Extended estimates: enabled Status: Five stages locally complete; production and maintainer acceptance pending

Cycle estimate: 0.60

Entry: 2026-10-29 UTC; v2/A, R1/P2, original baseline cdb7a4e75a8b0e9065140656ec79dba5cf12e229; Codex single exposed rater. Step 3 projection reaffirmed; verified references carried forward. Planning commit ef47c56ae on feat/railspike-feature-gating. Original stage-work estimates S1–S5: 0.12/0.14/0.15/0.14/0.12, separately scoped in Step 3 and not additive. No measured labor. Production verification and maintainer acceptance pending.

— Codex · 2026-10-29 UTC

Stage 1 - Flag and API enforcement

Original estimate: 0.12 Retrospective stage work: 0.12

• Changes: Added default-off FORUM_RAILSPIKE_ENABLED in the existing Agent replies group, site/environment precedence and private-config schema without a template default. Workflow GET and both POST phases refuse before storage access when disabled. Updated API catalog/runbook.

• Verification: php tests/run.php RailspikeFeatureFlagTest FeatureFlagEvaluatorTest PrivateConfigSchemaTest PrivateConfigCommandTest: 32/32 passed, including disabled routes, enabled anonymous rejection, defaults/overrides and config creation/refresh. git diff --check passed.

• Notes: Browser rendering and worker suspension belong to subsequent stages. Zero dependency/schema delta; original scope unchanged. R1/P2, Codex exposed rater, 2026-10-29 UTC; no measured labor.

— Codex · 2026-10-29 UTC

Stage 2 - Worker suspension and recovery

Original estimate: 0.14 Retrospective stage work: 0.14

• Changes: Worker skips disabled Railspike claims, rechecks fresh application flag state at assessment admission, and requeues admission races without consuming retries. Disabled reconciliation preserves work; admitted results still finish. Existing task table and deferral contract reused.

• Verification: php tests/run.php RailspikeWorkflowTest TaskQueueWorkerTest TaskQueueCommandTest: 32/32 passed. Includes repeated disabled runs, claimed-before-disable race, unrelated task progress, in-flight finish and re-enable without duplicate execution. Syntax and diff checks passed.

• Notes: Stage 1 commit ba8d6e8d6. No schema/dependency change. Original scope unchanged; R1/P2, Codex exposed rater, 2026-10-29 UTC; no measured labor.

— Codex · 2026-10-29 UTC

Stage 3 - Eligible-page and first-paint gating

Original estimate: 0.15 Retrospective stage work: 0.15

• Changes: Only eligible thread/post mounts render when enabled. Public operator fingerprints provide local presentation hints; API authorization remains authoritative. An inline pre-paint check reveals a static collapsed Development control only for a matching saved key; asynchronous private status stays inside it. Disabled pages omit the client script. Static/high-traffic HTML checks reject obsolete flag state and legacy workflow markup.

• Verification: Railspike flag tests 3/3; prior cache/backup regression run 8/8; PHP syntax/diff checks; Node auth-navigation test; real signed Railspike browser journey passed (start/answer/revise/approve, failure/retry, rebuild, direct post, Activity role/JS/viewport matrix and session recovery). Initial browser failure was a test opening the collapsed shell before a session-resumption navigation; corrected the test to await restored status before opening.

• Notes: Stage 2 commit dcc17b8e9. Detailed network timing/theme matrix follows in S5. Zero dependency/schema delta. R1/P2, Codex exposed rater, 2026-10-29 UTC; scope unchanged, no measured labor.

— Codex · 2026-10-29 UTC

Stage 4 - Polling lifecycle and draft preservation

Original estimate: 0.14 Retrospective stage work: 0.18

• Changes: Replaced fixed interval with one non-overlapping five-second scheduler, including hidden-page pause, page navigation suspension, identity-change stop, terminal authorization/disabled stop and three-failure transient cutoff. Eligible threads poll regardless of workflow state. Session-scoped per-identity/post/revision drafts survive reload and state changes; older drafts remain copyable/discardable. Successful submission clears only the exact submitted draft.

• Verification: node tests/browser/railspike_polling.mjs passed real-browser controlled-clock checks for idle/completed polling, coalescing, visibility, revision changes, retained drafts/reload, terminal denial, bounded failures/manual recovery and removed eligibility. Auth-navigation regression and real signed full workflow browser journey passed. node --check and diff checks passed.

• Notes: Stage 3 commit 817db341f. Draft recovery required more work than the original stage estimate; whole-cycle projection remains 0.60. No new dependencies/schema. R1/P2, Codex exposed rater, 2026-10-29 UTC; retrospective is scope judgment, not measured labor.

— Codex · 2026-10-29 UTC

Acceptance discovery - Feature Flags identity readiness

Request/disposition: Completing the approved normal toggle flow exposed an existing public-site race: Feature Flags starts preparation before its background identity-hint update finishes, producing a root-approved-identity rejection despite a valid authenticated operator. In-scope correction in S5: use the existing verified identity-readiness option so the canonical flag control awaits that hint. No new endpoint, authentication policy or dependency. Browser replay is pending; stage commit and final evidence will be recorded below.

Stage 5 - Acceptance and handoff

Original estimate: 0.12 Retrospective stage work: 0.18

• Changes: Added signed Feature Flags/production-style browsing acceptance, baked and busy-cache policy regression, theme/first-paint checks and documented recovery/production replay. Fixed the normal toggle identity-readiness race above. Storage-quota acceptance also found that session persistence failure needed an in-memory draft fallback; drafts now survive same-page revision changes with a persistent copy-before-reload warning.

• Verification: Broad focused PHP batch 77/77, Feature Flags behavior/page batch 6/6, final Railspike flag/cache batch 4/4, API catalog/help batch 3/3 passed (overlapping batches, not a full suite). Railspike polling/draft/auth tests passed, including storage refusal and back/forward suspension. Signed full workflow and flag browser acceptance passed: ordinary/disabled/guest silence over 11-second windows, visible eligible polling, one stale disabled request at most, worker suspension, re-enable/reload, delayed-response collapsed-entry stability, all 13 enabled themes at 390/1280px and no overflow. Inspected Chicago, Word97 and Midnight phone screenshots. Shared Feature Flags toolbar tests and backup signed-toggle suite (240 theme/viewport/page states) passed. Syntax/diff checks passed.

• Notes: Stage 4 commit d9789f951. Browser fixture now selects its Railspike queue job explicitly because real signed flag changes also enqueue snapshot work; production worker behavior is separately tested. Stored-draft warning persists even when later polls succeed. No runtime dependencies, navigation additions, canonical-format changes or schema changes. No deployment or production writes performed.

Closeout

Status: Five stages locally complete; branch feat/railspike-feature-gating. Planning ef47c56ae; S1 ba8d6e8d6; S2 dcc17b8e9; S3 817db341f; S4 d9789f951; S5 is the acceptance/closeout commit containing this section.

Original entry projection: 0.60 Retrospective cycle scope: 0.65

2026-10-29 UTC; v2/A, original baseline/R1/P2, Codex single exposed rater. Original S1–S5 0.12/0.14/0.15/0.14/0.12 retained; retrospectives 0.12/0.14/0.15/0.18/0.18 are non-additive scope judgments. Corrections above complete approved recovery/normal-entry requirements rather than expanding scope. Measured labor unavailable; maintainer comfortable-fit/acceptance pending, no accepted-count increment. Dependency delta: zero.

Release limits: Not merged or deployed. Production replay, physical devices and full suite unverified; local emulation is not production evidence. Session drafts do not survive closing the tab. Existing legacy localhost handoff is intentionally independent of this flag. Unrelated untracked claude_request.txt appeared during acceptance and is untouched.

— Codex · 2026-10-29 UTC

Rebase onto origin/main — 2026-10-29

User requested pulling origin/main and placing this implementation on top. Fetched and rebased onto 9005e8761. Resolved only appended documentation conflicts in the planning index, effort ledger and UI audit, retaining both histories. Application patches replayed unchanged; upstream authentication, approval/removal formats and UI changes remain intact.

Rebased commits: planning b5045504f; S1 30c6daa9d; S2 ae0999db2; S3 d04cf9d91; S4 fccaebba6; S5 63050b1a6; diagnostic log 9b93fbf7d. Original commit references above are historical provenance, not current branch hashes. Scope, scores and study outcome are unchanged; this is integration verification, not a new cycle.

Verification: git range-diff confirmed application patches unchanged; origin/main is an ancestor; diff checks passed. Focused PHP batch 63/63 passed. Railspike polling/draft and authentication browser checks passed; full signed workflow/flag replay passed, including network silence, queued-work recovery, first-paint stability and 13-theme phone/desktop matrix. No push or deployment; full suite and production verification remain pending. Dependency delta from this integration: zero new additions beyond upstream main.

— Codex · 2026-10-29 UTC