docs: propose OpenSpec operating model

docs/openspec-operating-model.md

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+# OpenSpec operating model for agent-ready development
+
+> **Status:** Proposed
+>
+> **Decision requested from:** Maintainers and contributors of workspaces using
+> OpenSpec
+
+## Decision
+
+Use OpenSpec as a bounded implementation contract for one agent-ready change.
+Do not use it as a roadmap, general knowledge base, Jira mirror, or store for
+temporary agent analysis.
+
+Before adopting this model, reviewers are asked to agree that:
+
+1. Jira owns roadmap, priority, ownership, dependencies, and story status.
+2. Only actionable implementation work belongs in the active OpenSpec queue.
+   OpenSpec does not own a separate ready or in-progress workflow status.
+3. An OpenSpec change is created when work benefits from an explicit
+   implementation contract. Mechanical-only work may use the normal
+   pull-request workflow.
+4. An implementation agent receives one explicit OpenSpec change and does not
+   scan the complete specification tree by default.
+5. Blocked and deferred work remains in Jira and leaves the active OpenSpec
+   queue; Git history preserves any removed implementation plan.
+6. This model is the result of the Boost pilot, and its corrected workflow
+   will be validated in Boost before repository-wide tooling is added.
+
+## Why this is needed
+
+OpenSpec and agentic development have been exercised in more than one RHDH
+context. The RHDH 2.1 work in `ai-integrations` exercised them on an existing
+codebase, while Boost served as the clean-room pilot for new, substantially
+interdependent features. The intended outcome was that an agent could pick up
+a story, understand its behavior and design constraints, execute its tasks,
+and validate the result. This RFC captures the lessons from those pilots.
+
+During the pilot, Fullsend used GitHub issues as an execution trigger; this
+RFC treats that as a workflow entry point, not another source of truth.
+
+The pilot exposed a failure of information ownership. Scope, status, design
+decisions, and implementation claims were distributed across Jira, OpenSpec,
+product specifications, general documentation, GitHub issues, code, and tests.
+The same information was duplicated and drifted, with no reliable boundary
+around what belonged in the active OpenSpec queue.
+
+Without that boundary, material accumulated into a large, mixed, low-trust
+document set. Its volume is now a bottleneck in its own right: the tree is too
+large for a person or an agent to inspect as a whole without spending most of
+the effort on retrieval.
+
+The following snapshot was measured from `upstream/main` at commit
+`f8145f8b7605f7e10177f0bac89705e78756d684` on 2026-09-08. The numbers are
+indicative, not targets.
+
+- `openspec list` presents all 18 top-level changes as `in-progress`, because
+  the CLI derives that label from unchecked tasks.
+- The OpenSpec tree contains 127 Markdown files and 15,074 lines.
+- Some individual changes contain 95, 109, or 122 tasks.
+- Jira identifiers appear nearly 2,000 times across 90 workspace Markdown
+  files.
+- Draft, deferred, consolidated, implemented, and historical information is
+  stored alongside active implementation work.
+
+These numbers are evidence of an operational failure, not line-count targets.
+Unclear ownership allowed duplication and mixed state to accumulate; the
+resulting volume made reconstruction expensive. The active queue cannot be
+trusted without first deciding what is current and actionable.
+
+## What went wrong in the pilot
+
+The process lacked the controls needed to keep this workspace usable:
+
+1. **Information ownership:** Status, scope, and implementation claims were
+   copied across systems and drifted independently.
+2. **Volume and granularity:** The amount of material and the size of
+   individual changes exceed a useful human review and agent-retrieval
+   boundary.
+3. **Queue hygiene:** Active work, drafts, deferred plans, completed
+   work, and historical context were left together, making the active queue
+   unreliable.
+4. **Readiness:** Completing proposal, design, spec, and task documents was
+   treated as equivalent to being ready for implementation.
+5. **Retrieval:** Agents were expected to discover relevant information by
+   navigating the workspace instead of receiving a bounded change.
+
+This is a failure of the operating model. The corrective action is to reduce
+the information an agent must consume, make ownership explicit, and remove
+content that is not actionable. It is not an assignment of blame to the people
+or agents that produced the current documents.
+
+## Information ownership
+
+Each kind of information has one authoritative home.
+
+| Information                                                  | Source of truth                                               |
+| ------------------------------------------------------------ | ------------------------------------------------------------- |
+| Release boundary                                             | A minimal workspace release map, such as Boost's `CURRENT.md` |
+| Roadmap, priority, ownership, dependencies, and story status | Jira                                                          |
+| Active implementation contract                               | The selected active OpenSpec change                           |
+| Shipped behavior contract                                    | `openspec/specs/`                                             |
+| Executable implementation and evidence                       | Code and tests                                                |
+| Durable project context and architecture decisions           | Stable workspace documentation                                |
+| Engineering discussion and execution history                 | GitHub issues, pull requests, and Git                         |
+| Temporary agent plans and analysis                           | Outside the repository                                        |
+
+Documents may link to another source, but they must not copy frequently
+changing status from it. Jira references provide traceability; they are not
+required reading for an implementation agent.
+
+When an active change, implementation, tests, and canonical spec disagree, the
+discrepancy must be resolved before merge. After archive, `openspec/specs/`
+describes shipped behavior and code/tests provide executable evidence. Neither
+is automatically rewritten to hide a discrepancy.
+
+## OpenSpec lifecycle
+
+The active-queue rule applies after an initial classification. Before adopting
+this model in a workspace, existing changes must be classified as actionable,
+completed, blocked or deferred, or historical. Retain only actionable changes
+directly under `openspec/changes/`; archive completed behavior under
+`openspec/specs/`; and remove blocked, deferred, and historical material from
+the active tree while preserving Git history.
+
+After that initial classification, every change directly under
+`openspec/changes/` is actionable implementation work. Review readiness is
+established through pull-request review, while ownership and implementation
+progress are visible in Jira, branches, and pull requests. Completion is
+represented by archiving the change.
+
+Create a change when the work needs an explicit implementation contract. For a
+design choice that reviewers may reasonably question, the proposal records the
+context, alternatives, and impact. Mechanical-only changes may remain normal
+pull requests. A behavior change represented by OpenSpec still uses the
+standard delta-spec format and validation.
+
+Blocked and deferred work remains in Jira and is removed from the active
+OpenSpec tree. It does not receive a second repository backlog record. If an
+existing change is removed, its Git history and the removal pull request retain
+the traceability to Jira. Historical decisions are not backfilled solely to
+make the repository appear complete; document them when the code is next
+changed or when a current implementation contract requires them.
+
+## Implementation-ready change contract
+
+An implementation-ready change must:
+
+- represent one implementable vertical slice;
+- identify its affected package paths;
+- contain observable requirements and testable scenarios;
+- contain ordered, atomic implementation and verification tasks;
+- include every product and architecture decision needed for implementation;
+- be understandable without opening Jira or unrelated OpenSpec changes;
+- avoid duplicating background material that can be linked instead;
+- contain no unresolved alternatives, placeholders, or future decisions.
+
+Use the standard OpenSpec artifacts as needed to make the change
+decision-complete. Not every change needs every artifact. Include `design.md`
+only when the change introduces decisions not already covered by existing
+architecture; otherwise, link to that architecture instead of duplicating it.
+
+Keep each change within a useful review boundary. If its scope or task list
+grows beyond that boundary, split it into smaller vertical slices or document
+why it should remain together.
+
+## Agent context contract
+
+OpenSpec is the implementation contract, not an agent framework. The same
+change may be used by Fullsend, Cursor, Codex, or a human engineer. The tool
+used to select or execute it does not change the information ownership defined
+here.
+
+An implementation agent receives only:
+
+1. the workspace's minimal release map;
+2. one explicitly selected change;
+3. source files and tests referenced by that change or discovered while
+   implementing it.
+
+The agent must not scan all OpenSpec changes, archives, Jira analysis, product
+requirements, or historical documents unless the selected change identifies a
+specific dependency.
+
+## Implementation workflow
+
+1. Product planning and readiness are resolved in Jira.
+2. A focused OpenSpec change is created when the story is ready to become an
+   implementation contract.
+3. Reviewers confirm the implementation-ready contract through pull-request
+   review.
+4. An agent or engineer works from the selected change; ownership and progress
+   are tracked through Jira, a branch, or a pull request.
+5. Implementation and tests are completed against the selected change.
+6. Before merge, tasks, tests, implementation, and canonical behavior are
+   reconciled.
+7. The implementation pull request runs the standard OpenSpec validator and
+   any Boost-specific structural checks, then archives the completed change,
+   updating `openspec/specs/`.
+8. Story status continues to be maintained only in Jira.
+
+Validation checks artifact shape, placement, and consistency. It does not
+decide whether a change is valuable or whether the implementation satisfies
+product intent; those remain author and reviewer decisions.
+
+## Applying the lessons in Boost
+
+If this RFC is approved, Boost will be the first workspace to apply the
+corrected operating model in a separate pull request:
+
+- keep its release map small;
+- start with a one-time classification of existing changes: retain only
+  actionable changes under `openspec/changes/`, archive completed behavior
+  under `openspec/specs/`, and remove blocked or deferred plans from the active
+  tree while preserving Git history;
+- keep concise canonical frontend and OGX behavior specs;
+- add a local validator that also runs the standard OpenSpec validator;
+- validate the bounded workflow through real Boost implementation work.
+
+Repository-wide validation or migration will not be introduced until the
+corrected workflow has been exercised in Boost. Checks that prove useful may
+later move into `repo-tools`, and other workspaces may adopt them
+incrementally.
+
+## Next steps
+
+If approved, validate the model through Boost implementation work. Proven
+practices can then be curated into shared RHDH skills, while framework-specific
+workflows and related tracking items are documented separately as needed.
+
+> **Note:** This model follows the [OpenSpec workflow](https://github.com/Fission-AI/OpenSpec/blob/main/docs/team-workflow.md)
+> and [Solana Explorer's adoption](https://github.com/solana-foundation/explorer/blob/master/openspec/README.md).
+> Public adoption remains limited, so Boost will validate it as a pilot before
+> broader use.
+
+## Success criteria
+
+The model succeeds when:
+
+- a contributor can identify the authoritative source for each information
+  type;
+- `openspec list` exposes only actionable work;
+- an agent can start from one change without a workspace-wide documentation
+  scan;
+- an implementation-ready change requires no external product decisions;
+- implementation status is not synchronized manually across several files;
+- standard OpenSpec validation and Boost-specific validation pass for active
+  changes and live specs;
+- the corrected Boost workflow completes without another state-reconstruction
+  exercise.