check-skills-paths lost 55 of its 93 assertions when the contributor guides moved out of `skills/` — widen SCAN_ROOT to cover `.claude/skills`

[os-litant]

Filed out-of-scope from the #7251 skills-optimization flight. Unassigned.

What happened

scripts/check-skills-paths.mjs declares SCAN_ROOT = 'skills'. #7251 moved the two contributor-only files out of the published bundle into a repo-internal skill:

• skills/objectui/guides/console-development.md → .claude/skills/objectui-contributor/guides/console-development.md
• skills/objectui/rules/no-touch-zones.md → .claude/skills/objectui-contributor/rules/no-touch-zones.md

Both still state in-repo path coordinates in backtick code spans, which is exactly what this gate exists to check. .claude/skills is not under SCAN_ROOT, so they are no longer checked by anything.

Measured, at 4704aa4 before the flight and after it

	before	after
files scanned	18	16
stated paths checked	93	27
in console-development.md	49	— (moved, unscanned)
in no-touch-zones.md	6	— (moved, unscanned)

55 of 93 assertions, 59%, left the gate's surface in one commit. Both files stayed green the whole time; nothing turned red, because the gate simply stopped looking.

Why this matters more than the raw count

The gate was built for this file. Its own docblock says so: the cost was paid twice before it existed — #3713 / PR #3729 and #3730 / PR #3734, the latter 13 real symbols given at coordinates that did not exist — both in console-development.md, both found by eye while reading. The docblock also names why the class recurs by construction: the app-shell extraction commits moved code with nothing anywhere to say the guides had gone stale.

That file is still 49 coordinates deep, still describes a tree that moves, and is now unguarded.

The change

Make SCAN_ROOT a list and add .claude/skills. The script's own header is explicit that this kind of widening is a decision with a measurement attached, not a rider on someone else's change:

Widen it on purpose, with the measurement re-run, not as a rider.

so it wants its own change, with a before/after count and whatever red the new surface brings cleared in the same PR. Note .claude/skills/verify/SKILL.md also states paths and would come under the gate at the same time.

What #7251 did instead, and what it left

It could not do this widening inside its own file surface, so it did the honest minimum and recorded the gap:

• scripts/skills-path-baseline.json's single entry was keyed to the moved guide; the gate demanded its deletion in its own words (1 baseline entry the scan never met ... Delete the entry), and it was deleted. The map is now empty.
• scripts/__tests__/check-skills-paths.test.ts's checked floor dropped from > 50 to > 20, with the reason and this follow-up recorded in the comment beside it.
• The objectui#3713 / #3730 pin block can no longer assert result.missing on that guide, since scan(repoRoot) does not see it. It now pins that the file still exists, is still dense in stated paths (> 40), and is not covered by the gate — that last assertion is written to be deleted the day SCAN_ROOT widens.

So the work here is: widen the root, clear whatever red appears, then restore those pins to their real form.

[os-litant]

Claim: PM loop round 5 (graded by the skills lane seat as a follow-up of its own programme card #7251 — priority:p2, pm:dispatched, assignee set in the same stroke)
Session: session_01LraLgQVGq8egUwfYZpbYt1
Branch: claude/issue-7358-skills-paths-scan-root
Worktree: objectui-issue-7358
Domain: domain:skills
Scope, as the card and the script's own header ask: make SCAN_ROOT in scripts/check-skills-paths.mjs a list and add .claude/skills, re-run the measurement (files scanned / stated paths checked, before and after), clear whatever red the widened surface brings in the same PR (console-development.md's 49 coordinates, no-touch-zones.md's 6, verify/SKILL.md's paths — each stale coordinate corrected at source, never baselined away), then restore the two pins #7251 had to weaken in scripts/__tests__/check-skills-paths.test.ts (the checked floor back above its real count; the #3713/#3730 block back to asserting result.missing on the guide, and the "not covered by the gate" assertion deleted as it was written to be).
File surface: scripts/check-skills-paths.mjs, scripts/__tests__/check-skills-paths.test.ts, scripts/skills-path-baseline.json only if the gate's own prescription names it, and the internal skill files under .claude/skills/** only where a stated path is genuinely stale (governed there — draft either way).
Container & model: S/M, mode:subagent, model: opus; floor sonnet · default opus · ceiling fable.
Clause-②: no — a gate script and its test; ⛔ no needs:contract-review.
Serial constraints: no open PR touches scripts/check-skills-paths.mjs or .claude/skills/** in this repo (#7370 and #7375 merged). Heavy slots: 5 of 5 after this dispatch.
Landing form: ONE draft PR against main, first line Fixes #7358; changeset per check-changeset-presence's own verdict (⛔ never an empty-frontmatter changeset, ⛔ never a skip-changeset label in this repo); if the diff touches .claude/skills/** the PR is governed (queue guard exit 3) and stays draft; review requests are the seat's step.

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Generated by Claude Code

[os-litant]

Dev claim (confirming the dispatch claim above — same session, so this is the implementing seat restating the branch it actually pushed, not a second claimant).

Session: session_01LraLgQVGq8egUwfYZpbYt1
Branch: claude/issue-7358-skills-paths-scan-root (pushed empty first as the write-route probe, then after each of three commits)
Worktree: ../objectui-issue-7358, cut from origin/main at 0614b6df1

File surface actually touched, all three in scripts/:

• scripts/check-skills-paths.mjs — SCAN_ROOT becomes SCAN_ROOTS = ['skills', '.claude/skills'], threaded through scan() (a perRoot breakdown beside the totals), the OK line, the --list footer, and the empty-verdict trap, which is now judged per root.
• scripts/skills-path-baseline.json — one entry, re-keyed to the moved guide.
• scripts/__tests__/check-skills-paths.test.ts — the two weakened pins restored, the placeholder assertion deleted, five two-root fixture cases added. 31 to 37 cases.

Nothing under .claude/skills/** is in the diff. The widened surface brought exactly one red and it was not a stale coordinate: the deliberate negative sentence "there is no apps/console/src/context/ directory at all", which held the sole baseline entry before the move. The other 60 coordinates in the two moved guides all resolved on arrival. So there was nothing to correct at source, and check-governed-queue-guard --test returns NOT GOVERNED on this diff rather than the exit 3 the dispatch expected — recorded as a premise outcome, not worked around. Draft either way, as asked.

Two out-of-scope findings filed unassigned, neither touched here: #7403 (check-shell-escape-residue's skills root lost the same two files in the same move — 18 fenced blocks) and #7404 (this gate's own workflow header still states the surface as skills/** over 18 files).

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Generated by Claude Code

[os-litant]

os-dev-report

{
  "issue": 7358,
  "status": "done",
  "branch": "claude/issue-7358-skills-paths-scan-root",
  "pr": "https://github.com/objectstack-ai/objectui/pull/7407",
  "premise_still_valid": true,
  "summary": "SCAN_ROOT is now SCAN_ROOTS = ['skills', '.claude/skills'], threaded through scan() (a perRoot row per root beside the totals), the OK line, the --list footer and the empty-verdict trap, which is judged PER ROOT now because a whole-surface floor is precisely what could not see #7251's move. The widened surface brought exactly one red and it was not rot: the deliberate negative sentence 'there is no apps/console/src/context/ directory at all', which held the sole baseline entry before the move and holds it again under the new key, granted against the gate's own quoted prescription. Zero coordinates were corrected at source because zero were stale (60 of 61 resolve). The two weakened pins are restored (checked floor 20 back to 50 with the arithmetic, #3713/#3730 asserting result.missing through scan(repoRoot) again) and the 'is NOT covered by the gate' assertion is deleted as written, replaced by its inverse so a clean guide and an unscanned guide stop being confusable. The card's headline 93 does not survive re-measurement: its own figures lose 66 assertions while the two moved guides carry 55, the other 11 having been removed when #7251 rewrote the guides it kept. Real reading is 27 to 88 across 16 to 20 files; the PR title carries 88.",
  "tests": "All at head 471589f, exit codes redirected to a file before capture, never read across a pipe. node scripts/check-skills-paths.mjs -> exit 0, its own line: 'check-skills-paths: OK (87/88 stated path(s) resolve across 20 guide file(s); 1 baselined)' plus per-root 'skills/ 27/27 across 16' and '.claude/skills/ 60/61 across 4'. pnpm exec vitest run scripts/__tests__/check-skills-paths.test.ts (run from repo root, path relative to repo root, no bare double-dash, under the shared verify lock, VERDICT command-exit 0 after a 287s wait) -> 'Test Files 1 passed (1)' / 'Tests 37 passed (37)', up from 31 cases. pnpm type-check:scripts -> exit 0, and NOT MEASURED was ruled out: tsc -p tsconfig.scripts.json --listFiles lists both check-skills-paths.mjs and check-skills-paths.test.ts, one occurrence each. check-doc-links 'Links are valid across 17 scan roots.'; check-control-bytes 'OK (scanned 6103 tracked text file(s); skipped 85 binary)'; check-shell-escape-residue 'OK (4/4 root(s) resolved)'; check-changeset-presence 'No source or published contract of a released package changed in this range, so no changeset is owed.'; check-governed-queue-guard --self-test 'OK ... 132 cases pass'; --test on the 3 changed paths 'NOT GOVERNED - 3 path(s) checked against 5 governed surface(s); none matched.'; eslint on the changed files exit 0, 1 file linted, 0 errors, 0 warnings. ESLINT NARROWING DECLARED AND MEASURED: population read from eslint.config.js (every block scoped files ['**/*.{ts,tsx}'], no .mjs/.cjs/.json glob, so only the .ts test is in the population), count read from --format json (1 result object), invariance from the absence of parserOptions.project and projectService (not type-aware, so this diff cannot move any untouched file's verdict); full-repo pnpm lint left to CI. ABLATION: on the committed tree, one coordinate in .claude/skills/objectui-contributor/guides/console-development.md mutated (UnifiedSidebar.tsx to UnifiedSidebarGONE.tsx) under a trap on EXIT INT TERM with absolute paths. Mutation proved on disk before reading anything: injected-token grep count 1, original-token grep count 0, on-disk hash 0cd9feb vs HEAD blob 27e5f46. Gate exit 1 naming the mutated coordinate at line 268 in the newly covered root. Restore proved, not assumed: git checkout HEAD -- ABSOLUTE_PATH, then on-disk hash back to 27e5f46 equal to the HEAD blob, git diff HEAD --name-only empty, injected-token count 0, original-token count 1, gate exit 0. No build or dist stands between the edit and the reading (the gate is a node script over markdown), so no dist preflight applies and none is claimed.",
  "mcp_calls": "9",
  "open_questions": [],
  "out_of_scope_findings": [
    "filed as #7403: check-shell-escape-residue's `skills` dir root lost the same two guides in the same #7251 move - 18 fenced blocks off its surface, invisible to its minFiles: 5 floor because 16 files still satisfy it",
    "filed as #7404: .github/workflows/skills-paths.yml's header still states the gate's surface as `skills/**` over 18 files - both halves stale, prose only, labelled `finding`; not fixed in the PR because the bounded in-place exemption needs 'no other claim holds this file' and that was not verifiable from here (repo-scoped REST 403)"
  ],
  "premise_false": [
    "PM assumption 2, 'node scripts/check-skills-paths.mjs (self-test + live)': the script has NO --self-test mode. grep for self-test/selfTest over it returns zero hits; its only other mode is --list. The self-test meant here is the vitest suite, and that is where the two-root cases were added (5 new fixture cases).",
    "The card's and the dispatched title's '93 stated paths back under the gate': re-measured 88. Widening restores 61 assertions under the new root (the 55 that left, plus 6 in two files never under `skills`), on top of the 27 still under `skills`. The card's own before/after loses 66, not 55; the missing 11 went when #7251 rewrote the published guides it kept. PR title states 88.",
    "PM assumption 2, 'exit 3 = GOVERNED if .claude/skills/** is touched': nothing under .claude/skills/** needed correcting, so the diff is three files under scripts/ and the guard's own verdict is NOT GOVERNED (exit 0). Reported, not worked around; the PR is draft either way as the dispatch asks.",
    "Scope item 2 anticipated stale coordinates to correct at source under .claude/skills/**: there are none. 60 of 61 resolve; the single non-resolver is the deliberate negative sentence, which is the baseline case the gate's own prescription names."
  ]
}

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Generated by Claude Code