ContextLattice v3.16.0 - The Agent Packet

Agents do not need more memory dumped into their prompt. They need the right
truth, compressed without losing its proof, delivered at the moment it can
change the work.

v3.16.0 turns that principle into the default ContextLattice experience.

One packet, not a payload parade

agent_packet.v1 carries bounded evidence, provenance, uncertainty, next
actions, continuation state, outcome identity, and an explicit
act|verify|abstain gate. The normal target is 2,000 tokens with a 4,000-token
product ceiling. Full compiler contracts remain available through --full or
--debug, but they no longer tax every ordinary agent turn.

Serialized transport JSON is tokenizer-counted. Compiled prompt size and wire
size stay separate. If the envelope costs more than the raw-evidence
counterfactual, ContextLattice reports the loss and claims zero savings.

One task, one live session

• Repeated entry with the same task/native/repo/branch/worktree identity reuses
  one live session without duplicating session.started.
• Idle expiry defaults to 12 hours and honors explicit lifecycle TTL/expiry.
• Completed, failed, canceled, and expired state is absorbing.
• List and resume commands default to compact views; --full is explicit.
• Runtime telemetry separates live, expired, terminal, and total sessions.

Async truth that cannot run backward

Queued, pressure-shed, cooldown, and durable-retry work stays pending or
warming. It is never mislabeled degraded while work remains viable. Source
state and agent steering are monotonic: at most one progress notice, followed by
one absorbing ready or degraded terminal notice.

Configured-but-disabled sources remain visible as configuration truth without
poisoning effective source coverage.

Retrieval with a burden of proof

• Intent alignment, recency, supersession penalties, and normalized cross-source
  deduplication shape evidence ranking.
• Weak evidence abstains.
• Partial coverage verifies.
• Contradictions can tighten an act gate but never loosen a refusal.
• Verify and abstain packets remove executable mutation commands.

A learning loop agents will actually use

The normal CLI is now:

contextlattice context "current task" --project contextlattice --pretty
contextlattice resume --project contextlattice --pretty
contextlattice remember "checkpoint summary" --project contextlattice --pretty
contextlattice correct "retrieval was stale" --category stale --project contextlattice --pretty
contextlattice finish "verified result" --success --project contextlattice --pretty
contextlattice doctor --pretty

finish automatically reports the latest pending retrieval outcome unless
explicitly disabled. correct records useful/wrong/stale/superseded feedback;
factual mutation remains separate and requires explicit claim fields.

The proof cockpit

The dashboard now separates:

• Token truth: serialized transport, compiled prompt size, net delta, and
  measurement coverage.
• Session truth: live, total, expired, and idle-TTL state.
• Learning truth: outcome count, first-pass rate, and repair rate.

The new Truth / Action workbench asks Synthesis v2 for a bounded Agent Packet
and renders its gate, evidence, uncertainty, and next steps. Commands are
copy-only. The dashboard does not execute work.

Boundaries preserved

• No new MCP tools.
• No new backend or service.
• No mandatory LLM or cloud dependency.
• No runner subprocess execution moved into the gateway.
• Existing wrappers and full HTTP contracts remain compatible.
• Public policy and generated skills remain non-activating.

Verification

• go test -count=3 ./... in services/gateway-go
• cargo test -p context_codec in crates
• Dashboard test suite, TypeScript check, and production build
• Generated-contract, output-contract, global-installer, open-core boundary,
  and public leak audits

The frozen baseline, holdouts, failure evidence, and reproduction commands are
in docs/evals/agent-packet-session-truth-v3.16.0.md.