missing-source-file-is-silent
OUT premise
If a node's source file no longer exists on disk, `check_stale` silently skips it; callers cannot distinguish "file deleted" from "file never tracked."
Summary
When the staleness checker encounters a belief whose original source file has been deleted, it quietly moves on without reporting anything. This means there's no way for code using the checker to tell the difference between a file that was deliberately removed and one that was never part of the system in the first place, which could mask broken references or orphaned beliefs.
Dependents
These beliefs depend on this one:
- all-external-inputs-produce-correct-state — Both external input pathways (LLM derivation and multi-agent import) produce a fully correct persisted network state — bounded validation prevents invalid beliefs, namespace isolation prevents cross-contamination, and layered reconciliation handles all truth states — provided the agent count bug is fixed and missing source files are detected.
- architecture-sustains-gapless-lifecycle — Architectural safety (clean layer boundaries with atomic isolated mutations) sustains gapless lifecycle management (staleness detection plus propagation lifecycle awareness) — beliefs are correctly managed at every point in their lifecycle, backed by structural guarantees that lifecycle operations execute atomically and without cross-layer leakage.
- automated-sync-achieves-full-lifecycle-coverage — Automated repeated sync safely reconciles external beliefs with complete lifecycle coverage including full source staleness detection — idempotent cascade-preserving sync combined with conservative staleness gating ensures no lifecycle gap between sync runs.
- belief-currency-is-actively-managed — The system actively manages belief currency bidirectionally: the production-ready derive pipeline safely introduces new beliefs through defensive validation, while the staleness CI gate detects drift in existing beliefs against source material — together preventing both unsafe additions and undetected obsolescence.
- complete-system-is-self-correcting — The system actively maintains its own consistency along two independent dimensions: the TMS core handles exceptional conditions (contradictions trigger deterministic resolution, propagation respects lifecycle state), while belief currency management detects and surfaces drift in source material — no inconsistency persists undetected or unresolved.
- complete-unified-system-is-production-ready — The fully unified minimal-dialectical-scalable system with end-to-end integrity is production-ready — all mutations produce correct state, all revision is reliable, all extensions compose safely — but only when every known fragility and bug is resolved.
- external-belief-lifecycle-is-complete — The system manages external beliefs across their full lifecycle: import/sync provides dual reconciliation modes with heterogeneous truth state handling and namespace auto-wiring, while staleness checking detects source drift for CI gating — beliefs are tracked from initial ingestion through ongoing validity monitoring.
- external-beliefs-are-defended-and-lifecycle-managed — External beliefs are managed end-to-end across a complete trust boundary: defensively contained at ingestion through layered validation pipelines and namespace isolation, then actively lifecycle-managed through dual reconciliation modes, staleness detection against source material, and CI gating — no phase of external belief existence lacks oversight.
- external-beliefs-are-safe-and-current — External beliefs are managed end-to-end across their complete lifecycle with no gap between ingestion safety and ongoing maintenance: defensively contained at ingestion through layered validation, correctly lifecycle-managed through import reconciliation and staleness checking, and actively tracked for currency — no external belief enters unvalidated, drifts undetected, or persists without lifecycle oversight.
- external-integration-is-architecturally-safe — External beliefs are end-to-end safe within the system's architecture: defensively contained at ingestion and lifecycle-managed thereafter (external belief thread) within the same three-layer boundaries and atomic mutation guarantees that protect internal operations (architecture thread).
- external-integration-preserves-all-invariants — External beliefs are architecturally safe at ingestion and participate in the same invariant-preserving revision system as all other belief origins — architectural containment and revision parity together ensure external integration cannot corrupt system invariants.
- external-lifecycle-is-complete-and-automatically-maintained — External beliefs achieve both complete lifecycle management (dual reconciliation modes with heterogeneous truth state handling and staleness detection) and automated ongoing maintenance (idempotent sync with cascade preservation and full source staleness coverage), enabling zero-touch external belief management
- lifecycle-governance-achieves-gap-free-source-coverage — Metadata-enabled lifecycle governance with deterministic source integrity and exception-safe recoverability achieves truly gap-free source coverage — every source file is verified, every lifecycle decision is grounded in verifiable source state, and no silent source gap undermines governance decisions about staleness or retraction.
- lifecycle-management-is-gapless — The system manages belief lifecycle without gaps across all operation types: staleness checking detects all forms of source drift, propagation respects node lifecycle states, and both read and write paths enforce consistent lifecycle semantics — no operation ignores or corrupts lifecycle state.
- self-correction-is-resource-sustainable — The system's self-correction capability — contradiction resolution at derivation time and staleness detection at maintenance time — is resource-sustainable: accurate bidirectional token budgets support continuous belief derivation and maintenance, ensuring the correction loop can operate indefinitely without resource exhaustion.
- staleness-checking-is-comprehensive — Staleness checking detects all nodes whose source material has changed on disk
- staleness-gate-catches-all-drift — The staleness CI gate detects all forms of source material drift without false negatives.
- unified-system-is-a-closed-self-maintaining-architecture — The system forms a closed self-maintaining belief architecture: end-to-end integrity ensures no operation corrupts consistency, while revision completeness ensures any valid belief configuration is reachable — together guaranteeing the system can evolve to any target state while preserving all invariants — only when all known defects and fragilities are resolved.
Details
| Source | entries/2026/04/23/reasons_lib-check_stale-check_stale.md |