René's URL Explorer Experiment

{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"DiscussionForumPosting","headline":"status: a truncated ACTIVE_GOAL_STATE.md reports healthy with zero Todos","articleBody":"**What happens**\n\n`ACTIVE_GOAL_STATE.md` truncated at a section boundary (e.g. everything from\n`## Agent Todo` onward removed) is read as a goal with no Todos:\n\n```\nhealthy: {\"status_exit\":0,\"status_ok\":true,\"todo_index_total\":2,\"attention\":\"[P1] implement the thing\",\"todo_total\":2}\nwounded: {\"status_exit\":0,\"status_ok\":true,\"todo_index_total\":0,\"attention\":\"run the first read-only adapter tick and save a compact run record\",\"todo_total\":0}\n```\n\nBoth `loopx status --format json` and `loopx todo list --format json` exit 0\nwith `ok:true`, and the attention line silently degrades from the real P1 item\nto the generic first-tick advice. 5/5 runs.\n\n**Why this path is taken**\n\n`parse_active_state_todos` iterates only the regions it finds\n(`loopx/control_plane/todos/active_state_todo_parser.py:36`), and a missing\nsection is legal — only unterminated frontmatter or malformed/orphan markers\nraise (`machine_region.py:53-58,86,103`). A present-but-truncated file is\ntherefore indistinguishable from a goal that genuinely has no Todos.\n\n**Trigger honesty**\n\nThe state writer is atomic (`runtime/document_io.py`, temp + fsync + replace),\nso this is not a same-version torn write. It models disk corruption after a\ncrash, a partial backup/restore, or a bad manual/merge edit of a file that is\npresent.\n\n**Relationship to #6799**\n\n#6799 is about a *missing* state file letting the quota gate authorize turns.\nThis is the sibling case: the file exists, its earlier sections parse, and the\nTodo section is simply gone — so a missing-file guard would not fire, and the\nquota gate sees a goal with no open work.\n\n**Expected**\n\nA state file that parses but lost a section it used to have should not read as\n\"no open work\". Options: require the `## Agent Todo` region; compare a revision\nor section inventory against the last known good state; or surface a\n`state_incomplete` warning on `status`/`todo list`.\n\n**Reproduced**\n\nSnapshot `105c4bc1`; unchanged on `main` at `1c7b258cb`. Fixture: one goal with\nexactly two Agent Todos; the wounded copy is the same fixture with the state\nfile cut at 377 → 235 bytes (before `## Agent Todo`). The script asserts the\nhealthy control first (2 Todos, P1 attention) and fails if the wounded side does\nnot match.\n","author":{"url":"https://github.com/BiBoyang","@type":"Person","name":"BiBoyang"},"datePublished":"2026-10-19T08:41:53Z","url":"https://github.com/loopx-project/loopx/issues/6870"}