Taste

Contract

Field	Bound contract
Trigger	User asks 'overkill?', 'elegant?', 'audit', or 'taste-test this', or asks to set a taste register
Authority	Read-only. No file, VCS, credential, paid, published, deployed, or remote mutation.
Side effect	Audit returns a verdict table and ranked fixes in chat; anchor mode persists the register best-effort; no files are written.
Done	A per-anchor verdict table with ranked top-3 fixes is returned, or the taste register is loaded in anchor mode.

Inputs

• The artifact or decision to judge (required for audit mode).
• No inputs required for anchor mode beyond the invocation.

Procedure

Mode selection

Auto-detect from the user's phrasing, with slash-arg override:

1. User wording matches overkill?, elegant?, audit, taste-test this, judge this → audit mode.
2. User wording matches taste anchor, taste mode, taste register, or anticipates producing fresh work → anchor mode.
3. Anything else → audit (default; cheaper to run; no behavior commitment).
4. Explicit override: /taste audit or /taste anchor. Override always wins.

Audit mode

1. Walk the eleven anchors one at a time against the artifact.
2. For each anchor: state the anchor, judge the artifact (pass / warn / fail), cite the Side A or Side B charter row when violated, and write a concrete fix.
3. When two anchors fail with conflicting fixes (e.g., Restraint says compress, Generosity says expand), surface the tension explicitly. Do not auto-pick. Tie-break is user-led.
4. Close with the top-3 ranked fixes.

Anchor mode

1. Load the charter and anchors as imperatives for subsequent responses.
2. Persistence is best-effort: applies until the user signals "stop taste" or "normal mode" OR context is compacted, whichever comes first.
3. Re-invoke /taste anchor if drift is observed.

Auto-clarity exception

Suspend the register temporarily for:

• Destructive or irreversible operation confirmations (e.g., git push --force, rm -rf).
• Security or data-loss warnings.
• Multi-step procedures where order or atomicity matters and the judgment register would obscure structure.
• Direct user clarification requests.

Resume the register once the high-stakes section ends.

The two-sided charter

Side A: slop (centroid-AI default convergence): generic openers ("Sure!", "Of course"), hedge-stacks ("perhaps it might be"), validation phrases ("you're absolutely right"), AI-flat prose with no rhythm, default palettes, defensive nil-checks where impossible, 50/50 decision hedges that pick nothing.

Side B: overkill (decoration covering thin ideas): gradient stacks on every section, thesaurus-soup prose ("orchestrate the comprehensive synthesis of"), abstraction towers (4 layers where 1 suffices), complexity-flex masking absent conviction, ceremony that performs depth without delivering it.

Domain	Side A (slop)	Side B (overkill)
Prose	"I think this might possibly help..."	"We orchestrate a paradigm shift across"
Code	try { x } catch { /* swallow */ }	Factory<Builder<Strategy<T>>>
Design	Default purple-blue gradient	Gradient on every section + glow + glass
Decision	"Both options have merit, so..."	12-criterion weighted scoring matrix

Anchors

Eleven anchors apply across prose, code, design, and decisions:

Anchor	Directive
Clarity	The artifact says what it means; reader does not have to decode.
Hierarchy	Important looks important; secondary supports.
Intent	Every choice is committed; nothing reads as "I let the default decide."
Coherence	Parts agree; tension only where deliberately staged.
Restraint	Default posture; compress before adding.
Generosity	Gives more than required at the right moment.
Honesty	No decoration covering missing depth; no slop covering missing POV. Care finishes the unseen.
One strong moment	Exactly one commitment carries the lift; the rest supports.
Invariants	The artifact names what must hold; preconditions, postconditions, and invariants are explicit.
Audience	The artifact enters through the reader's frame, not the author's.
Emptiness	The artifact leaves space the user completes; the least assertion.

Failure and recovery

Failure class	Response
Artifact too short or ambiguous to judge	Return "insufficient surface" with the specific missing element; do not fabricate verdicts.
Anchors produce conflicting fixes	Surface the tension; do not auto-pick. Tie-break is user-led.
Anchor mode drift after context compaction	Re-invoke /taste anchor; do not assume persistence.
User artifact is in a domain with no charter row	Apply the anchors directly; note the domain gap in the verdict table.

No partial-result fabrication. If fewer than eleven anchors can be judged, return only the judged anchors and name the blocker.

Output

Audit mode

Anchor             | Verdict | Citation              | Fix
-------------------|---------|-----------------------|----------------------------
Clarity            | pass    |                       |
Hierarchy          | warn    | Side A: AI-flat prose | Lead with the verdict line
Intent             | fail    | Side A: hedge-stack   | Pick one; drop "might"
Coherence          | pass    |                       |
Restraint          | warn    | Side B: ceremony      | Cut the framing paragraph
Generosity         | pass    |                       |
Honesty            | pass    |                       |
One-strong-moment  | fail    | Side A: 50/50 hedge   | Commit to one direction
Invariants         | pass    |                       |
Audience           | pass    |                       |
Emptiness          | pass    |                       |

Top-3 fixes: 1. Pick one direction (Intent + One-strong-moment).
             2. Lead with the verdict (Hierarchy).
             3. Cut the framing paragraph (Restraint).

Anchor mode

The register is loaded; subsequent responses hold the eleven anchors as imperatives. No table is emitted.