# M3 Gate Report: Production Honesty Boundaries

**Milestone:** M3 — production callers, reachable branches, and failure readers
**Owner:** m3-gate
**Date:** 2026-09-11
**Repository:** `/Users/dawn/proj/klbr`
**Snapshot:** uncommitted working tree at gate-run time; no commit or pushed snapshot is claimed here.

## 1. Executive Summary

M3 did not primarily add features. It connected honesty claims to the whole production path: every claim now has a production caller, a branch that can actually be reached with production inputs, and a reader that exposes failure to the system or operator. The gates exercise the real daemon or `Agent::run_turn` path and bind their assertions to request bytes captured at a local TCP provider boundary.

The request gates cover causal prompt-prefix stability, route-scoped cache fields and usage absence, required-guidance overflow, and restart reconstruction after an unreported cache miss. The overflow path now refuses the provider request, persists a typed failure, and emits a client-visible error. The restart test constrains the cache adapter; it does not repair a cache-driven reset path, because no such reset path existed at M3 start.

The gate table's `YES` means source/helper and deterministic end-to-end evidence. Real-model authorship and later observed benefit remain `NOT RUN` for every item.

## 2. Gate Table

| item | owner | exact command | exit code + pass/fail | honesty label | mutation receipt |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| U19 — causal request prefix survives reconnect and committed wake/helper evidence | m3-compiler + m3-gate | `cargo test --locked -p klbr-daemon --test m3_request_gate u19_actual_request_prefix_survives_reconnect_and_causal_updates -- --nocapture` | `0`; 1 passed, 0 failed | YES | Pending-tail `push` mutated to `insert(0, ..)`; exit 101, panic `m3_request_gate.rs:410: request 1 moved prior messages`; restored. |
| U20 — cache profile is route-scoped; absent usage is distinct from reported zero; changed-route merge reaches wire | m3-adapter + m3-gate | `cargo test --locked -p klbr-daemon --test m3_request_gate u20_actual_wire_is_profile_scoped_and_usage_keeps_absent_distinct_from_zero -- --nocapture` and `cargo test --locked -p klbr-daemon --test m3_request_gate u20_changed_route_merge_reaches_wire_without_inherited_cache_profile -- --nocapture` | `0`; 1 passed, 0 failed for each | YES | Removed `stream`'s `apply_to_request`; exit 101, panic `m3_request_gate.rs:558: unsupported route emitted prompt_cache_key`; restored. |
| U21 — required-guidance overflow refuses the request and reports the typed failure | m3-compiler (core gate); m3-gate (daemon gate); m3-context (contract) | `cargo test --locked -p klbr-core --test m3_guidance_gate -- --nocapture` (m3-compiler); `cargo test --locked -p klbr-daemon --test m3_request_gate u21_required_guidance_overflow_stops_before_provider_request -- --nocapture` (m3-gate) | `0`; 2 passed, 0 failed in core; `0`; 1 passed, 0 failed in daemon | YES | Replaced the `UnresolvedBudget` bail with a no-op; exit 101 after 13.83s, `Error: client did not receive required guidance budget error`; restored. |
| U22 — reported cache miss preserves semantic history across daemon restart without fabricated turns | m3-resilience + m3-gate | `cargo test --locked -p klbr-daemon --test m3_request_gate u22_provider_miss_replays_same_semantic_history_without_fabricated_turn -- --nocapture` | `0`; 1 passed, 0 failed | YES | `ctx.clear()` mutation caused the exact prefix assertion at `turn.rs:793` to fail; restored. |

The complete owned gate binary was also run: `cargo test --locked -p klbr-daemon --test m3_request_gate -- --nocapture` — exit `0`, 5 passed, 0 failed. Workspace compilation was checked with `cargo check --workspace --locked --all-targets` — exit `0`.

## 3. Four Honesty Labels

For U19–U22, source/helper implemented is `YES` and deterministic end-to-end execution is `YES`. Real-model authored evidence is `NOT RUN`; later observed benefit is `NOT RUN`. No gate claims either of those unmeasured properties.

## 4. NOT RUN

The following are explicitly `NOT RUN`, and M3 makes no claim about them:

- real-model-authored evidence;
- later observed benefit or longitudinal improvement;
- Linux/NixOS validation;
- long-duration soak testing;
- filesystem fault injection;
- the `(c)` real-model-authored column and `(d)` later-observed-benefit column;
- a clean full-workspace pass: NOT RUN / UNRESOLVED; the battery result is disclosed below.

The full workspace battery (`cargo test --workspace --locked --no-fail-fast`) was run twice: 615 passed across 40 suites, with ONE failing test, `service_lifecycle::service_quiesce_preserves_waiting_deadline_and_resumes`, failing with `database is owned elsewhere or locking failed: WouldBlock` from `klbr-runtime/src/store.rs:220` (non-blocking `File::try_lock`). That suite passes 5/5 in isolation. The failure is under separate investigation; M3 does not claim it is green, and does not claim it is unrelated. No M3 gate item depends on it. No live provider measurement is claimed.

## 5. The Defects Found

All six defects had the same species: an honest component whose honesty did not reach the system.

1. **ContextReceipt had no production caller.** The component could describe request identity, but the daemon did not compile or persist it on the live path.
2. **`GuidanceStatus::UnresolvedBudget` had no daemon reader.** The engine returned an honest signal that the caller ignored.
3. **Production passed `usize::MAX` as the guidance budget.** The unresolved-budget branch was therefore unreachable. A guard that cannot fire is not a guard.
4. **Overflow logged and broke.** The path did `tracing::error!` plus `break`, with no client error or durable turn-failure audience. That is silent truncation's twin.
5. **Gemini used `unwrap_or(json!(0))`.** It fabricated a measured zero upstream of four layers that each preserved absence correctly.
6. **The U22 negative test used `usize::MAX` as its watermark.** Its no-compaction assertion could not fail because compaction was impossible by construction. It now uses a finite watermark with context genuinely below it.

## 6. Limitations

No commits were pushed. No live beads issue IDs are invented here. Rust tests were authored and run, but Linux/NixOS validation, long-duration validation, filesystem fault injection, real-model authorship, and later observed benefit were not run. M3 therefore does not claim them.