ADR-043: An existing decision process gets an exception, not a second home
| Status | Accepted (2026-08-09) |
| Date | 2026-08-09 |
| Author | Łukasz Bodurka |
| Tags | methodology, adoption, decisions |
Context
R5 requires a contestable, re-litigable choice to be recorded as a decision record, and docs/decision-records is a required manifest entry every align run fills. Nothing in Step 0 asks whether the target repo already has one. Two real repos this standard was assessed against make the gap concrete: git's design decisions run on its mailing list, a process older than this standard by decades; vim's run through its own maintainer-led process. Neither writes an ADR. Align, run as specified, would still propose docs/decision-records/ for both - not because either repo lacks a working process, but because Step 0 never asked whether one already existed. The result is not neutral: a repo gets a second, competing home for the same class of decision, and the standard's own process (R6: an accepted record must not be edited into a different decision) now has to coexist with whatever authority the mailing list or the maintainer already carries - two records of the same choice that can disagree.
This is the same shape as the AI-policy detection Step 0 already does (SKILL.md's four-shape read of AI_POLICY.md/LLM_POLICY.md/ CONTRIBUTING.md/AGENTS.md) - a repo's own file can answer a question this skill would otherwise ask or, worse, silently override - just for a different axis: not may an agent contribute, but where do contestable choices already get recorded.
Options considered
- A - do nothing; let the repo end up with two homes. The user notices the redundancy eventually and asks about it, or doesn't. Rejected: it is exactly the kind of silent side effect this standard's own intake philosophy (ADR-020) exists to prevent - measure and ask before acting, never assume.
- B - detect it and hard-stop, the same tier as an AI-policy ban. Rejected: an existing decision process is not a prohibition on this standard - it is a fact to weigh, and the right answer is very often "adopt ours anyway", not "the run cannot proceed". Treating it as a stop asks the wrong question.
- C - chosen. Detect it, ask, and record either answer as data the manifest already carries. The manifest's
exceptionsmechanism (R17: an update "preserves the repo's recorded deviations") already exists for exactly this shape - a required entry the repo consciously does not carry, with a reason. No new machinery:docs/decision-records's existing manifest entry (required: true, rule R5) gets a{ "kind": "file", "match": "docs/decision-records", "reason": "..." }exception when the answer is "keep the existing process", and nothing when the answer is "adopt ours".self-verifyreports the choice as excepted, never as an unmet requirement or a silent gap.
Decision
Option C. Step 0's measurement pass (SKILL.md) gains one detection, next to the existing governance-config read: a CONTRIBUTING/README pointer to a mailing list or RFC process, an rfcs//doc/design//enhancement- proposal directory, or a governance doc naming who decides and how. When found, ask rather than assume: adopt this standard's ADR/BDR mechanism going forward (the default), or keep the repo's own process, recorded as an exception on R5's manifest entry with the reason named. No new rule number - this is Step 0 procedure applying the manifest's existing exceptions mechanism to a case R5 already covers, the same way the AI-policy read applies existing judgment rather than adding new normative text.
Consequences
- Positive: a repo with a real, working decision process no longer gets a second one imposed by omission; the choice either way is named and checkable (
self-verifyreads the exception), not left to be discovered later as an unexplained emptydocs/decision-records/or an unexplained duplicate process. - Negative: one more detection Step 0 has to run and one more question it may have to ask - on the large majority of repos with no such process, this costs nothing (the signals are absent, the question is never surfaced).
Confirmation
SKILL.md's Step 0 measurement pass names the detection and the two-answer question; a repo that answers "keep mine" carries a docs/decision-records exception with a stated reason instead of an empty required directory.
Revisit when
The detection signals named here (a CONTRIBUTING/README pointer to a mailing list or RFC process, an rfcs//doc/design/-shaped directory, or a governance doc naming who decides) repeatedly miss a real existing decision process that doesn't surface through any of them - that would mean the detection needs another signal or a different approach, not just a wider list.