Implementer's guide

An implementation of GHOST is small on purpose: four artifact kinds, one register, and a short list of acts only a human may take.

The artifacts#

Artifact Schema Spec sections
Counselor charter schema/v1/counselor-charter.schema.json 3, 4.1, 5, 6, 9
Corpus manifest schema/v1/corpus-manifest.schema.json 2, 4.1.1
Creation record schema/v1/creation-record.schema.json 4.1.3, 14
Reliance record schema/v1/reliance-record.schema.json 7.1, 6.2
Calibration record schema/v1/calibration-record.schema.json 7.2, 7.3, 13

Validate any of them with node tools/validate.mjs <file>. The schemas are draft interpretations of a draft spec and say so; where they interpret, the description fields cite the section interpreted.

The order of operations#

  1. Qualify the subject (4.2) and fix the persona class (3). The class decides most of what follows: a living subject's simulated counselor is private forever unless the official path is taken (3.2.1); a projection needs a rights declaration (4.1.5) and a closed corpus (9.2).
  2. Enumerate the corpus before anything counsels: no manifest, no recommendations, ever (4.1.1).
  3. Create deliberately (4.1.3): a recorded act, by the operator, with the self test (14) run and its results kept.
  4. Counsel under controls: rung 0 by default (6.1), provenance on every recommendation (6.2), evidence gating (6.3), quorum and distinct voices (6.4), and the terminal control: a counselor recommends, it never decides (6.5).
  5. Keep the reliance and calibration records (7): they are what make rung movement an evidenced decision instead of a mood.

What only a human does#

Creation, rung changes, certification, revocation handling, publication of anything, and every action taken on counsel. An implementation that automates one of these has not implemented the spec; it has routed around it.

Conformance posture#

The register (/conformance/) measures which normative requirements an implementation covers; the tiers (11) name what a claim would mean. While the spec is draft, its own note holds: conformance claims are premature. Measure, publish the measurement if you like, and let the claim wait for the spec.