acdream/docs
Erik 65f6f5848a fix(ui): Campaign AS gate fixes AS-GF1 — extras-list overflow ruled OUT as a code defect; paperdoll regression not isolated, probe added instead
Two owner-reported defects at the Campaign AS connected gate on the
examination window (player targets): the animated paperdoll no longer
renders at all, and a "reserved black rectangle" appears at the window's
bottom with the character extras list clipped mid-row at default (310x400)
window size.

ROOT CAUSE — extras-list overflow (the "clipped mid-row" half of defect 2):
NOT a code bug. AS3 (armor-level trio) and AS4 (society/allegiance/
configurable extras) grew the extras list past its DAT-authored 87px region
(element 0x10000335) at the window's minimum size — a new hermetic
regression test proves the worst-case combination (every AS3+AS4 addition
at once) reaches 20 rows / 400px of content, a 4.6x overflow. But retail's
own LayoutDesc authors NO scrollbar for this listbox either
(ScrollbarElementId == 0, verified against both the committed fixture and a
fresh tools/LayoutDump read of the live installed DAT — no drift), and the
SAME test proves UiItemList's pre-existing, unmodified wheel-scroll handler
(OnEvent's UiEventType.Scroll branch) already reveals every row on the next
paint. A scrollbar-less, wheel-scrollable list clipped to its authored
region until the user scrolls or resizes IS retail's own already-correctly-
ported mechanism, not a regression — so no fix was made here.

ROOT CAUSE — paperdoll / "black rectangle" (defect 1): NOT ISOLATED despite
exhaustive investigation. Every file the Campaign AS diff touches
(AppraisalUiController.cs, RetailUiRuntime.cs, CreatureAppraisalRows.cs,
AllegianceRankTitleTable.cs, CharacterIdentityText.cs,
CharacterSheetProvider.cs, InteractionRetainedUiComposition.cs, plus two
unrelated mechanical PublicWeenieFlags-literal refactors) was reviewed in
full against the pre-Campaign-AS baseline. The same worst-case regression
test proves Apply/ApplyCreature/RebuildCreatureStats/BuildExtra never throw
and always leave ActiveView == Character, CurrentObjectId != 0, and the
viewport's full ancestor-visibility chain Visible == true — ruling out
RetailCreatureAppraisalFrameView.TryGetVisibleTarget's first three gates.
CreatureAppraisalPresentation.cs and LivePresentationComposition.cs (the
entire render-time viewport pipeline) are byte-for-byte unchanged across
the whole 974fe88a..87e98395 window. UiViewport.OnDraw draws NOTHING (not
black) when its TextureSlot is unassigned, and the creaturePanel's own
full-panel backdrop (0x10000141) is what would show through instead — the
most likely explanation tying both defects to ONE underlying condition, but
its exact trigger (TryGetVisibleTarget's CurrentObjectId check, or
TrySynchronize's live-entity/mesh-availability check) lies in code nothing
in Campaign AS touches, and could not be reproduced hermetically (needs a
live entity + a live examine exchange).

Filed #443 with the full investigation trail. Added a temporary,
state-change-gated diagnostic probe (ACDREAM_PROBE_CREATURE_APPRAISAL_
VIEWPORT=1, CreatureAppraisalViewportDiagnostics) at both
TryGetVisibleTarget and TrySynchronize so the next live repro pinpoints the
exact failing reason instead of another guess. Per CLAUDE.md's "no
workarounds without explicit approval" and the investigation mode's own
escape hatch ("if you cannot root-cause, say what runtime evidence you
need instead of shipping a guess"), no behavioral fix was shipped for
defect 1.

Tests: AcDream.App.Tests hermetic filter 6,337/0; full-solution hermetic
suite 15,612/0 (all 14 projects green, including the known #442 flake,
which did not trip this run).

Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
2026-08-25 12:58:29 +02:00
..
architecture feat(ui): Campaign AS AS5 — allegiance rank-title table, exam title bar + character panel name line (G9, narrows AP-109) 2026-08-25 10:20:07 +02:00
audit docs: update audit — Sprint 1 items verified (sequence counters + scenery LCG) 2026-04-13 13:51:39 +02:00
plans docs(AS): AS5 REVIEW-CLOSED; AS6 gate script committed — Campaign AS implementation COMPLETE 2026-08-25 10:33:49 +02:00
reference docs(reference): preserve local ACE command catalog 2026-07-27 00:03:58 +02:00
render-packs fix(render): correct foliage-wind classification, receiver/caster desync, and frame binding (Campaign VM VM6 review) 2026-08-23 01:54:36 +02:00
reports docs: the overnight consolidation report, open questions first 2026-07-29 03:54:43 +02:00
research docs(AS): AS5 REVIEW-CLOSED; AS6 gate script committed — Campaign AS implementation COMPLETE 2026-08-25 10:33:49 +02:00
reviews docs: close r3 test cleanup 2026-08-18 17:02:15 +02:00
superpowers feat(launcher): complete Campaign LA11 pre-gate support 2026-08-15 00:02:04 +02:00
bugs.md docs: reconcile project status and navigation 2026-07-20 13:00:41 +02:00
ci-and-releases.md docs: note that docs-only pushes skip the pipeline 2026-08-19 16:15:04 +02:00
ISSUES.md fix(ui): Campaign AS gate fixes AS-GF1 — extras-list overflow ruled OUT as a code defect; paperdoll regression not isolated, probe added instead 2026-08-25 12:58:29 +02:00
launch-options.md fix(ui): Campaign AS gate fixes AS-GF1 — extras-list overflow ruled OUT as a code defect; paperdoll regression not isolated, probe added instead 2026-08-25 12:58:29 +02:00
README.md docs: launch-options reference + the test that keeps it honest 2026-08-24 10:28:59 +02:00
release-gate.md feat(render): implement Campaign AR and terrain fidelity 2026-08-22 13:13:29 +02:00

acdream documentation map

This page is the entry point for project documentation. It distinguishes current sources of truth from implementation history so an old plan or issue banner cannot silently override the current program state.

Current snapshot — 2026-07-27

  • Milestone state: M3, “Cast a spell,” landed 2026-07-21. M4, “Live in the world,” is active.
  • M4 gameplay program: resume the pre-M4 world-interaction completion program. Favorite-spell overflow, status Use/Assess, and the complete assessment surface are user-accepted. Equipped-child picking and vendor browse/transactions remain Slices 46.
  • Structural/runtime state: all eight GameWindow decomposition slices, Modern Runtime Slices AJ, and the connected visual/lifecycle gates are complete. GameWindow is a 1,622-line composition/callback shell. AcDream.Runtime.GameRuntime owns canonical session, entity/object, gameplay, movement, physics, projectile, environment, and portal state; graphical and no-window hosts borrow the same owner graph.
  • Headless state: Slice K is complete. AcDream.Headless is a presentation-free Windows/Linux host with deterministic commands/events, shared immutable content, multi-session isolation, reconnect, resource telemetry, and 1/5/10/30-session gates. The final two-account native-Linux soak completed ten minutes, logged out through ACE, and converged every ownership ledger.
  • Linux graphical state: Slice L0 and the L1 implementation checkpoint are complete at 66f114b2 and 11501d52. Native Windows passes the active modern-GL/audio/window smoke. WSLg X11/Wayland correctly reject their missing GL_ARB_bindless_texture. Physical-Linux validation and L2L6 are explicitly deferred; resume at the supported AMD/NVIDIA L1 gate.
  • Completed gameplay gates: R6 locomotion/collision/projectile/teleport/ radar, two-client portal-out/materialization, indoor prepared collision, loot ordering, local/remote ground drops, and selection-marker lifetime.
  • Separate visual verification: issue #225, the shared-alpha lifestone/particle result; its connected resource-lifetime and performance routes pass.
  • Carried behaviour debt: issue #153 (far teleport onto an unstreamed edge), #116 (narrowed slide response), #235 (capped/RDP jump cadence), and the active temporary-stopgap rows in the divergence register.
  • Divergence audit: 189 active rows — IA 18, AD 38, AP 91, TS 38, and UN 4 — plus retained struck/retired historical rows such as TS-37.
  • Latest automated baseline: the Release build succeeds with the 17 test-project warnings tracked by issue #228; 8,826 tests pass and five are intentionally skipped. App passes 3,763 / 3 skips. The L1 Windows supported smoke and WSLg X11/Wayland negative-capability reports all end with zero window/GL/input/audio ownership.

Sources of truth

Read these in this order when deciding what to do next:

  1. plans/2026-05-12-milestones.md — the active playable outcome, freeze boundaries, and visual gates.
  2. plans/2026-04-11-roadmap.md — strategic phase ledger: shipped, active, deferred, and future work.
  3. ISSUES.md — tactical defects and small follow-ups. The status inside an issue is authoritative; physical order is not.
  4. architecture/retail-divergence-register.md — every known place runtime behavior can differ from retail.
  5. architecture/acdream-architecture.md and architecture/code-structure.md — ownership, dependency, update-thread, and extraction rules.
  6. architecture/worldbuilder-inventory.md — rendering/DAT code already owned in-tree versus mechanisms still ours to port.

If these disagree, milestones control the current outcome, the roadmap controls work ordering, the issue status controls the individual defect, and the architecture documents control implementation shape. Reconcile the stale document in the same change; do not leave both claims standing.

Research and implementation records

  • research/named-retail/ is the primary retail oracle: named pseudo-C, headers, symbols, and types from the Sept 2013 build.
  • research/decompiled/ is the older Ghidra fallback.
  • research/ contains focused pseudocode, traces, fixtures, and gate reports. A dated research note records evidence; it does not become a new roadmap.
  • superpowers/specs/ and superpowers/plans/ are per-slice design and execution records. Completed plans remain historical.
  • ci-and-releases.md is the SSOT for the Gitea CI pipeline, the self-hosted runners, and how alpha releases are published. Load-sensitive tests live in Lane=Timing; see release-gate.md before adding to it.
  • launch-options.md is the SSOT for every environment variable and command-line argument the client reads, including what each one changes about the run beyond its obvious effect. Read the side-effects column before trusting any measurement. Enforced by LaunchOptionsDocumentationTests: a flag without a row fails the build, and so does a row whose read site was deleted.
  • audit/ contains completion and conformance audits.
  • reference/ace-commands.md preserves the local ACE server's complete in-game command catalog and points to the authoritative per-command help surface.

Durable memory

  • ../claude-memory/MEMORY.md indexes the live subsystem memories and the render/physics digests. Read a domain digest before changing that subsystem, especially its DO-NOT-RETRY table.
  • ../memory/ contains stable engineering references such as the modern rendering pipeline, two-tier streaming, and toolchain notes.

Memory accelerates recall; it does not outrank the canonical documents above. When current truth changes, update the relevant canonical document and distill only the durable lesson into memory.

Historical and deprecated documents

  • bugs.md is the April 2026 bug snapshot. It is preserved for archaeology and is not an active ledger.
  • Dated plans and specs describe the decision at that time. Their completion wording is historical unless the current milestone/roadmap explicitly links the item as active.
  • Old R1→R8 architecture sequencing is superseded. Current execution comes from the milestones and strategic roadmap.

Documentation maintenance rules

  • Update milestone, roadmap, issue, divergence, architecture, and memory claims in the same commit when a shipped change affects them.
  • Keep one issue ID per defect. Narrow an issue in place; do not reuse another issue's number as a shorthand.
  • Mark automated, connected, and visual gates separately. An automated pass is not a visual acceptance, and an RDP throughput sample is not a local-display visual comparison.
  • Preserve research history, but remove stale “current/next” claims from living documents once the state advances.