acdream/docs
Erik e77dd7c413 docs: launch-options reference + the test that keeps it honest
The client reads 161 ACDREAM_* environment variables across 79 files. Only
about 25 were written down, and the audit found the documentation drifting
in both directions: CLAUDE.md still advertised ACDREAM_RUN_SKILL /
ACDREAM_JUMP_SKILL (deleted; skills are server-authoritative now, and the
jump fallback is 300, not the documented 200), while flags with real
side effects had no description at all.

docs/launch-options.md documents every one by lifecycle — production,
command line, measurement, automation, permanent diagnostics, temporary
probes, deprecated, retired — with a mandatory side-effects column. That
column is the point: #432 cost three days of taxed measurements because
ACDREAM_AUTOMATION_ARTIFACT_DIR reads like an output path and also builds
a per-frame diagnostics referee, and ACDREAM_STREAM_RADIUS silently
measures a streaming window production never uses. Rows now say so. Other
surprises the audit surfaced and recorded: ACDREAM_DUMP_SCENERY_Z swaps in
a duplicate scenery-placement path rather than only logging,
ACDREAM_PROBE_VIS silently also enables ACDREAM_PROBE_ENVCELL, and
ACDREAM_DUMP_ENTITY's id list doubles as an unrelated probe's watchlist.

LaunchOptionsDocumentationTests enforces it, because a hand-maintained list
of 161 flags is stale within a week: an undocumented flag fails, and so
does a documented row whose read site was deleted. It scans string literals
rather than GetEnvironmentVariable call shapes — the startup path reads
through an injected delegate, so a call-shaped pattern silently missed
ACDREAM_LIVE, ACDREAM_PAK_PATH and every other production flag. A third
test freezes per-file direct-read debt by exact count (20 files outside the
owner classes), so structure rules 4 and 5 can be paid down but not
regressed.

CLAUDE.md's 94-line env-var section becomes a 16-line pointer, and its
stale test-character paragraph is corrected.

Also fixed, all doc-vs-code mismatches the audit proved:
- RenderingDiagnostics.FrameProfEnabled described a GPU-query self-disable
  that Campaign V slice V11 deleted.
- Two comments named ACDREAM_RENDER_BACKEND as a live co-requisite; it died
  with the OpenGL backend.
- EnvCellRenderer.CollectCellAuditLines and its ACDREAM_A8_AUDIT doc: the
  method had no caller anywhere and its documented caller never existed.

Filed rather than fixed, to keep this a documentation change: #434 (the
DebugPanel/DebugVM surface is never constructed, so ~40 "runtime-toggleable"
comments are false and 35 env reads are unreachable) and #435 (17 temporary
probes outlived their closed investigations; 14 more name no owner).

Full hermetic suite 12,202 passed / 0 failed.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
2026-08-24 10:28:59 +02:00
..
architecture feat(sky): pack-gated procedural night sky replacing the stretched DAT star layer; register IA-26 2026-08-23 17:55:20 +02:00
audit docs: update audit — Sprint 1 items verified (sequence counters + scenery LCG) 2026-04-13 13:51:39 +02:00
plans docs: Campaign VM shipped — owner accepted #422 as carried and authorised the merge 2026-08-23 10:09:05 +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 fix #28: port retail's sky default-script playback (aurora) and the particle facing law 2026-08-23 15:28:59 +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 docs: launch-options reference + the test that keeps it honest 2026-08-24 10:28:59 +02:00
launch-options.md docs: launch-options reference + the test that keeps it honest 2026-08-24 10:28:59 +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.