[unic-archon-dlc] Explore workflow — prototype, spike verdicts, and spike-branch gate

[orioltf]

Parent

docs/issues/unic-archon-dlc/PRD.md

What to build

Second half of the explore workflow: a prototype node that runs structured experiments, an optional human gate for preserving valuable spike code, and a spike ticket in the configured tracker.

In scope:

• prototype node appended to .archon/workflows/explore.yaml. Reads findings.md and produces one or more experiments, each emitting a structured verdict — exactly one of:
  • VALIDATED — approach works as expected, evidence captured.
  • INVALIDATED — approach failed, reason captured.
  • PARTIAL — partially works, gaps documented.
  • Verdicts and per-experiment notes are written into a ## Spike verdicts section of findings.md (single source of truth — no separate spike file).
• Optional interactive gate after prototype: asks the user whether the spike produced code worth preserving on a branch. If yes, the workflow creates a spike/<slug> branch with the prototype code committed; if no, the worktree is left clean.
• Spike ticket creation via the tracker adapter (slice 03): a ticket of type spike, labelled with the configured priority default, linking to docs/workflow/<slug>/findings.md. The ticket records VALIDATED/INVALIDATED/PARTIAL summary in its body so the tracker view is informative.

Out of scope: feeding spike code into plan automatically — plan reads findings.md only, not the branch.

Acceptance criteria

• prototype node runs after synthesize and writes a ## Spike verdicts section to findings.md with at least one experiment carrying exactly one verdict from {VALIDATED, INVALIDATED, PARTIAL}.
• Spike-branch gate is interactive: answering "yes" creates a spike/<slug> branch with a commit; answering "no" leaves no branch behind.
• A spike ticket is created in the configured tracker via the tracker adapter, with type label spike, body linking to findings.md, and a one-line verdict summary.
• Re-running /unic-dlc-explore <slug> on an existing slug does not duplicate the spike ticket; the existing ticket is updated.

Blocked by

• [unic-archon-dlc] Triage workflow and tracker adapter #103
• [unic-archon-dlc] Explore workflow — parallel research and synthesize #104

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PRD: docs/issues/unic-archon-dlc/PRD.md
Migrated from: docs/issues/unic-archon-dlc/05-explore-prototype-and-spike-gate.md (source removed after migration)
Touched by PRs: #33

[orioltf]

Superseded by the two-axis redesign of unic-archon-dlc (PRs #262–#273, shipped 2026-07-03, v0.12.0).

This issue specifies the pre-redesign architecture — six Archon workflows, a tracker-adapter lib, yaml-gen/dag-builder, and docs/workflow/ artifacts. All of those were deliberately dissolved:

• Container now follows structural need — Archon workflows only for the AFK-isolated legs, commands/skills for interactive work (ADR-0017).
• tracker-adapter, dag-builder, yaml-gen, findings-writer and spike-verdicts were dissolved in favour of a generic core plus config (ADR-0018).
• Session artifacts moved to <artifacts_dir>/<slug>/; ROADMAP.md and HANDOFF.md were dropped (ADR-0013, ADR-0015).

Closing as rejected — the intent shipped, the specified design did not. Removing ready-for-agent so it cannot be dispatched. Current architecture: CONTEXT.md, ADRs 0011–0029.