Hold the knowledge half-life seed files out of the release (unblocks v1.97.19)

[davekilleen]

Linked Issue

• Linear issue: none. Follow-up to Daily rituals stop doing the same work twice (release v1.97.19) #741 (see its second status comment) and Restack knowledge half-life onto current main (#569) #744.

What Changed

• .distignore now excludes System/knowledge-half-life.yaml and System/knowledge-half-life.example.yaml from the built release, with a comment explaining why.
• Why: Restack knowledge half-life onto current main (#569) #744 added both as seed paths and taught core/portable_contract.py about them, but an update is planned by the installed vault's contract (natively via core.lifecycle.service, or through the bridge via the pinned v1.81.16 foundation's service). Every contract before Restack knowledge half-life onto current main (#569) #744 returns unclassified-never-write for both, so build_update_plan raises release contains a path the ownership contract refuses for every existing vault. That is the exact historic-fleet-darwin-pr-canary failure on Daily rituals stop doing the same work twice (release v1.97.19) #741's last head. These two files are the first shipped paths added since the foundation was pinned, which is why nothing else trips it.
• The feature is an unwired proposal (Proposal: declare how long an observation stays trustworthy, and measure it #569) and core/utils/freshness.py treats a missing config as UNAVAILABLE by design, so no user-visible change. The rules stay in the contract, so a later release can ship the files once installed contracts know them.
• No version bump: main is already at 1.97.19 and untagged; v1.97.19 gets tagged on the main head after this lands.

Test Plan

• Unit/integration tests added or updated: none needed; this is a distribution list change. The gate that would have caught the regression is the fleet canary, which runs on this PR.
• Negative/error-path tests added or updated: n/a.
• Commands run locally: resolved the release file list through scripts/resolve-distignore-files.sh and checked every included path with the v1.81.16 foundation contract's update_write_verdict: 0 refused (2 before this change). scripts/verify-distribution.sh, scripts/check-portable-contract.sh, scripts/check-tracked-ignored.py, scripts/check-tau-removal.py all pass. test_security_gate, test_product_agents_bootstrap, test_freshness, test_portable_contract pass. Three test_distribution_artifacts bundle-build tests fail identically with and without this change in the sandbox (exit 127 from build-vault-bundle.sh, a tool the sandbox lacks).

Ralph Wiggum Loop

• I implemented the change.
• I self-reviewed for defects and edge cases.
• I requested specialist review for risky areas (testing/infra/security when relevant).
• I addressed review findings and re-ran checks.

Quality Gates

• I added/updated tests or documented why no tests are needed.
• I added a regression test for bug fixes, or this PR is not a bug fix.
• I validated failure modes / edge cases.
• I updated docs or confirmed no docs impact.
• CI checks for lint + tests + coverage are expected to pass.

Risk & Rollback

• Risk level (low/medium/high): low. Two files leave the release; nothing reads them yet.
• Rollback plan: revert this commit once installed contracts carry the half-life rules (one release after they ship in the contract), which is the intended path to shipping the files.

Docs Impact

• Files updated: none.
• If none, reason: the exclusion is explained in .distignore itself; the feature's own docs describe it as a proposal.

🤖 Generated with Claude Code

https://claude.ai/code/session_0113icGZrCbSBmwomv7e49bH

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Generated by Claude Code

[github-actions]

What this pull request touches

• other parts of Dex — No mapped product journey was detected for these paths.

Gates that will judge this change

• Personal-data gate: added lines must not expose real identities or personal vault content.
• Change-aware gates: source changes are checked for tests, path-contract use, documentation drift, and touched-file coverage.
• Tests and coverage: the Python, MCP, migration, hook, and script suites must remain healthy.
• Safety and quality: security, lint, distribution, path consistency, and large-vault checks still apply.

Based on 1 changed file.

[cursor]

Approved. Cursor Bugbot was not running after the first check poll, and nothing in the remaining signals or approval policy requires human review. No reviewers were assigned.

  

_{Sent by Cursor Approval Agent: Pull Request Router and Approver}