review-decisions

name: review-decisions description: Canonical decision policy for turning review findings into review_backlog.json decisions (fix_now, verify_first, defer, drop, needs_human_decision) with deterministic metadata and loop-cap behavior.

Review Decisions

Shared policy for Arbiter and PR shepherd style decision-making after review findings are normalized.

When To Use

Use this skill when:

• Converting canonical review findings into backlog decisions
• Enforcing allowed decision taxonomy
• Applying loop-cap policy (governed by gates.max_fix_iterations in allowlist)
• Appending deferred findings to .quest/backlog/deferred_findings.jsonl

Canonical Decision Set

Allowed decision values:

• fix_now
• verify_first
• defer
• drop
• needs_human_decision

Each backlog item must include:

• decision_confidence
• reason
• needs_validation
• owner
• batch

Baseline Rules

1. Use fix_now for high-severity, high-confidence findings with clear evidence.
2. Use verify_first when confidence/evidence is weaker or reproduction is needed.
3. Use defer when scope/priority does not justify immediate work.
4. Use drop for low-value/noise findings after explicit evaluation.
5. Use needs_human_decision when risk/tradeoff needs explicit human call.

Loop-Cap Rules

• Max fix iterations are governed by gates.max_fix_iterations in the allowlist (default 3).
• Solo mode uses min(solo.max_fix_iterations, gates.max_fix_iterations).
• At cap, unresolved findings must be converted to:
  • defer (with accepted-debt rationale), or
  • needs_human_decision
• Do not silently continue looping after cap.

Deferred Backlog Requirements

When a finding is deferred, append one JSON object per line to:

• .quest/backlog/deferred_findings.jsonl

Required lineage fields per deferred record:

• deferred_by_quest
• deferred_at (ISO8601 UTC)
• defer_reason
• proposed_followup

Batching And Ownership

• owner should identify who can resolve the finding (usually by touched area).
• batch should group related files/findings to keep implementation slices focused.
• Prefer deterministic grouping by canonical write scope path.