# Implementation Plan: UI Bloat Regression Guard v1

**Branch**: `375-ui-bloat-regression-guard` | **Date**: 2026-06-13 | **Spec**: `specs/375-ui-bloat-regression-guard/spec.md`
**Input**: Feature specification from `specs/375-ui-bloat-regression-guard/spec.md`

## Summary

Build a narrow repository guard that scans TenantPilot UI source paths for known UI bloat and customer/auditor safety regression patterns from Specs 368 and 370-374. The implementation should prefer existing Pest guard conventions and surface-guard lane ownership, create spec-local rule/design/allowlist/scan artifacts, run an initial scan in `warn` mode, and avoid any runtime UI page refactor.

## Technical Context

**Language/Version**: PHP 8.4.15, Laravel 12.52, Filament 5.2.1, Livewire 4.1.4
**Primary Dependencies**: Pest 4.3, PHPUnit 12, existing Laravel/Filament app and test harness
**Storage**: N/A - no database or product persistence; spec-local Markdown reports only
**Testing**: Pest guard/source-scan tests preferred; optional Artisan command test only if a command is selected
**Validation Lanes**: heavy-governance / surface-guard by default; targeted command/test for local validation
**Target Platform**: local Laravel app and Gitea-compatible CI runners
**Project Type**: Laravel monolith under `apps/platform` plus repo-level scripts/docs
**Performance Goals**: deterministic local scan; no browser, DB, provider, queue, or network dependency
**Constraints**: no runtime UI refactor; no fast-feedback lane pollution unless scan cost is proven narrow; hard-fail only clear customer/auditor default-surface leakage in v1
**Scale/Scope**: configured scan over selected UI source directories, not full repository or generated assets

## UI / Surface Guardrail Plan

- **Guardrail scope**: workflow-only guardrail change.
- **Affected routes/pages/actions/states/navigation/panel/provider surfaces**: none.
- **No-impact class, if applicable**: tooling-only / test-only / documentation-artifact change.
- **Native vs custom classification summary**: N/A - no rendered UI.
- **Shared-family relevance**: status messaging, header actions, dashboard/stat cards, evidence/report viewers, customer/auditor defaults, diagnostic entrypoints.
- **State layers in scope**: none for runtime; source-scan surface classification only.
- **Audience modes in scope**: customer/read-only, operator-MSP, support-platform as scanner classifications.
- **Decision/diagnostic/raw hierarchy plan**: derive guard rules from Spec 370-374 hierarchy: decision/customer-safe content first, diagnostics second, support/raw third.
- **Raw/support gating plan**: guard reports raw/support terms in customer/auditor defaults as blocking or manual review depending on context/allowlist.
- **One-primary-action / duplicate-truth control**: scanner flags missing primary question/next action, header action overload, repeated status/lifecycle/timestamp/count noise, and zero-card spam.
- **Handling modes by drift class or surface**: clear customer/auditor leakage is hard-stop candidate; diagnostic/operator ambiguity is review-mandatory; allowlisted legacy debt is report-only.
- **Repository-signal treatment**: report/warn by default, future hard-stop candidate for additional rules after allowlist cleanup.
- **Special surface test profiles**: surface-guard; no browser smoke.
- **Required tests or manual smoke**: targeted source-scan fixture/sample coverage and initial scan report.
- **Exception path and spread control**: allowlist entries must be explicit, reasoned, reviewed, and scoped by rule/file/pattern.
- **Active feature PR close-out entry**: Guardrail.
- **UI/Productization coverage decision**: No UI surface impact.
- **Coverage artifacts to update**: none.
- **No-impact rationale**: no reachable UI is added, removed, renamed, or materially changed.
- **Navigation / Filament provider-panel handling**: no panel/provider changes.
- **Screenshot or page-report need**: no; guard-only spec.

## Shared Pattern & System Fit

- **Cross-cutting feature marker**: yes, because the guard reviews cross-surface UI interaction classes; no runtime shared interaction family changes.
- **Systems touched**: likely `apps/platform/tests/Feature/Guards`, `apps/platform/tests/Architecture`, `apps/platform/tests/Pest.php`, `apps/platform/tests/Support/TestLaneManifest.php` when heavy-governance ownership is selected, optional `apps/platform/app/Console/Commands`, optional repo scripts, and spec-local artifacts.
- **Shared abstractions reused**: existing source-scan guard patterns, Pest group/lane conventions, and `scripts/check-ui-productization-coverage` as a reference for report/fail behavior.
- **New abstraction introduced? why?**: at most one narrow scanner helper or guard test. It is justified only if inline test code would be too duplicated or unreadable.
- **Why the existing abstraction was sufficient or insufficient**: current UI coverage guard checks acknowledgement of UI impact, not source content bloat or customer-safety leakage.
- **Bounded deviation / spread control**: no product runtime abstraction; no framework under `app/Support` unless implementation proves test-local code is insufficient.

## OperationRun UX Impact

- **Touches OperationRun start/completion/link UX?**: no.
- **Central contract reused**: N/A.
- **Delegated UX behaviors**: N/A.
- **Surface-owned behavior kept local**: none.
- **Queued DB-notification policy**: N/A.
- **Terminal notification path**: N/A.
- **Exception path**: none.

## Provider Boundary & Portability Fit

- **Shared provider/platform boundary touched?**: no runtime provider seam.
- **Provider-owned seams**: N/A.
- **Platform-core seams**: N/A.
- **Neutral platform terms / contracts preserved**: guard language must describe provider/internal term leakage rather than making provider-specific labels platform truth.
- **Retained provider-specific semantics and why**: provider terms can remain legitimate in provider-owned diagnostic/operator surfaces and should be manual-review/allowlisted there.
- **Bounded extraction or follow-up path**: none.

## Constitution Check

*GATE: Must pass before implementation. Re-check after guard design is finalized.*

- Inventory-first: N/A - no inventory/snapshot behavior.
- Read/write separation: passes - no product write/change function; guard only reads source files and writes spec-local reports.
- Graph contract path: passes - no Graph calls.
- Deterministic capabilities: N/A - no capability resolver changes.
- RBAC-UX: passes - no authorization behavior changes; future implementation must not treat UI visibility as security.
- Workspace isolation: passes - no runtime workspace/tenant queries.
- Tenant isolation: passes - no tenant-owned data reads.
- Run observability: passes - no long-running remote/queued work and no OperationRun semantics.
- OperationRun start UX: N/A.
- Data minimization: guard reports must not include secrets, credentials, provider raw responses, or sensitive customer data.
- Test governance: surface-guard/heavy-governance classification is explicit; no hidden browser/DB fixtures.
- Proportionality: one narrow guard is justified by current UI safety/productization risk.
- No premature abstraction: prefer a single test/scanner path; avoid reusable framework unless needed for readability and tests.
- Persisted truth: no product persistence; spec-local reports only.
- Behavioral state: rule IDs are tooling diagnostics, not product state.
- UI semantics: guard consumes Spec 370-374 UI semantics and must not create a new UI interpretation framework.
- Shared pattern first: reuse existing guard/test/script conventions.
- Provider boundary: provider terms are scanner indicators only.
- V1 explicitness / few layers: direct text scanning and simple heuristics preferred over AST-heavy or browser-required tooling.
- Spec discipline / bloat check: proportionality review is complete.
- Filament-native UI: no rendered Filament UI changes; if implementation touches Filament source only by scanning it, no asset or provider updates are needed.
- UI/Productization coverage: no-impact decision is checked and rationalized.

## Test Governance Check

- **Test purpose / classification by changed surface**: Heavy-Governance / surface-guard for broad source scanning; unit-like sample cases may live inside the guard test.
- **Affected validation lanes**: heavy-governance or explicit targeted guard test/command; no browser lane.
- **Why this lane mix is the narrowest sufficient proof**: The feature protects cross-surface source patterns and does not render UI.
- **Narrowest proving command(s)**:
  - `cd apps/platform && php vendor/bin/pest tests/Feature/Guards/UiBloatRegressionGuardTest.php` or exact selected guard file.
  - If heavy-governance ownership is registered: targeted lane manifest/placement contract coverage proving the guard is discoverable by `test:heavy`, or a documented targeted-only validation if not registered.
  - If an Artisan command is selected: `cd apps/platform && php artisan tenantpilot:check-ui-bloat --strictness=warn`.
  - `git diff --check`.
  - `cd apps/platform && php vendor/bin/pint --dirty` if PHP changed.
- **Fixture / helper / factory / seed / context cost risks**: none expected; use source fixture strings/files only.
- **Expensive defaults or shared helper growth introduced?**: no; any scanner helper must avoid DB/application boot beyond what Pest already needs.
- **Heavy-family additions, promotions, or visibility changes**: one new bounded surface-guard family or test.
- **Surface-class relief / special coverage rule**: no product page browser smoke.
- **Closing validation and reviewer handoff**: reviewer confirms no runtime UI refactor, no raw hard-fail expansion beyond customer/auditor defaults, no hidden fast-feedback lane cost, and report artifacts are complete.
- **Budget / baseline / trend follow-up**: record guard runtime and lane impact in validation report.
- **Review-stop questions**: lane fit, breadth, false positives, allowlist quality, hidden cost, and scope creep.
- **Escalation path**: document-in-feature; follow-up-spec only if CI hardening or browser integration becomes structural.
- **Active feature PR close-out entry**: Guardrail.
- **Why no dedicated follow-up spec is needed**: v1 guard setup is bounded; follow-up specs are limited to browser fixture coverage, scorecard integration, and CI strictness expansion.

## Project Structure

### Documentation (this feature)

```text
specs/375-ui-bloat-regression-guard/
|-- spec.md
|-- plan.md
|-- tasks.md
|-- checklists/
|   `-- requirements.md
`-- artifacts/
    |-- source-summary.md
    |-- guard-rules.md
    |-- scanner-design.md
    |-- allowlist-policy.md
    |-- initial-scan-report.md
    |-- affected-files.md
    |-- validation-report.md
    `-- follow-up-recommendations.md
```

### Likely Source/Test Surfaces

```text
apps/platform/tests/Feature/Guards/
apps/platform/tests/Architecture/
apps/platform/tests/Pest.php
apps/platform/tests/Support/TestLaneManifest.php  # if heavy-governance lane ownership is selected
apps/platform/app/Console/Commands/        # only if command is narrower than Pest-only guard
scripts/                                  # only if repo-level script is chosen
```

### Initial Scan Scope

```text
apps/platform/app/Filament
apps/platform/resources/views/filament
apps/platform/app/Support/EnvironmentDashboard
apps/platform/app/Support/Navigation
apps/platform/app/Support/OpsUx
apps/platform/app/Support/SupportDiagnostics
apps/platform/app/Support/Ui
apps/platform/app/Support/Workspaces
```

Candidate paths `apps/platform/resources/views/components` and `apps/platform/app/View` are not present in current repo truth and must be recorded as `not available` if still absent during implementation. Additional `apps/platform/app/Support` subpaths may be added only when `scanner-design.md` documents why they are UI-support paths; `apps/platform/app/Support` must not be scanned wholesale in v1.

### Exclusions / Separate Classification

```text
vendor
node_modules
storage
bootstrap/cache
public/build
database dumps
spec artifacts
screenshots
generated reports
tests unless explicitly used as scanner fixtures
translation dictionaries unless implementation proves rendered default UI copy is being checked
```

**Structure Decision**: Use a single repo-conform guard entrypoint. Prefer `apps/platform/tests/Feature/Guards/UiBloatRegressionGuardTest.php` because existing broad UI/source guard tests live under `tests/Feature/Guards`. If the guard is intended to run in `test:heavy`, it must be grouped in `apps/platform/tests/Pest.php` and registered as a `surface-guard` family/hotspot in `apps/platform/tests/Support/TestLaneManifest.php`; otherwise the source summary and validation report must document targeted-only ownership.

## Complexity Tracking

| Violation | Why Needed | Simpler Alternative Rejected Because |
|-----------|------------|-------------------------------------|
| New source scanner/guard | Existing UI coverage guard does not detect specific bloat/customer-safety copy patterns | Manual checklist alone does not reliably catch cross-surface drift |
| Rule IDs and allowlist policy | Findings need stable review language and controlled exceptions | Unstructured grep output would be noisy and unactionable |

## Proportionality Review

- **Current operator problem**: Future UI work can reintroduce unsafe customer/auditor copy and noisy, unprioritized surfaces without early review feedback.
- **Existing structure is insufficient because**: `scripts/check-ui-productization-coverage` proves coverage acknowledgement, not the content quality of changed source.
- **Narrowest correct implementation**: One source scanner/test/command, ten bounded rule groups, warn default, hard-fail only clear customer/auditor leakage, and spec-local artifacts.
- **Ownership cost created**: Rule maintenance, initial scan debt triage, allowlist review, and one guard lane/test.
- **Alternative intentionally rejected**: Full browser visual regression and broad screenshot diffs are too expensive and unnecessary for v1; page refactors are explicitly not this spec.
- **Release truth**: Current-release truth protecting completed UI productization.

## Implementation Phases

### Phase 1 - Repo Truth And Source Inputs

Verify existing guard/test/script conventions, existing console command patterns, Spec 368 inputs, and Spec 370-374 artifacts. Record available and missing inputs in `artifacts/source-summary.md`.

### Phase 2 - Guard Rules And Design Artifacts

Create `guard-rules.md`, `scanner-design.md`, and `allowlist-policy.md` before runtime/tooling changes so review can stop scope growth early.

### Phase 3 - Tests First / Fixture Cases

Add targeted sample cases proving customer/auditor hard failures, manual-review heuristics, allowlist shape, and strictness behavior.

### Phase 4 - Scanner / Entrypoint Implementation

Implement one repo-conform entrypoint. Prefer Pest guard unless final discovery proves Artisan command or script is narrower.

### Phase 5 - Initial Scan And Report

Run the guard in `warn` mode, generate `initial-scan-report.md`, and classify findings without broad UI fixes.

### Phase 6 - Validation And Close-Out Artifacts

Complete affected files, validation report, follow-up recommendations, and run targeted validation commands.

## Deployment / Ops Considerations

- **Environment variables**: none.
- **Migrations**: none.
- **Queues/scheduler**: none.
- **Storage/volumes**: none.
- **Filament assets**: no registered assets expected; `filament:assets` is not required unless implementation unexpectedly registers assets, which should be treated as scope drift.
- **CI**: v1 may run as a targeted guard or report-only heavy-governance check. Do not make broad heuristic failures CI-blocking before allowlist cleanup.

## Filament v5 Output Contract

- **Livewire v4.0+ compliance**: The app has Livewire 4.1.4; this spec must not introduce Livewire v3 references.
- **Provider registration location**: No panel providers are changed. If an implementation unexpectedly touches panel providers, Laravel 12 registration remains `apps/platform/bootstrap/providers.php`.
- **Global search**: No resources or global search behavior are changed.
- **Destructive actions**: No destructive/high-impact actions are added or changed. Any existing destructive actions observed by scanner remain runtime-owned and must retain confirmation, authorization, and audit behavior.
- **Asset strategy**: No new Filament assets. No deploy `filament:assets` impact expected.
- **Testing plan**: targeted Pest/source-scan guard or selected command test; no browser smoke required.

## Risk Controls

- Keep scanner deterministic and text-based.
- Default ambiguous findings to manual review.
- Keep hard failures narrow.
- Separate existing debt from new blocking failures.
- Do not auto-fix files.
- Document every allowlist entry.
- Record any chosen implementation option and rejected alternatives.