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Promotion Contracts and Downstream Trust

Page Maps

graph LR
  family["Reproducible Research"]
  program["Deep Dive DVC"]
  section["Promotion Registry Boundaries Auditability"]
  page["Promotion Contracts and Downstream Trust"]
  capstone["Capstone evidence"]

  family --> program --> section --> page
  page -.applies in.-> capstone
flowchart LR
  orient["Orient on the page map"] --> read["Read the main claim and examples"]
  read --> inspect["Inspect the related code, proof, or capstone surface"]
  inspect --> verify["Run or review the verification path"]
  verify --> apply["Apply the idea back to the module and capstone"]

Promotion is the moment a result becomes someone else's dependency.

That is why promotion is not a copy operation. It is a contract:

This specific result is approved for downstream use, and the evidence needed to explain it travels with it.

If the release boundary only says "latest model" or "latest report," downstream consumers are being asked to trust a moving target.

Promotion changes authority

Before promotion, a result may be:

  • exploratory
  • useful for comparison
  • promising but unreviewed
  • local to a candidate run
  • part of internal pipeline state

After promotion, the result is allowed to support downstream work:

  • reporting
  • deployment
  • stakeholder review
  • audit
  • recovery
  • rollback

That authority change is why promotion needs review.

A promoted result needs a sentence

A strong promotion statement is concrete:

Promote model bundle v1 for incident escalation review. It uses evaluate.threshold: 0.50, improves recall under the accepted release objective, and is published with matching metrics, parameters, manifest, and lock evidence.

Weak:

Copy latest model to publish.

The first sentence can be checked. The second only describes movement.

Keep internal and promoted state separate

Internal pipeline state can be rich and messy:

  • intermediate datasets
  • cached features
  • candidate outputs
  • debug reports
  • multiple metrics
  • temporary comparison files

Promoted state should be smaller and clearer:

  • the artifact consumers need
  • the parameters that define it
  • the metrics that justify it
  • a manifest of what is included
  • a review note or contract explaining downstream use
flowchart LR
  internal["internal pipeline state"] --> review["promotion review"]
  review --> publish["promoted release boundary"]
  publish --> consumer["downstream consumer"]

The review boundary protects consumers from internal churn.

Promotion should answer who can trust what

Before promoting, ask:

  • who is the downstream consumer?
  • what file or bundle are they allowed to use?
  • what assumptions travel with it?
  • what evidence explains why it was promoted?
  • what should they not depend on?

If the answer includes "they can just look around the repository," the release surface is too vague.

Review checkpoint

You understand this core when you can:

  • explain why promotion changes result authority
  • write a promotion statement that can be checked
  • distinguish internal pipeline state from promoted state
  • name the downstream consumer and what they may trust
  • reject "copy latest" as an insufficient release contract

Promotion is where trust becomes explicit.