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Lead PR bodies with the problem in the Why/What shape - #157

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wallstop merged 3 commits into
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guidance/why-what-pr-bodies
Oct 10, 2026
Merged

wallstop merged 3 commits into
mainfrom
guidance/why-what-pr-bodies

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@wallstop wallstop commented Oct 9, 2026 •

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Why: Our PR descriptions grew into Behavior/Validation/Risk forms that bury the problem under process detail; a reviewer cannot see at a glance what was broken and why it mattered.

What:

  • Lead PR bodies with **Why:** (the problem) and **What:** one-line bullets, then issue refs, per the Ambiguous-Interactive/unity-helpers shape (ship-changes + .llm/context.md).
  • Move validation evidence, risk, and rollback to the commit body, tests, and linked issues; open PR Dedupe the Troubleshooting nav entry and index bullet #156 already uses the shape.

Note

Low Risk
Process and documentation only; no runtime, auth, or packaging behavior changes.

Overview
Replaces the old Behavior / Validation / Risk PR body pattern with a problem-first Why / What shape so reviewers see what was broken and what changed without process-heavy sections.

Adds .github/pull_request_template.md so new PRs open with Why, What bullets, Fixes #, plus Type of Change and Checklist. Updates .llm/context.md and ship-changes to match: narrative capped at ~15 lines, validation and risk moved to commits, tests, and issues (not the PR body).

Minor docs cleanup: removes a duplicate Troubleshooting entry in docs/index.md and mkdocs.yml.

Reviewed by Cursor Bugbot for commit 695b1c5. Bugbot is set up for automated code reviews on this repo. Configure here.

Fixes #154.

## Behavior

- mkdocs.yml lists Troubleshooting once; PR #145 registered the page twice,
  so the Material nav rendered a duplicated section.
- docs/index.md keeps one Where-to-go-next bullet (the topic-list blurb that
  matches the page's sections).

## Validation

- mkdocs build --strict green (mkdocs 1.6.1, mkdocs-material 9.7.7); built
  nav carries exactly one Troubleshooting entry and the index one bullet.
- npm run lint:llm green; npm pack payload unchanged (172 files, no docs/
  paths). Docs-only change: Unity suites not exercised (precedent #145).

## Risk / Rollback

- Prose-only nav removal; strict build guards link validity.
- Revert the single commit to restore the duplicate.
## Behavior

- ship-changes and .llm/context.md replace the Behavior/Validation/Risk
  PR template with the unity-helpers shape: Why states the problem in one
  or two plain sentences, What lists one-line change bullets, then
  Fixes/Refs issue lines.
- Validation evidence, limitations, and risk belong in the commit body,
  tests, and linked issues instead of the PR body.

## Validation

- Skills index regenerated; npm run lint:llm and the file-length lint
  green; .llm/context.md stays at exactly 300 lines.

## Risk / Rollback

- Prose-only harness guidance; no product code or packaging impact.
- Revert the commit to restore the previous template.
GitHub now pre-fills the Why/What shape for new PRs, so future PR bodies lead with the problem by default instead of recreating it by hand. Pairs with the ship-changes skill update in this PR. Guidance only: no product code.
@wallstop
wallstop merged commit b613297 into main Oct 10, 2026
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@wallstop
wallstop deleted the guidance/why-what-pr-bodies branch October 10, 2026 00:43
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