rileyhilliard/verification-before-completion

Verification Before Completion

Core Principle: No completion claims without fresh verification evidence.

Unverified claims break trust and ship broken code: undefined functions that crash production, incomplete features missing requirements, lost time on rework after false completion. The cost of running one command is trivial compared to the cost of a wrong claim.

The Verification Gate

Before any claim of success, completion, or satisfaction:

1. IDENTIFY - What command proves this claim?
2. RUN - Execute the full verification command (fresh, complete)
3. READ - Check full output, exit code, failure counts
4. VERIFY - Does output confirm the claim?
   • NO - State actual status with evidence
   • YES - State claim WITH evidence from step 2-3

When This Applies

Before:

• Claiming "tests pass", "build succeeds", "linter clean", "bug fixed"
• Expressing satisfaction ("Great!", "Done!", "Perfect!")
• Using qualifiers ("should work", "probably fixed", "seems to")
• Committing, creating PRs, marking tasks complete
• Marking a multi-file implementation as complete (dispatch ce:code-reviewer agent)
• Moving to next task or delegating work

Common Verification Requirements

| Claim | Required Evidence | Not Sufficient | | --------------------- | -------------------------------- | ----------------------------- | | Tests pass | yarn test output: 0 failures | Previous run, "looks correct" | | Build succeeds | Build command: exit 0 | Linter clean, "should work" | | Bug fixed | Test reproducing bug: now passes | Code changed, assumed fix | | Linter clean | Linter output: 0 errors | Partial check, spot test | | Regression test works | Red→Green cycle verified | Test passes once | | Agent task complete | VCS diff shows expected changes | Agent reports "success" | | Work is complete | Code review via ce:code-reviewer with no unresolved Critical issues | Self-review, "looks good to me" |

Red Flags

Stop and verify if you're about to:

• Use hedging language ("should", "probably", "seems to")
• Express satisfaction before running verification
• Trust agent/tool success reports without independent verification
• Rely on partial checks or previous runs

Key Examples

Regression test (TDD Red-Green):

Write test → Run (fail) → Fix code → Run (pass) → Revert fix → Run (fail) → Restore → Run (pass)
vs. "I've written a regression test" (without verifying red-green cycle)

Build vs Linter:

Run `npm run build` → See "exit 0" → Claim "build passes"
vs. Run linter → Claim "build will pass" (linter ≠ compiler)

Agent delegation:

Agent reports success → Check `git diff` → Verify changes → Report actual state
vs. Trust agent's success message without verification