A lint error names something the user may change

Context

Lint reports findings at two severities, and an error fails the build. Under ADR-0001 a terminal document is never modified. A rule whose subject is the body of a frozen document can find a fault there that no permitted edit could clear: an empty required section, an unresolved wiki link, a link to a heading that no longer exists. Reported as an error, that fault fails the build forever, and the only remedy is the edit the freeze forbids.

Decision

A lint error names something the user is permitted to change. A finding that no permitted edit to the named document could clear is a warning. This applies to the rules whose subject is the document's own body, which are L14, L16 and L17, when the document is frozen. It does not apply to a fault in a relationship between documents, such as L04's, which is cleared by editing the other document rather than the one named. It does not apply to L11 itself, whose finding is that a frozen document was edited, and whose remedy is to revert.

Alternatives

No alternatives were weighed.

Consequences

Easier:

• A repository with a fault inside a frozen document can still pass, and the fault is still reported.
• An error is always a task: something the person reading it can do.

Harder:

• A warning on a frozen document is a permanent fixture of the output. It records something real that will never be fixed in place.

Constrained:

• Every rule will decide its severity by whether the document it names is frozen, so every rule needs to know.
• A rule about a relationship keeps its error severity even when one side is frozen, because the other side is not.

Sources

• docs/ARCHDOC.md at 9654fe2a, the preamble to the lint rules, states the softening, the three rules it covers, and the two it does not. This sets created and decided.
• docs/DECISIONS.md at 9654fe2d, section The lifecycle and freezing, records the same rule.
• The decision was taken in a design session before that commit, not publicly available, and first written down on 2026-09-13. The date it was taken is not recalled.