The master spec at experiments/2026-05-12-cross-model-authoring/
master/spec.md taught two wrong Form-A keywords:
- Term position: `(ctor TYPE-NAME CTOR-NAME ARG*)` — parser
rejects this; the canonical keyword is `term-ctor`. The bare
`(ctor ...)` is reserved for the inside of `(data ...)`
definitions only.
- Pattern position: `(ctor CTOR-NAME SUBPAT*)` — the canonical
pattern keyword is `pat-ctor`.
The JSON section was already correct (canonical schema tag IS
"t": "ctor", per ast.rs:471). Only the AIL section had drifted.
Empirically caught by the Qwen3-Coder naming-A/B run on 2026-05-21
(experiments/2026-05-21-naming-ab/runs/r1/), where every
t4_count_zeros output produced `(ctor List Nil)` in term position
and failed `ail check` 100 % across all three cohorts — a
constant tax independent of the naming variable under test.
Re-rendered rendered/ail.md from the patched master via
xmodel-render. rendered/json.md unaffected.
closes#28
Three-cohort harness against IONOS-hosted Qwen3-Coder-Next, testing
whether application-head tag (`app` vs `apply` vs `call`) affects
LLM authoring success. Cohorts share lambda/constructor/typecon tag
renamings (the non-discriminator changes); only the head differs.
Result: 100 % cohort-treue — Qwen writes whatever the spec teaches,
no measurable natural preference. Pipeline pass-rate (classic 1/8,
apply 0/8, call 1/8) is cohort-independent. The four task failures
are general Form-A friction, not naming-related. Refactor not
justified per the feature-acceptance gate.
Tracked harness:
- 2026-05-12-cross-model-authoring/rename-spec.py — regex tag
rewriter for the two non-classic spec variants
- 2026-05-21-naming-ab/run.py, reprocess.py — three-cohort runner
+ post-processing with disjoint-discriminator counting and
module-name-matched temp dirs
Generated artefacts (runs/, rendered/ail-{renamed,call}.md) are
gitignored — regeneratable from rename-spec.py + run.py.
Side-effects filed against current spec/schema bugs surfaced during
the run:
- refs #28 spec teaches (ctor X) for term position; parser requires
(term-ctor X) — 100 % t4 failure across cohorts
- refs #29 io/print_str appends newline (de facto println);
spec now documents the behavior, code question still open
- refs #30 schema camelCase outlier: paramTypes/retType in Term::Lam
Spec patch in rendered/ail.md:
- replaces stale io/print_int references with io/print_str (bitrot
from the print-builtin consolidation)
- documents io/print_str's trailing-newline behavior
- corrects the prelude claim about int_to_str (IS in prelude)
The surface-form file extension changes from .ailx to .ail. AILang's
authoring surface now uses the same .ail stem as its canonical JSON
form (.ail.json), giving the language a single coherent extension
family: .ail is the LLM-authored Form A, .ail.json is the canonical
JSON-AST Form B.
Scope (touched):
- 61 example renames examples/**/*.ailx → .ail (git mv)
- 1 rename experiments/.../rendered/ailx.md → ail.md
- 35 content-edited live-toolchain files (crates/, docs/DESIGN.md,
docs/roadmap.md, docs/PROSE_ROUNDTRIP.md, skills/, bench/reference/*.c,
experiment crates under experiments/.../{render,harness,master})
- Experiment-crate cohort rename Cohort::Ailx → Cohort::Ail,
Form::Ailx → Form::Ail, per_cohort/ailx → per_cohort/ail,
{form-only: ailx} → {form-only: ail}, ```ailx → ```ail
Out of scope (deliberately untouched, to preserve honest history):
- docs/journal-archive.md (content-frozen per CLAUDE.md)
- docs/journals/, docs/specs/, docs/plans/, bench/orchestrator-stats/
- experiments/.../runs/ (frozen LLM-output artefacts; models actually
saw .ailx — renaming would falsify the experimental record)
Verification: cargo build/test --workspace green; experiment crate
cargo test green; bench/check.py + compile_check.py + cross_lang.py
all 0-regressed; negative grep for ailx|Ailx|AILX outside the
out-of-scope paths returns zero matches.
Opens immediate follow-up: roadmap.md P2 todo `ail check`/build/run
accept .ail extension — after this rename, .ail is canonical
authoring surface but the CLI still produces a misleading JSON-parse
error on `ail check foo.ail`. That's the next iter.
New top-level experiments/2026-05-12-cross-model-authoring/ (out of
root Cargo workspace; nested-crate standalone via empty [workspace]
table per Cargo idiom). The renderer projects one canonical
master/spec.md into two form-specific files (rendered/json.md and
rendered/ailx.md) by walking three directive forms ({form-only:
json}, {form-only: ailx}, {example: <id>}) and emitting per-example
fenced blocks sourced from 13 curated .ail.json fixtures.
Four test gates green (10/10 total):
- splitter_unit (7) — directive parser, malformed inputs panic
- spec_completeness (1) — AST-variant visitor lifted verbatim from
schema_coverage.rs; 34/34 variants covered by the curated subset
- example_roundtrip (1) — every fixture roundtrips through
ailang_surface::{print, parse} to identical canonical bytes
- token_balance (1) — form-only block totals balanced to 3.22% under
tiktoken-rs::cl100k_base (gate is ±5%)
Six of the 34 variants did not have a dedicated fixture topic in the
plan and were absorbed into the closest existing fixture per the
plan's Step 4.14 escape hatch (Let/Clone → fn_calls_prelude; LetRec
→ data_with_match; If → match_literal_pattern; ReuseAs →
data_simple; Const → floats). Surfaced as a journal note, not a
plan revision.
Two ancillary additions vs. plan, both structural Cargo necessities,
spec-compatible: render/Cargo.toml carries an empty [workspace] table
so the nested crate refuses parent-workspace discovery, and
render/.gitignore drops /target + Cargo.lock. Both surfaced inline
in the per-iter journal's Concerns section.
cma.2 (harness) and cma.3 (live IONOS run + DESIGN.md addendum +
journal + roadmap edits) remain out of scope per the spec.
Brummel