docs(claude): sharpen CHANGELOG rule — diff between main and ship

Codifies what was already implicit in the existing "Never orphan
branch-internal versions" + "Only document what shipped between main
and this change" sections, but with sharper language and concrete
NEVER examples.

The rule: a CHANGELOG entry is the diff between main and the shipping
branch — what users get when they upgrade. NOT how the branch got
there. Branch-internal version bumps, mid-branch bug fixes, plan
review outcomes, and patch narratives all belong in PR descriptions
and commit messages, not in CHANGELOG.

Adds explicit examples of phrasing to NEVER use:
  - "v1.X had a bug that v1.Y fixes" (mentions a branch-internal version)
  - "The shipping headline of v1.X was broken because..." (apologizes
    for never-released state)
  - "Pre-fix tests encoded the broken behavior" (contributor's victory
    lap, not user benefit)
  - "Two surgical edits, both in the dispatch path" (micro-narrative
    of the patch)

The constructive replacement: describe the released system as a
property, not as a fix. "Browser-skills run end-to-end with the
expected tab-access semantics." If a property is worth calling out,
document it in the trust-model section, not as a "we fixed X" callout.

Pairs with feedback_no_shame_changelog and
feedback_changelog_harden_against_critics memories — entries should
read as a flex even to a hostile screenshotter, never admit prior
breakage.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 4.7 (1M context) <noreply@anthropic.com>
This commit is contained in:
Garry Tan
2026-04-28 17:09:18 -07:00
parent a69a517edd
commit a95c39eea5
+25
View File
@@ -489,6 +489,31 @@ MINOR again on top (e.g., main at v1.14.0.0, your branch lands v1.15.0.0).
own version bump and CHANGELOG entry. The entry describes what THIS branch adds —
not what was already on main.
**The CHANGELOG entry is the diff between main and the shipping branch — what users
get when they upgrade. NOT how the branch got there.** A reader landing on the entry
should learn what they can do now that they couldn't before; they should not learn
about the branch's internal version bumps, the bugs we caught and fixed mid-branch,
the plan reviews we ran, or the commits we squashed. That is branch development
narrative. It belongs in PR descriptions and commit messages, not CHANGELOG.
**Never reference branch-internal versions in a CHANGELOG entry.** If your branch
bumped VERSION from v1.5.0.0 → v1.5.1.0 → v1.6.0.0 during development and only the
final v1.6.0.0 ships to main, the entry must read as if v1.5.1.0 never existed.
Concretely, NEVER write:
- "v1.5.1.0 had a bug that v1.6.0.0 fixes" — readers don't know about v1.5.1.0; it's
a branch-internal artifact.
- "The shipping headline of v1.5.1.0 was broken because..." — same reason. From main's
perspective, v1.5.1.0 was never released.
- "Pre-fix tests encoded the broken behavior" — that's a contributor's victory lap,
not a user benefit.
- "Two surgical edits, both in the dispatch path" — micro-narrative of the patch.
Instead, describe the released system: "Browser-skills run end-to-end with the
expected tab-access semantics." If a property of the shipped system is worth calling
out (e.g., "skill spawns get permissive tab access; pair-agent tunnel tokens require
ownership"), document it as a property, not as a fix. The shipped system is what
the user gets; the path to that system is invisible to them.
**When to write the CHANGELOG entry:**
- At `/ship` time (Step 13), not during development or mid-branch.
- The entry covers ALL commits on this branch vs the base branch.