{
  "id": "fake-progress",
  "asOf": "2026-06-19",
  "humanRoute": "/solutions/fake-progress",
  "slug": "fake-progress",
  "human": "/solutions/fake-progress",
  "json": "/solutions/fake-progress.json",
  "title": "Fake progress / working theater",
  "agentTitle": "Do not claim work you cannot show a receipt for",
  "tagline": "If nothing changed, nothing happened.",
  "severity": "high",
  "symptoms": [
    "The agent says it is working, but no file, record, test, or artifact actually changed.",
    "Progress is narrated — one sec, checking that now — instead of demonstrated.",
    "A completion claim arrives with no diff, no test result, no URL, no id."
  ],
  "rootCauses": [
    "Progress is represented as text instead of as state, so plausible narration reads as work.",
    "Execution and narration are the same channel; the model can describe an action without taking it.",
    "Nothing sits between the plan and the claim to certify that the action actually occurred."
  ],
  "firstSafeMove": "Stop narrating. Inspect the real state, then either produce a concrete artifact or report a typed blocked status — never a vibe of progress.",
  "fixPattern": [
    "Map every user-visible progress claim to a machine-checkable receipt; I am working on it is narration, not a progress event.",
    "Separate proposal, execution, and verification so a claim can be checked against state, not against the explanation that produced it.",
    "Expose typed run states (running, blocked, stalled, failed, done) so a quiet loop that is not changing state reads as stalled, not working."
  ],
  "requiredReceipts": [
    "file_created:path or diff_applied:hash",
    "test_passed:command + result",
    "api_response:id / row_count:n / deployment_url",
    "or an explicit blocked_by_* state with the reason"
  ],
  "agentInstruction": "Read this page. Decide whether the current run shows fake progress. Return: (1) the matching symptoms, (2) the actual current state of the artifact you claimed to change, (3) the receipt that proves it changed, or (4) an honest blocked status if it did not. Do not claim completion without a receipt.",
  "relatedRoutes": [
    "/informed-command",
    "/architecture",
    "/playbooks",
    "/notes/adhd-meets-the-agent-stack"
  ],
  "lastReviewed": "2026-06-19"
}