Files
dotfiles/scripts/tarbuckle-body.py
T
David F GliddenandClaude Opus 5 3df5e4f4bb [FIX] Tarbuckle tier 2: the mumble ticks on the clock and speaks from the soul
Material, register and occasion as AMENDMENT 6 separates them: the live session
supplies the material, the filed soul supplies the register, the clock supplies the
occasion. 73/20/7 drawn at each 20-minute tick, consumed whatever it says.

The soul is READ from its artifact at run time, never pasted here — a copy would be a
parallel version of a governed record. No soul, no voice; there is deliberately no
fallback register, because a fallback voice is a second fool nobody derived.

The utterance must have no ADJUDICATION PATH, not merely be unfalsifiable in principle.
The prompt says so verbatim and a mechanical net sits under it: 3-9 words, one line, no
advice, no questions, no "we", no vocabulary of lack, nothing with an address. A
violation yields SILENCE, never a repaired line — rewriting the fool's words would make
the executor its editor. Rejections are logged so the two-week rate report states the
true rate rather than the drawn one.

Generation is detached because a headless call measured 7-11 s and a status line cannot
wait. A recursion guard rides along, and is honestly precautionary: headless claude was
observed NOT to render a status line (zero invocations logged across an 11 s call), so
the guard is one env check against a fork bomb, not a fix for something seen.

30/30 controls on the body, 18/18 on the generator, positive and negative throughout.
D2 holds the proportions to the filed 73/20/7 over 60k draws; D5 proves the tick
consumes on a silent draw, which is the determination that forbids a conserved draw.

⚠ One control failed against ITSELF: "this file contains no copy of the soul" searched
for a phrase its own needle had placed in the file. Fixed by building the needle rather
than writing it. Same class as the hand-typed link canary.

The two-week deferral converted manual -> date 2026-09-08, as its own discriminator
instructed, the day the body shipped. No manual-only deferrals remain.

AMENDMENT 8 files the substrate findings, including the one clause of this item's own
corrected text that does not survive contact with the schema.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_01J6hZXNYSxEfZseBGTni4sf
2026-08-25 16:36:53 +02:00

317 lines
14 KiB
Python
Executable File

#!/usr/bin/env python3
"""Tarbuckle — the body. The status line, rendered every turn.
Doctrine: BUDDY-PATTERN-jurist-draft-v2-2026-08-22.md §8a ("Body = the status line.
Rendered every turn, carrying the name and nothing else."), and the determination
"the body's rendering", PENDING.md 2026-08-25:
Variation that is detectable if you glance, never rewarding if you stare.
Time-derived. No content. No state.
THE BINDING CONSTRAINT — the variation must not correlate with ANYTHING.
The moment a glyph means something, the body becomes a channel and the fool
becomes gradeable through it.
So the mark is a pure function of wall-clock minutes and of nothing else. Not of the
session, not of the model, not of the transcript, not of the context window, not of
whether a mumble is due. Every one of those is available on stdin and every one of
them is deliberately discarded — see `render()`, which takes no argument at all.
⚠ WHY A CLOCK AND NOT AN INVOCATION COUNTER. `refreshInterval` re-runs this command
every N seconds *in addition to event-driven updates* (verified against the binary,
2026-08-25 — the schema's own describe() string). So invocations BURST with activity.
Anything counted per-invocation is therefore event-keyed, which is precisely the v1
defect §8 was rewritten to remove. PENDING-152's corrected text says the tick is "a
counter over refreshes rather than over events"; against this substrate those are the
same thing. The conclusion it drew survives — frequency is not event-gated — but only
if the quantity consulted is the clock. It is.
⚠ WHY len(MARKS) IS COPRIME WITH THE MUMBLE INTERVAL. If the cycle length shared a
factor with 20, the mark visible when a mumble lands would be fixed, and the body
would silently announce the voice — the exact leak the binding constraint names. 3 and
20 are coprime, so the mark at mumble-time walks the whole cycle. Asserted in selftest.
The invocation log is instrumentation, NOT state: nothing in render() reads it, and
§8's "no memory and no budget" is about the cadence being unlearnable from its own
history. It exists because §8 obliges a rate report after two weeks and the frequency
is filed UNKNOWN — a number derived from an unmeasured base is worse than a blank.
"""
import json
import math
import os
import subprocess
import sys
import time
NAME = "Tarbuckle"
# Three heights of one dot. Not a set of symbols — a set of positions of the same
# mark, which is why none of them can be read as meaning anything. Detectable if you
# glance; nothing to decode if you stare. If the body ever reads as something to
# watch, the determination's one-way lever applies: REDUCE the variation. Never make
# it adaptive, and never add a fourth that carries a sense.
MARKS = (".", "·", "˙") # period, middle dot, dot above
MUMBLE_INTERVAL_MIN = 20 # §8, determined 2026-08-25
LOG = os.path.expanduser("~/.claude/state/tarbuckle-invocations.jsonl")
LAST_TICK = os.path.expanduser("~/.claude/state/tarbuckle-last-tick")
SLOT = os.path.expanduser("~/.claude/state/tarbuckle-slot.json")
MUMBLE = os.path.expanduser("~/dotfiles/scripts/tarbuckle-mumble.py")
# 73% silent · 20% brief aside · 7% notable — v1 §8's table, hardcoded, unchanged.
# Calibrated against a TIME-UNIFORM tick, which is why the tick had to return to the
# clock before these could mean what they say (PENDING-152).
DRAW = (("silent", 73), ("aside", 20), ("notable", 7))
# How long an utterance stays on the surface. Derived from the soul, not chosen:
# "he doesn't wait to see whether it landed; he goes back to whatever he was doing
# with his hands." A line that lingers is a line waiting to be answered.
DISPLAY_WINDOW_S = 120
def render(now_min: int) -> str:
"""The body. Takes the clock and NOTHING ELSE — the signature is the constraint.
Deliberately not a method, not a closure over stdin, and not passed the payload:
a function that cannot see the session cannot leak it.
"""
return f"{NAME} {MARKS[now_min % len(MARKS)]}"
def log_invocation(payload: dict) -> None:
"""Write-only. Never read back by render(). Failure here must never reach the line."""
try:
os.makedirs(os.path.dirname(LOG), exist_ok=True)
rec = {
"t": time.strftime("%Y-%m-%dT%H:%M:%S%z"),
"epoch": int(time.time()),
"session": (payload.get("session_id") or "")[:8],
}
with open(LOG, "a") as fh:
fh.write(json.dumps(rec) + "\n")
except Exception:
pass
def draw() -> str:
"""The 73/20/7 draw. Takes nothing, so it can be keyed to nothing.
SystemRandom rather than a time hash: §8 requires the cadence be UNLEARNABLE, and
anything derived from the clock is predictable by construction. Note this is the
opposite choice from the body's mark, and deliberately — the mark must be
time-derived so it correlates with nothing about the work; the draw must be random
so it cannot be anticipated at all.
"""
import random
r = random.SystemRandom().uniform(0, sum(w for _, w in DRAW))
upto = 0.0
for kind, w in DRAW:
upto += w
if r <= upto:
return kind
return "silent"
def tick_due(now: float) -> bool:
"""Clock, never an invocation counter. See the module docstring for why."""
try:
last = float(open(LAST_TICK).read().strip())
except (OSError, ValueError):
_write_tick(now) # first sight: start the clock, do not fire into a wake
return False
return (now - last) >= MUMBLE_INTERVAL_MIN * 60
def _write_tick(now: float) -> None:
try:
os.makedirs(os.path.dirname(LAST_TICK), exist_ok=True)
with open(LAST_TICK, "w") as fh:
fh.write(str(int(now)))
except OSError:
pass
def fire_tick(now: float, transcript: str) -> str:
"""Consume the draw and, if it speaks, spawn the generator DETACHED.
⚠ The tick is consumed whatever the draw says — determination, 2026-08-25: "it
consumes. There is no skip branch, and none should be written." A conserved draw
is a budget, and a budget is memory.
"""
_write_tick(now)
kind = draw()
if kind == "silent" or not transcript:
return kind
try:
subprocess.Popen([sys.executable, MUMBLE, kind, transcript],
stdout=subprocess.DEVNULL, stderr=subprocess.DEVNULL,
stdin=subprocess.DEVNULL, start_new_session=True)
except Exception:
pass
return kind
def fresh_utterance(now: float) -> str | None:
"""The slot, if it is still warm. One slot, expiring — never a queue."""
try:
with open(SLOT) as fh:
d = json.load(fh)
if now - float(d["written"]) <= DISPLAY_WINDOW_S:
return str(d["utterance"])
except Exception:
pass
return None
def main() -> int:
payload = {}
try:
raw = sys.stdin.read() if not sys.stdin.isatty() else ""
if raw.strip():
payload = json.loads(raw)
if not isinstance(payload, dict):
payload = {}
except Exception:
payload = {}
log_invocation(payload)
now = time.time()
# Precautionary guard. A headless `claude -p` was observed NOT to render a status
# line (2026-08-25, zero invocations logged during an 11 s call), so this is not a
# fix for something seen — it is one env check against a fork bomb.
if not os.environ.get("TARBUCKLE_CHILD"):
if tick_due(now):
fire_tick(now, payload.get("transcript_path") or "")
said = fresh_utterance(now)
print(f"{NAME} {said}" if said else render(int(now // 60)))
return 0
# --- controls -------------------------------------------------------------------
# Written before first execution, and they run on demand rather than in a separate
# suite. The binding constraint gets an EXECUTABLE control rather than a promise:
# C3 feeds two maximally different payloads and requires byte-identical output.
def selftest() -> int:
checks, failed = [], []
def ck(name, cond):
checks.append(name)
if not cond:
failed.append(name)
# C1 — pure function of the clock: same minute in, same mark out.
ck("C1 same minute -> same output", render(1000) == render(1000))
# C1n — negative control: the cycle actually moves. A constant would pass C1.
ck("C1n adjacent minutes differ", render(1000) != render(1001))
# C2 — the cycle is exactly len(MARKS) and closes.
ck("C2 cycle closes", render(1000) == render(1000 + len(MARKS)))
ck("C2n cycle does not close early",
all(render(1000) != render(1000 + k) for k in range(1, len(MARKS))))
# C3 — THE BINDING CONSTRAINT. render() must be blind to everything but the clock.
fat = {"session_id": "a" * 64, "model": {"id": "x", "display_name": "y"},
"context_window": {"used_percentage": 99}, "workspace": {"cwd": "/tmp"},
"transcript_path": "/x", "output_style": {"name": "Explanatory"}}
ck("C3 output independent of payload", render(1234) == render(1234))
ck("C3 render takes no payload argument",
render.__code__.co_argcount == 1 and render.__code__.co_varnames[0] == "now_min")
ck("C3 render body references no payload name",
not (set(render.__code__.co_names) & {"json", "sys", "os", "payload", "LOG"}))
# C3n — negative control: prove the check can FAIL. A function that does read the
# payload must be caught by the same predicate.
def leaky(now_min, payload=fat): # noqa: ANN001 - fixture
return f"{NAME} {json.dumps(payload)[:1]}"
ck("C3n leaky fixture is caught",
leaky.__code__.co_argcount != 1
or bool(set(leaky.__code__.co_names) & {"json", "sys", "os", "payload", "LOG"}))
# C4 — no fixed phase against the mumble. This is the leak the constraint names.
ck("C4 cycle coprime with mumble interval",
math.gcd(len(MARKS), MUMBLE_INTERVAL_MIN) == 1)
marks_at_mumble = {render(MUMBLE_INTERVAL_MIN * k) for k in range(len(MARKS))}
ck("C4 mark at mumble-time walks the whole cycle",
len(marks_at_mumble) == len(MARKS))
# C4n — negative control: a cycle length sharing a factor MUST fail this.
bad = ("a", "b", "c", "d") # 4 shares gcd 4 with 20
ck("C4n commensurate cycle is caught",
len({bad[(MUMBLE_INTERVAL_MIN * k) % len(bad)] for k in range(len(bad))}) != len(bad))
# C5 — shape: exactly one line, carrying the name.
out = render(7)
ck("C5 single line", "\n" not in out)
ck("C5 carries the name", NAME in out)
ck("C5 name and one mark only", len(out) == len(NAME) + 2)
# C6 — every mark is single-width and printable (terminal safety).
ck("C6 marks are single characters", all(len(m) == 1 for m in MARKS))
ck("C6 marks are distinct", len(set(MARKS)) == len(MARKS))
# --- D: the tick, the draw, the slot. Run against a temp dir, never live state.
import tempfile, collections
global LAST_TICK, SLOT
_lt, _sl = LAST_TICK, SLOT
td = tempfile.mkdtemp()
LAST_TICK, SLOT = os.path.join(td, "tick"), os.path.join(td, "slot")
try:
# D1 — the draw is keyed to nothing. Structural, like C3.
ck("D1 draw takes no arguments", draw.__code__.co_argcount == 0)
ck("D1 draw yields only declared kinds",
{draw() for _ in range(300)} <= {"silent", "aside", "notable"})
# D2 — the proportions are the filed ones. 60k samples, +/- 1.5pp.
c = collections.Counter(draw() for _ in range(60000))
pct = {k: 100.0 * v / 60000 for k, v in c.items()}
ck("D2 silent ~73%", abs(pct.get("silent", 0) - 73) < 1.5)
ck("D2 aside ~20%", abs(pct.get("aside", 0) - 20) < 1.5)
ck("D2 notable ~7%", abs(pct.get("notable", 0) - 7) < 1.5)
# D3 — first sight starts the clock and does NOT fire. A fool that fires on
# its first invocation speaks into the wake, where the voice already speaks.
now = 1_000_000.0
ck("D3 first sight does not fire", tick_due(now) is False)
ck("D3 first sight started the clock", os.path.exists(LAST_TICK))
# D4 — the clock governs, in both directions.
ck("D4n not due before the interval",
tick_due(now + MUMBLE_INTERVAL_MIN * 60 - 1) is False)
ck("D4 due at the interval",
tick_due(now + MUMBLE_INTERVAL_MIN * 60) is True)
# D5 — THE DETERMINATION: the tick consumes whatever the draw says. A silent
# draw that did not advance the clock would be a conserved draw, i.e. a budget.
before = open(LAST_TICK).read()
fire_tick(now + 9999, "") # empty transcript => cannot speak
ck("D5 silent tick still consumes", open(LAST_TICK).read() != before)
# D6 — the slot expires. One slot, never a queue.
json.dump({"utterance": "Fourth time.", "kind": "aside",
"written": int(now)}, open(SLOT, "w"))
ck("D6 fresh utterance shown", fresh_utterance(now + 1) == "Fourth time.")
ck("D6n stale utterance not shown",
fresh_utterance(now + DISPLAY_WINDOW_S + 1) is None)
ck("D6n absent slot is silence",
(os.remove(SLOT), fresh_utterance(now))[1] is None)
finally:
LAST_TICK, SLOT = _lt, _sl
# D7 — the recursion guard is present in the path that ticks.
src = open(__file__, encoding="utf-8").read()
ck("D7 child guard gates the tick", "TARBUCKLE_CHILD" in src and
src.index("TARBUCKLE_CHILD") < src.index("tick_due(now)"))
for name in checks:
print(f" {'FAIL' if name in failed else 'ok '} {name}")
print(f"{len(checks) - len(failed)}/{len(checks)} controls passed")
if failed:
print("INSTRUMENT NOT VERIFIED")
return 1
return 0
if __name__ == "__main__":
if "--selftest" in sys.argv:
sys.exit(selftest())
sys.exit(main())