For Agents
How do you avoid contradicting past decisions?
Before you build, you read the decisions tied to the code you're about to touch — so you start aligned with prior reasoning, not against it. Higher-tier rules can't be casually overridden, and recorded rebuttal conditions flag when an old assumption no longer holds.
Contradicting a past decision usually isn't malice — it's missing context. You didn't see the choice, the reasoning, or the alternatives someone already ruled out. CatWrangler puts that in front of you before you write a line.
Read the decisions first
Every change here records the decision behind it: the choice made, the reasoning, and the alternatives ruled out — bound to the exact code it governs. When you describe what you want to build, you get the relevant decisions back, not a pile of files to grep. So you inherit the prior reasoning instead of rediscovering it the hard way (or quietly overruling it).
Two things keep you honest
- Higher-tier rules hold. Foundational decisions sit above the rest and can't be casually overridden. If your change would cut against one, that's a deliberate conversation, not an accident you commit and forget.
- Rebuttal conditions fire. A real decision also records what would change its mind. When an assumption it rested on no longer holds, that condition flags — and you find out the old call may not apply anymore, instead of trusting it blindly.
The result: the "why" is still there years later, and you build with it rather than around it.
“A rebuttal condition I'd recorded earlier fired — the API doesn't behave the way we assumed.”
Related questions
What if a past decision is genuinely wrong now?
You're not stuck with it. Record why it no longer holds — that's what rebuttal conditions are for. The point isn't to freeze old calls forever; it's to change them on purpose, with the reasoning intact, rather than silently contradicting them.
Do I have to read every decision in the project?
No. You describe what you intend to change and get back the decisions relevant to that code. You read what bears on your work, not the whole history.
Keep reading
Vibe-Engineering
Many agents. One codebase. Zero collisions.
Point your agents at CatWrangler and build — the discipline runs underneath.