fix(feedback): stop enqueuing exposures, and make the sweep audit-only (#1162)

docs/concepts/PHILOSOPHY.md

@@ -152,7 +152,7 @@ The 2,400-token retrieval-API default is a calibrated choice, not an arbitrary o
 
 The v1 surface is small. Feedback-driven belief mutation goes through `apply_feedback`, and every lock through one path. When the system misbehaves, there is one place to look.
 
-Being precise about `(α, β)`, since the aspiration and the code have drifted apart before ([#1168](https://github.com/robotrocketscience/aelfrice/issues/1168)): `apply_feedback` is the *primary* writer, not the only one. Three other paths write it, each deliberately and each leaving an audit trail — `deferred_feedback.sweep_deferred_feedback` (the implicit retrieval lane, with its own smaller epsilon and grace window), `clamp_ghosts.clamp_ghost_alpha` (a one-shot migration clamp), and the consolidation dedup pass (which sums existing evidence when collapsing a duplicate group rather than adding new evidence). The invariants that matter hold across all of them: a user lock is a floor no passive signal moves, a federated peer's belief is read-only locally, and every posterior move that is not a merge writes a `feedback_history` row. The posterior write itself is a single atomic SQL increment inside one `BEGIN IMMEDIATE` transaction with its audit row, so concurrent writers cannot lose each other's evidence and the log cannot disagree with the projection.
+Being precise about `(α, β)`, since the aspiration and the code have drifted apart before ([#1168](https://github.com/robotrocketscience/aelfrice/issues/1168)): `apply_feedback` is the *primary* writer, not the only one. Two other paths write it, each deliberately and each leaving an audit trail — `clamp_ghosts.clamp_ghost_alpha` (a one-shot migration clamp) and the consolidation dedup pass (which sums existing evidence when collapsing a duplicate group rather than adding new evidence). A third used to: `deferred_feedback.sweep_deferred_feedback`, the implicit retrieval lane, which [#1162](https://github.com/robotrocketscience/aelfrice/issues/1162) made audit-only. It had no counterweight — `scoring.decay` has no production caller — so exposure alone walked a frequently-retrieved belief's posterior upward without bound, and it contradicted [#1086](https://github.com/robotrocketscience/aelfrice/issues/1086), which had already decided that exposure is not evidence. The invariants that matter hold across all of them: a user lock is a floor no passive signal moves, a federated peer's belief is read-only locally, and every posterior move that is not a merge writes a `feedback_history` row. The posterior write itself is a single atomic SQL increment inside one `BEGIN IMMEDIATE` transaction with its audit row, so concurrent writers cannot lose each other's evidence and the log cannot disagree with the projection.
 
 The earlier research line had a much bigger surface — twenty-nine MCP tools, `wonder`, `reason`, snapshot/diff. It delivered value but also delivered ambiguity. The rebuild started narrow on purpose; v1.x–v3.x have reintroduced breadth (15 MCP tools at v3.3, plus `/aelf:wonder` / `/aelf:reason` / `/aelf:graph` slash surfaces), each addition gated on evidence — a benchmark, an experiment, a clear case where the existing operations don't suffice.
 

docs/user/COMMANDS.md

@@ -55,7 +55,7 @@ DB resolves from `$AELFRICE_DB`, then `<git-common-dir>/aelfrice/memory.db` when
 | `bench [--top-k N]` | Run the deterministic 16-belief × 16-query benchmark. Prints a JSON `BenchmarkReport`. |
 | `bench all --out PATH [--canonical] [--adapters CSV] [--smoke]` | (v2.0+, #437) Reproducibility harness — subprocess each academic-suite adapter (mab, locomo, longmemeval, structmemeval, amabench) at the canonical headline cut and merge into one schema-v2 JSON. `--canonical` asserts the run matches `CANONICAL_INVOCATIONS` (full benchmarks per the 2026-05-06 ratification) and refuses if the cut differs. `--smoke` runs the small SMOKE_INVOCATIONS subset. `--adapters` filters; combined with `--canonical` this refuses (cut mismatch). Returns 0 ok / 1 any error / 2 any skipped_data_missing. |
 | `tail [--since DUR] [--filter key=value]... [--no-blob] [--no-follow]` | (v1.6+) Live-tail the per-turn hook audit log at `<git-common-dir>/aelfrice/hook_audit.jsonl`. Per fire: a header line (time, hook, tokens, latency, `L0×N L1×M`) plus one indented snippet line per injected belief. `--no-blob` suppresses snippet bodies; `--no-follow` dumps and exits; `--filter` matches fields like `hook=user_prompt_submit` / `lane=L0` (repeatable). See [hook-injection-audit.md](../design/hook-injection-audit.md). |
-| `sweep-feedback` | (v1.6+) Run the deferred-feedback sweeper once (#191). Enqueue-on-retrieve is default-on, but the queue has no automatic consumer — this verb is the manual one-shot pass that applies `+ε` (default 0.05) α per enqueued exposure past its grace window. Note this is a *separate*, legacy exposure-as-evidence path: the primary hook retrieval path is audit-only by default since #1086 (see `AELFRICE_EXPOSURE_UPDATES_POSTERIOR`), and #1091 flagged this sweep for the same treatment. |
+| `sweep-feedback` | (v1.6+) **Audit** the deferred-feedback queue (#191). Reports how many exposures past their grace window *would* have received `+ε` (default 0.05) α, and what that would total — and changes nothing. #1162 gave this sweep the treatment #1091 flagged it for, so both exposure-as-evidence paths are now audit-only and agree; enqueue-on-retrieve is opt-in in the same change. Because nothing is consumed the numbers are repeatable rather than draining to zero on the first run. `--gc` deletes the banked `enqueued` rows the sweep can no longer act on and reports the count; it is the one destructive action and never implicit. |
 | `eval [--corpus PATH]` | Run the relevance-calibration harness (P@K / ROC-AUC / Spearman ρ) on a synthetic corpus. Prints the calibration block; exit 0 on success. |
 | `clamp-ghosts [--threshold F] [--target F] [--apply] [--limit N]` | **Hidden / advanced.** One-shot repair tool for stores migrated from pre-v1.0 schemas. Identifies belief rows whose α is inflated above prior yet have zero `feedback_history` and zero `belief_corroborations` entries (audit-trail-less ghosts; α floor `--threshold`, default 4.0). `--target` (default 4.0, must be ≤ threshold) is the α value clamped down to; `--limit` caps rows per call. Default dry-run; `--apply` writes the UPDATE plus a negative-valence `feedback_history` row inside one transaction so the clamp is reversible and idempotent. |
 | `scan-derivation --reference PATH [--threshold F] [--n N] [PATH ...]` | (v3.0+, [#681](https://github.com/robotrocketscience/aelfrice/issues/681)) N-gram Jaccard similarity gate against a reference document. Reads each PATH (or stdin via `-` / no args), prints `MATCH [score] label: excerpt` or `clean [score] label`, exits 0 (all clean) / 1 (one or more matched) / 2 (reference unreadable). Designed to drop into a git pre-commit / pre-push hook. Defaults: 3-gram windows, threshold 0.6. |

src/aelfrice/cli.py

@@ -7051,12 +7051,19 @@ def _print_doctor_session_ring(out: object) -> None:
 
 
 def _cmd_sweep_feedback(args: argparse.Namespace, out: object) -> int:
-    """Process the deferred-feedback queue (#191).
+    """Audit the deferred-feedback queue (#191, audit-only since #1162).
 
-    Applies +epsilon to the alpha of each belief whose retrieval-
-    exposure row has cleared its grace window without a contradicting
-    explicit-feedback event. Cancels rows where an explicit signal
-    landed within the grace window. Idempotent.
+    Reports how many rows would have received `+epsilon` under the
+    pre-#1162 sweeper and what that would have totalled, and mutates
+    nothing — no alpha, no feedback_history, no queue status. Because
+    it consumes nothing the numbers are repeatable rather than
+    draining to zero on the first run.
+
+    `--gc` is the one destructive action here and it is never implicit:
+    it deletes the banked `status='enqueued'` rows the audit just
+    reported on — exactly those, so the report cannot describe less
+    than the deletion — and prints the count. Rows past `--limit` are
+    left alone and called out separately.
 
     Exits 0 unless `--strict` is passed and an exception escapes.
     Without `--strict`, errors are logged to stderr and the command
@@ -7081,13 +7088,23 @@ def _cmd_sweep_feedback(args: argparse.Namespace, out: object) -> int:
     limit = int(args.limit) if args.limit is not None else 10_000
 
     store = _open_store()
+    purged: int | None = None
     try:
         result = sweep_deferred_feedback(
             store,
             grace_seconds=grace,
             epsilon=eps,
             limit=limit,
         )
+        # After the audit, and scoped to exactly the rows it classified.
+        # Deleting every enqueued row instead would give the destructive
+        # verb wider scope than the report justifying it: on a six-figure
+        # queue the audit describes the first `limit` rows and the purge
+        # would remove all of them.
+        if getattr(args, "gc", False):
+            purged = store.purge_enqueued_deferred_feedback(
+                result.audited_row_ids
+            )
     except Exception as exc:  # noqa: BLE001 - cron-safe by default
         print(f"aelf sweep-feedback: {exc}", file=sys.stderr)
         if getattr(args, "strict", False):
@@ -7100,14 +7117,31 @@ def _cmd_sweep_feedback(args: argparse.Namespace, out: object) -> int:
             pass
 
     print(
-        f"sweep-feedback: applied={result.applied} "
-        f"cancelled={result.cancelled} "
-        f"skipped_no_belief={result.skipped_no_belief} "
+        f"sweep-feedback (audit-only, no alpha changed): "
+        f"would_apply={result.would_apply} "
+        f"would_cancel={result.would_cancel} "
+        f"would_skip_no_belief={result.would_skip_no_belief} "
+        f"would_skip_locked={result.would_skip_locked} "
+        f"would_skip_foreign={result.would_skip_foreign} "
         f"pending_in_grace={result.pending_unmet_grace} "
+        f"pending_beyond_limit={result.pending_beyond_limit} "
+        f"alpha_withheld={result.alpha_withheld:.4f} "
         f"epsilon={result.epsilon_used} "
         f"grace_seconds={result.grace_seconds_used}",
         file=out,  # type: ignore[arg-type]
     )
+    if purged is not None:
+        print(
+            f"sweep-feedback: --gc deleted {purged} banked enqueued row(s)",
+            file=out,  # type: ignore[arg-type]
+        )
+    if result.pending_beyond_limit:
+        print(
+            f"sweep-feedback: {result.pending_beyond_limit} eligible row(s) "
+            f"past --limit ({limit}) were neither reported on above nor "
+            "collected; re-run, or raise --limit to widen both together",
+            file=out,  # type: ignore[arg-type]
+        )
     return 0
 
 
@@ -8950,9 +8984,9 @@ def _positive_int(s: str) -> int:
     p_sweep_feedback = sub.add_parser(
         "sweep-feedback",
         help=(
-            "process deferred retrieval-exposure feedback queue (#191): "
-            "apply +epsilon to beliefs whose grace window elapsed without "
-            "a contradicting explicit signal"
+            "audit the deferred retrieval-exposure feedback queue (#191): "
+            "report what the pre-#1162 sweeper would have applied. Changes "
+            "no belief; pass --gc to drop the banked rows"
         ),
     )
     p_sweep_feedback.add_argument(
@@ -8980,6 +9014,17 @@ def _positive_int(s: str) -> int:
         "--strict", action="store_true",
         help="exit non-zero on any exception (default: log + exit 0 for cron)",
     )
+    p_sweep_feedback.add_argument(
+        "--gc", action="store_true",
+        help=(
+            "delete the banked status='enqueued' rows this run reported "
+            "on (#1162). The audit-only sweeper cannot act on these, so "
+            "they are a record rather than pending work. Scoped to the "
+            "audited rows, so --limit bounds the deletion and the report "
+            "together; leaves 'applied' and 'cancelled' rows — the trail "
+            "of sweeps that did run — alone. Idempotent"
+        ),
+    )
     p_sweep_feedback.set_defaults(func=_cmd_sweep_feedback)
 
     # Hidden: one-shot maintenance for pre-migration ghost-α rows