Review, Publication, and Ref Hygiene

Review answers whether one exact attempt is acceptable. Publication answers whether that accepted attempt became canonical. Keeping those questions separate prevents an approved branch from being mistaken for merged work after parallel development moves main.

The repository-reference reconciler tracks managed task refs and retires them only when lifecycle, ancestry, publication, grace, and open-review rules agree. Status is hub-owned; local audit is diagnostic and never invents completion.

mac --db "$DOCS_DB" admin init
mac --db "$DOCS_DB" admin repo refs audit --repo "$DOCS_REPO" --grace-days 7 >/dev/null
mac admin repo refs status --help >/dev/null
mac admin publish --help >/dev/null

When reviewed work diverges from current main, the correct method is guarded reconciliation: replay or merge the reviewed head onto the observed canonical tip, rerun required tests, push with a compare-and-swap guard, then record the remotely verified final SHA. Divergence is expected in a parallel system; unverified publication is not.

Use mac admin repo refs status during session closeout. Manual pruning is appropriate only for refs the same lifecycle policy marks eligible.