docs(releases): the 10.4.11 note — hybrid filter-before-hydrate, one shutdown owner, a faster open

Gate: final tip 27759a1b vs a8c5fbf9 (10.4.10) control — collected
3,212, 0 new reds after two fix cycles (coverage-guard registration +
perf-lane classification; a real budget flake in the batch-size test
switched to unvectored items). shasum ffc33df95b2709dfcc8c67ac961991e3153f8883.

.claude/skills/architecture.md

@@ -2,7 +2,7 @@
 
 ## What Is Brainy
 
-@soulcraft/brainy (v7.17.0) is a Universal Knowledge Protocol -- a Triple Intelligence database combining vector search, graph traversal, and metadata filtering in a single library. Published to npm as a public MIT-licensed package.
+@soulcraftlabs/brainy (v7.17.0) is a Universal Knowledge Protocol -- a Triple Intelligence database combining vector search, graph traversal, and metadata filtering in a single library. Published to npm as a public MIT-licensed package.
 
 ## Core Architecture
 

.forgejo/workflows/ci.yml

@@ -5,6 +5,10 @@ name: CI
 # sequential, so tag-triggered matrix jobs (~22 min) would queue AHEAD of the
 # tag's publish-source run and starve every release (observed on 8.10.3 and
 # 9.0.0: the publish sat behind the tag's own redundant CI).
+concurrency:
+  group: ci-${{ github.ref }}
+  cancel-in-progress: true
+
 on:
   push:
     branches: ['**']

.forgejo/workflows/publish-source.yml

@@ -12,6 +12,11 @@ on:
   push:
     tags:
       - 'v*'
+  workflow_dispatch:
+    inputs:
+      ref_reason:
+        description: 'why this manual run (e.g. tag event dropped)'
+        required: false
 
 jobs:
   publish:
@@ -32,7 +37,7 @@ jobs:
         run: |
           set -eo pipefail
 
-          SOURCE_NPM_REG="https://source.soulcraft.com/api/packages/soulcraft/npm/"
+          SOURCE_NPM_REG="https://source.soulcraft.com/api/packages/soulcraftlabs/npm/"
           VERSION="$(node -p "require('./package.json').version")"
           # The dist-tag follows the version: a prerelease (any hyphen —
           # 10.4.0-rc.1) publishes under 'rc' and must NEVER move 'latest' —
@@ -43,13 +48,13 @@ jobs:
           case "$VERSION" in
             *-*) NPM_TAG="rc" ;;
           esac
-          echo "Publishing @soulcraft/brainy@${VERSION} to The Source registry (dist-tag: ${NPM_TAG})..."
+          echo "Publishing @soulcraftlabs/brainy@${VERSION} to The Source registry (dist-tag: ${NPM_TAG})..."
 
           TMPRC="$(mktemp)"
           chmod 600 "$TMPRC"
           {
-            echo "@soulcraft:registry=${SOURCE_NPM_REG}"
-            echo "//source.soulcraft.com/api/packages/soulcraft/npm/:_authToken=${FORGE_NPM_TOKEN}"
+            echo "@soulcraftlabs:registry=${SOURCE_NPM_REG}"
+            echo "//source.soulcraft.com/api/packages/soulcraftlabs/npm/:_authToken=${FORGE_NPM_TOKEN}"
           } > "$TMPRC"
 
           # The release script bumps package.json's version before it tags, so
@@ -64,7 +69,7 @@ jobs:
           # exit code: a benign duplicate publish (a prior run, or a mirror, already
           # landed this exact version) reports failure even though the registry
           # already holds the right content.
-          LANDED_VERSION="$(npm view "@soulcraft/brainy@${VERSION}" version --userconfig "$TMPRC" 2>/dev/null || echo "")"
+          LANDED_VERSION="$(npm view "@soulcraftlabs/brainy@${VERSION}" version --userconfig "$TMPRC" 2>/dev/null || echo "")"
           rm -f "$TMPRC"
 
           if [ "$LANDED_VERSION" != "$VERSION" ]; then
@@ -73,7 +78,7 @@ jobs:
           fi
 
           if [ "$PUBLISH_OK" = true ]; then
-            echo "Published and verified @soulcraft/brainy@${VERSION} on The Source registry."
+            echo "Published and verified @soulcraftlabs/brainy@${VERSION} on The Source registry."
           else
-            echo "::warning::npm publish reported failure, but readback confirms @soulcraft/brainy@${VERSION} is already live on The Source (a prior run or mirror landed it) — treating this run as successful, since the registry content is correct. Any OTHER failure mode would have failed the readback check above instead."
+            echo "::warning::npm publish reported failure, but readback confirms @soulcraftlabs/brainy@${VERSION} is already live on The Source (a prior run or mirror landed it) — treating this run as successful, since the registry content is correct. Any OTHER failure mode would have failed the readback check above instead."
           fi

CHANGELOG.md

@@ -2,12 +2,48 @@
 
 All notable changes to this project will be documented in this file. See [standard-version](https://github.com/conventional-changelog/standard-version) for commit guidelines.
 
-### [10.4.2](https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraft/brainy/compare/v10.4.2-rc.1...v10.4.2) (2026-08-27)
+### [10.4.4](https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraftlabs/open-brainy/compare/v10.4.3...v10.4.4) (2026-08-28)
+
+- fix(vfs): the old-root sweep narrates only when it has something to say (d49148e1)
+- fix(tests): the health-gate pin follows the verdict, and the VFS suite uses its own store (42e2da25)
+- Merge branch 'next/open-lazy-open-and-counts' (5ebd3b40)
+- docs: the contract manifest stands alone; public docs describe this engine only (a8c724a2)
+- docs(releases): 10.4.4 consumer notes — correctness and observability, with the performance line stated exactly (61a46927)
+- docs: measurements in public history carry numbers, not provenance (02c61636)
+- feat(open): name the two steps that hold the vfs-bootstrap phase (2cf38010)
+- fix(storage): a dead flush watch falls back to the 500ms poll, not the 30s sweep (5c22f950)
+- fix(storage): the flush watcher cannot arm twice in its async window (16d2e1a9)
+- perf(idle): the flush-request watch is event-driven; the heartbeat is observability (fb1da1c5)
+- perf(open): answer "are there any entities?" with one directory read (417ddb51)
+- perf(generations): discover generations by directory name, not by walking the log (9dd39921)
+- fix(flush): clear() and repairIndex() set the dirty witness themselves (e4c27fbc)
+- feat(open): the open names the STEP that cost the time, not just the phase (5a091cca)
+- perf(vfs): the old-root sweep runs once per store, not once per open (4a67aa0f)
+- chore: keep the generated neural stamps at main's values (c1f09723)
+- feat(contract): declare contract 1, serve three operators, refuse four by name (48802ba3)
+- fix(open): a provider rebuilding itself is a third state, not a CRITICAL (50676c02)
+- feat(open): open never waits for a provider that is rebuilding itself (131daa08)
+- perf(flush): an idle brain does no work — no periodic flush without a write (f5a6cb3f)
+- feat(repair): repairIndex narrates every phase and its receipt carries the walls (3fffd9c6)
+- fix(storage): a suspect count ledger heals itself, and counts.json is written atomically (f4e2d34b)
+- feat(open): the open narrates itself, on a channel production cannot clamp (afe08a1f)
+- fix(storage): a clean close is recorded, and the writer lock is always given up (e652162c)
+- docs: repository links point at soulcraftlabs/open-brainy — the soulcraft/brainy path becomes the native engine's repo tonight (38c3397b)
+
+
+### [10.4.3](https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraftlabs/open-brainy/compare/v10.4.2...v10.4.3) (2026-08-27)
+
+- Merge branch 'next/open-brainy-rename' (a58372f0)
+- chore: rename to @soulcraftlabs/brainy for Open Brainy on The Source (a99b1e83)
+- docs(releases): 10.4.3 — Open Brainy's first release under the new name, same engine as 10.4.2; The Source is the one registry (9f248b24)
+
+
+### [10.4.2](https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraftlabs/open-brainy/compare/v10.4.2-rc.1...v10.4.2) (2026-08-27)
 
 - docs(releases): 10.4.1 and 10.4.2 consumer notes; 10.4.2 is the last MIT release under this name, Open Brainy continues at @soulcraftlabs/brainy (a082e0ef)
 
 
-### [10.4.2-rc.1](https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraft/brainy/compare/v10.4.1...v10.4.2-rc.1) (2026-08-27)
+### [10.4.2-rc.1](https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraftlabs/open-brainy/compare/v10.4.1...v10.4.2-rc.1) (2026-08-27)
 
 - Merge branch 'next/zero-norm-unvector-door' (9b84ef5b)
 - fix(vectors): a zero-norm vector is not a vector, canonical side included, plus the sanctioned unvector door (0de76659)
@@ -24,23 +60,23 @@ All notable changes to this project will be documented in this file. See [standa
 - chore(release): 10.4.1-rc.1 (7870dc40)
 
 
-### [10.4.1](https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraft/brainy/compare/v10.4.0...v10.4.1) (2026-08-26)
+### [10.4.1](https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraftlabs/open-brainy/compare/v10.4.0...v10.4.1) (2026-08-26)
 
 - fix(reads): the read gate is per-family; a write carrying unchanged data never re-embeds (c039411e)
 - docs(guide): the docs pipeline publishes through the ingest API — the separate deploy step is retired (21e506e8)
 
 
-### [10.4.0](https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraft/brainy/compare/v10.4.0-rc.4...v10.4.0) (2026-08-26)
+### [10.4.0](https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraftlabs/open-brainy/compare/v10.4.0-rc.4...v10.4.0) (2026-08-26)
 
 - docs(releases): the 10.4.0 entry catches up to the late trains — repair routing, the vector ledger and open-gate leg, the loud config guard, the JSON-safe crossing (834149ed)
 
 
-### [10.4.0-rc.4](https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraft/brainy/compare/v10.4.0-rc.3...v10.4.0-rc.4) (2026-08-25)
+### [10.4.0-rc.4](https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraftlabs/open-brainy/compare/v10.4.0-rc.3...v10.4.0-rc.4) (2026-08-25)
 
 - feat(vector): the vectored-noun scalar joins the count ledger; the open gate closes the vector leg (9730835b)
 
 
-### [10.4.0-rc.3](https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraft/brainy/compare/v10.4.0-rc.2...v10.4.0-rc.3) (2026-08-25)
+### [10.4.0-rc.3](https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraftlabs/open-brainy/compare/v10.4.0-rc.2...v10.4.0-rc.3) (2026-08-25)
 
 - fix(update-seam): the metadata crossing never carries BigInt endpoint ints (f4780c8e)
 - Merge branch 'worktree-agent-ad3aff0dffd17a6eb' (f14da34b)
@@ -49,7 +85,7 @@ All notable changes to this project will be documented in this file. See [standa
 - feat(open-path): init never gates on the embedding model; open goes concurrent; slow opens narrate (96624f40)
 
 
-### [10.4.0-rc.2](https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraft/brainy/compare/v10.4.0-rc.1...v10.4.0-rc.2) (2026-08-25)
+### [10.4.0-rc.2](https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraftlabs/open-brainy/compare/v10.4.0-rc.1...v10.4.0-rc.2) (2026-08-25)
 
 - test(readiness): the report helper's clock freezes — two independently-built reports compared across a millisecond tick made the plant lane red (39b916a3)
 - feat(repair): a heal:'repair' verdict routes to the provider's own incremental repair() (553e0d97)
@@ -60,7 +96,7 @@ All notable changes to this project will be documented in this file. See [standa
 - feat(health): the gate reads the named report — reads refuse loudly, never rebuild; open serves before it returns; the ceremony door (f8f64780)
 
 
-### [10.4.0-rc.1](https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraft/brainy/compare/v10.3.1...v10.4.0-rc.1) (2026-08-24)
+### [10.4.0-rc.1](https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraftlabs/open-brainy/compare/v10.3.1...v10.4.0-rc.1) (2026-08-24)
 
 - ci(publish): the home dist-tag follows the version — a prerelease publishes under 'rc' and never moves 'latest' (a1376e4a)
 - chore(release): --source-only — a home-only prerelease mode (The Source, never the storefront) (dcbad176)
@@ -73,13 +109,13 @@ All notable changes to this project will be documented in this file. See [standa
 - ci(gate): the machine-health preflight and the truncation verdict guard (1e046aa1)
 
 
-### [10.3.1](https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraft/brainy/compare/v10.3.0...v10.3.1) (2026-08-18)
+### [10.3.1](https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraftlabs/open-brainy/compare/v10.3.0...v10.3.1) (2026-08-18)
 
 - docs(releases): the 10.3.1 consumer entry — the fold that behaves (900cc895)
 - fix(recovery): the fold streams and narrates; the checkpoint chain arms at the flip (ed7d1db9)
 
 
-### [10.3.0](https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraft/brainy/compare/v10.2.0...v10.3.0) (2026-08-18)
+### [10.3.0](https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraftlabs/open-brainy/compare/v10.2.0...v10.3.0) (2026-08-18)
 
 - docs(releases): the 10.3.0 consumer entry — the trust-and-provenance release (97d75649)
 - fix(locks): the fence keys ownership on pid+hostname — a same-process re-open never fences its predecessor (0991cf28)
@@ -88,14 +124,14 @@ All notable changes to this project will be documented in this file. See [standa
 - feat(log): system commits carry their origin; the attested per-id reconcile door (9ac9e706)
 
 
-### [10.2.0](https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraft/brainy/compare/v10.1.0...v10.2.0) (2026-08-17)
+### [10.2.0](https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraftlabs/open-brainy/compare/v10.1.0...v10.2.0) (2026-08-17)
 
 - docs(releases): the 10.2.0 consumer entry — adoption completes in one call (97538e1f)
 - ci: the correctness plant runs integration + conformance on every push — a release never waits on a second machine (b17fdc8e)
 - fix(adoption): the baseline backfill runs to completion — one call adopts a pre-log baseline of any size (a5a18838)
 
 
-### [10.1.0](https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraft/brainy/compare/v10.0.0...v10.1.0) (2026-08-13)
+### [10.1.0](https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraftlabs/open-brainy/compare/v10.0.0...v10.1.0) (2026-08-13)
 
 - docs(releases): the 10.1.0 consumer entry — bounded recovery, restore founding, the two write-path cures (7d3c8696)
 - fix(restore): a restore is an unclean event — the swap runs quiesced and the snapshot's durability stamps never survive it (9ca80667)
@@ -104,7 +140,7 @@ All notable changes to this project will be documented in this file. See [standa
 - feat(query): the sparse-store cut — where on a never-carried field serves operator truth, never a refusal (7b67db4d)
 
 
-### [10.0.0](https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraft/brainy/compare/v9.0.0...v10.0.0) (2026-08-12)
+### [10.0.0](https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraftlabs/open-brainy/compare/v9.0.0...v10.0.0) (2026-08-12)
 
 - fix(adoption): the baseline backfill cures hydration-law drift — existing brains reach the crash-safe default with zero operator steps (25f0dd96)
 - fix(adoption): the reserved-root mint exemption — int 0 is legitimate for exactly one id (2abe8b38)
@@ -136,7 +172,7 @@ All notable changes to this project will be documented in this file. See [standa
 - test: version-coupling pins go major-agnostic — the 8.x literals broke at the 9.0.0 bump while the coupling law itself behaved correctly (8a6807e8)
 
 
-### [9.0.0](https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraft/brainy/compare/v8.11.0...v9.0.0) (2026-08-04)
+### [9.0.0](https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraftlabs/open-brainy/compare/v8.11.0...v9.0.0) (2026-08-04)
 
 - docs: 9.0 namespace-migration guide — the simple story + the mechanical sweep checklist, published for humans and tooling alike (61ab9db2)
 - fix(release): storefront leg republishes CI's exact forge artifact — byte-identity by construction, verified by cross-registry shasum before the ceremony reports success (d89df2ed)
@@ -171,7 +207,7 @@ All notable changes to this project will be documented in this file. See [standa
 - feat: scanFacts liveness contract — first batch or loud failure within a documented bound (f8e6da2b)
 
 
-### [8.11.0](https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraft/brainy/compare/v8.10.1...v8.11.0) (2026-07-27)
+### [8.11.0](https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraftlabs/open-brainy/compare/v8.10.1...v8.11.0) (2026-07-27)
 
 - docs: the last two archived-host links point home (91ef1c8b)
 - feat: includeHidden — export carries every visibility tier for migration-grade canon completeness (63c1eeb9)
@@ -180,19 +216,19 @@ All notable changes to this project will be documented in this file. See [standa
 - ci: run the pipeline on the forge (999d0ebb)
 
 
-### [8.10.3](https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraft/brainy/compare/v8.10.2...v8.10.3) (2026-08-03)
+### [8.10.3](https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraftlabs/open-brainy/compare/v8.10.2...v8.10.3) (2026-08-03)
 
 - docs: dedupe the 8.10.2 release-notes entry the cherry doubled onto the branch (8c956608)
 - fix: user metadata named 'level' is a real field everywhere — the engine-internal node layer no longer shadows it in sort/filter/aggregation, and the indexing views stop stamping a phantom 0 into its column; index epoch 2 rebuilds existing brains at first open (958a0859)
 
 
-### [8.10.2](https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraft/brainy/compare/v8.10.1...v8.10.2) (2026-07-29)
+### [8.10.2](https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraftlabs/open-brainy/compare/v8.10.1...v8.10.2) (2026-07-29)
 
 - docs: 8.10.2 consumer release notes — update() write granularity, PathResolver idle-log fix, graph-lsm key recognition (a0123b5b)
 - fix: metadata-only update() never rewrites the noun record — the unconditional whole-vector save turned per-entity stat touches into full rewrites+fsync, amplifying read-heavy sweeps into disk saturation on a production deployment (5b65eb82)
 
 
-### [8.10.1](https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraft/brainy/compare/v8.10.0...v8.10.1) (2026-07-24)
+### [8.10.1](https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraftlabs/open-brainy/compare/v8.10.0...v8.10.1) (2026-07-24)
 
 - refactor: remove the orphaned transaction-result type left behind by the dead-path removal (edf123a5)
 - fix: warm() metadata surface routes through the active provider (warm hook added to the metadata contract); add maintenanceDebt() observability surface (5b2cbf74)

CLAUDE.md

@@ -12,13 +12,13 @@ Handoff file: `/home/dpsifr/.strategy/PLATFORM-HANDOFF.md`
 
 **Brainy's current open actions:** None. MIT open-source — no platform-specific actions.
 
-**Current version:** run `npm view @soulcraft/brainy version` (never trust a hardcoded number here — this line went stale for months); consumer-facing changes tracked in `RELEASES.md`
+**Current version:** run `npm view @soulcraftlabs/brainy version --registry https://source.soulcraft.com/api/packages/soulcraftlabs/npm/` (never trust a hardcoded number here — this line went stale for months); consumer-facing changes tracked in `RELEASES.md`
 
 ---
 
 ## Project Overview
 
-Brainy is a Universal Knowledge Protocol -- a Triple Intelligence database that combines vector similarity search, graph traversal, and metadata filtering into a single TypeScript library. Published as `@soulcraft/brainy` on npm under the MIT license.
+Brainy is a Universal Knowledge Protocol -- a Triple Intelligence database that combines vector similarity search, graph traversal, and metadata filtering into a single TypeScript library. Published as `@soulcraftlabs/brainy` on The Source (source.soulcraft.com registry) under the MIT license.
 
 ## Getting Started
 

CONTRIBUTING.md

@@ -6,7 +6,7 @@ may find elsewhere in the repo's history.
 
 ## Where the project lives
 
-The source of truth is a self-hosted forge: **source.soulcraft.com/soulcraft/brainy**.
+The source of truth is a self-hosted forge: **source.soulcraft.com/soulcraftlabs/open-brainy**.
 It's anonymously readable and cloneable — no account needed to browse, clone,
 or build.
 
@@ -31,7 +31,7 @@ fine) to talk through the approach saves everyone rework.
 ## Development setup
 
 ```bash
-git clone https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraft/brainy.git
+git clone https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraftlabs/open-brainy.git
 cd brainy
 npm install
 npm run build
@@ -57,6 +57,17 @@ see `package.json` for `test:integration`, `test:coverage`, and friends.
   description states a number, cite the benchmark that produced it (see
   [docs/performance-envelopes.md](docs/performance-envelopes.md) for the
   pattern). Don't state an estimate as if it were measured.
+- **Measurements carry numbers, not provenance.** Public commit messages and
+  docs give the SHAPE a number was taken at and never where it was taken: no
+  hostnames, no store or deployment identities, no operational anecdotes about
+  someone's running system. "A 14,056-noun / 72,679-verb production-shaped
+  store, measured solo under an exclusive lock" tells a reader everything the
+  number depends on; the machine it ran on and whose data it was tell them
+  nothing except where somebody's infrastructure lives.
+- **Documents that answer or reference a confidential specification never enter
+  this repository, even summarized.** The public docs describe THIS engine and
+  the published contract, and nothing else — a summary of a private document is
+  still that document's contents.
 
 ## License
 

README.md

@@ -1,5 +1,5 @@
 <p align="center">
-  <img src="https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraft/brainy/raw/branch/main/brainy.png" alt="Brainy" width="180">
+  <img src="https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraftlabs/open-brainy/raw/branch/main/brainy.png" alt="Brainy" width="180">
 </p>
 
 <h1 align="center">Brainy</h1>
@@ -11,9 +11,9 @@
 </p>
 
 <p align="center">
-  <a href="https://www.npmjs.com/package/@soulcraft/brainy"><img src="https://img.shields.io/npm/v/@soulcraft/brainy.svg" alt="npm version"></a>
-  <a href="https://www.npmjs.com/package/@soulcraft/brainy"><img src="https://img.shields.io/npm/dm/@soulcraft/brainy.svg" alt="npm downloads"></a>
-  <a href="https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraft/brainy/actions"><img src="https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraft/brainy/actions/workflows/ci.yml/badge.svg?branch=main" alt="CI"></a>
+  <a href="https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraftlabs/-/packages/npm/brainy"><img src="https://img.shields.io/badge/package-The%20Source-2c3e50.svg" alt="Package on The Source"></a>
+  <a href="https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraftlabs/open-brainy"><img src="https://img.shields.io/badge/repo-open--brainy-2c3e50.svg" alt="Repository"></a>
+  <a href="https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraftlabs/open-brainy/actions"><img src="https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraftlabs/open-brainy/actions/workflows/ci.yml/badge.svg?branch=main" alt="CI"></a>
   <a href="https://soulcraft.com/docs"><img src="https://img.shields.io/badge/docs-soulcraft.com-blue.svg" alt="Documentation"></a>
   <a href="LICENSE"><img src="https://img.shields.io/badge/license-MIT-blue.svg" alt="MIT License"></a>
   <a href="https://www.typescriptlang.org/"><img src="https://img.shields.io/badge/%3C%2F%3E-TypeScript-%230074c1.svg" alt="TypeScript"></a>
@@ -30,6 +30,8 @@
 
 ---
 
+**Open Brainy** is the MIT engine — the open API, client library, types, and protocol; an openly specified canonical on-disk format; and this TypeScript reference engine, scoped as a single-node engine for stores up to roughly one million rows. `@soulcraft/brainy` 10.4.2 was the last release under the old package name — the name passes to the native engine, **Brainy**, at 11.0.0: the same API over the same open format at production scale, and it requires a license.
+
 Built because we were tired of stitching a vector store to a graph database to a document store — and spending weeks on plumbing before writing a line of business logic. Brainy indexes every fact **three ways at once** and lets one call query them together:
 
 | You write | Brainy indexes it as | You query it with |
@@ -45,12 +47,14 @@ It runs **inside your process** — no server, no Docker, nothing to operate —
 ## Quick start
 
 ```bash
-bun add @soulcraft/brainy        # Bun ≥ 1.1 — recommended
-npm install @soulcraft/brainy    # Node.js ≥ 22
+bun add @soulcraftlabs/brainy        # Bun ≥ 1.1 — recommended
+npm install @soulcraftlabs/brainy    # Node.js ≥ 22
 ```
 
+> **Registry**: add `@soulcraftlabs:registry=https://source.soulcraft.com/api/packages/soulcraftlabs/npm/` to your `.npmrc` (anonymous read).
+
 ```javascript
-import { Brainy, NounType, VerbType } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy, NounType, VerbType } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 const brain = new Brainy()                       // in-memory; one line swaps to disk
 await brain.init()

RELEASES.md

@@ -1,7 +1,7 @@
 # @soulcraft/brainy — Release Notes for Consumers
 
 This file is the **quick reference for downstream sessions** tracking Brainy changes.
-Full auto-generated changelog: `CHANGELOG.md` · Releases: https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraft/brainy/releases
+Full auto-generated changelog: `CHANGELOG.md` · Releases: https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraftlabs/open-brainy/releases
 
 **How to use:** Brainy is the underlying data engine for downstream applications. Read this when:
 - Upgrading `@soulcraft/brainy` in your application
@@ -31,7 +31,139 @@ is sometimes cited as a 7.x removal — those methods never existed on 7.x; the
 
 ---
 
-## v10.4.2 — 2026-08-28 (a zero-norm vector is not a vector)
+## v10.4.4 — 2026-08-28
+
+**A correctness and observability release.** The headline is not speed: it is that a
+restart now tells you the truth about itself, a store stops lying about how much it
+holds, and the engine stops doing work nobody asked for. There is a performance
+improvement and it is modest; it is stated exactly below rather than rounded up.
+
+### The dark restart — fixed at the root
+
+A service could stop cleanly, exit 0, having awaited `close()` on every store it held,
+and its next boot would announce `Overwriting stale writer lock … appears dead` for
+every one of them. Nothing had crashed. Two deployments hit this; the same defect also
+made those boots pay a crash-recovery fold they did not owe.
+
+The cause was not the lock. `close()` released it correctly — when it got there. A
+failure part-way through close skipped both the release AND the clean-shutdown marker,
+and "the recorded pid is gone" reads identically for an orderly restart and a crash.
+
+- `close()` is now two parts and the second is unconditional: the flush-request watcher,
+  the **writer lock**, the VFS timers and the terminal `closed` flag are released whether
+  the durable steps succeeded or not. The original failure is narrated with what it costs
+  the next open, then rethrown.
+- Releasing the lock writes a **clean-close record** naming the lock generation it gave
+  up. The next open reads that record instead of guessing: recorded → nothing to recover;
+  absent → it says so, and names the recovery it is about to run. This also ends two
+  long-standing false alarms — a recycled pid locking a store out of its own reopen, and
+  `Re-acquiring writer lock … this is a bug` after a perfectly clean close.
+- The signal path stopped failing in a batch. One store's failing flush used to strand
+  every remaining store's lock and markers — at exit code 0. Now: per-store isolation, the
+  generation store's close (the marker) is part of shutdown, the lock goes in a `finally`,
+  and the handler no longer calls `process.exit()` when the host application has its own
+  signal handler, a race that truncated the host's own shutdown mid-flight.
+
+### The count ledger stops lying, and `counts.json` is written atomically
+
+The all-tier scalars are the denominator a coverage check subtracts against. A ledger
+derived under the old rule — one entity per id DIRECTORY — counted ghost and scar
+containers as rows, and was only FLAGGED suspect: it went on serving wrong numbers for
+the life of the store. Two copies of one archive could disagree, and a downstream index
+heal reported remaining work that did not exist.
+
+- Such a ledger now derives itself honestly **in the background** after the open, counting
+  identity records, and persists the correction stamped. Nothing waits for it, because no
+  read is served from a denominator.
+- A derivation that raced a write refuses to stamp its number: one retry on a quiet store,
+  then the ledger stays SUSPECT and names `repairIndex()` as the door that recounts under
+  a barrier.
+- `counts.json` is written temp+rename. A truncating write left a window in which a
+  concurrent reader saw the file EMPTY — and an unparseable ledger sends the next open
+  down the full-rescan path, so the cheapest file in the store was buying the most
+  expensive recovery.
+
+### An open and a repair narrate themselves — on a channel a log level cannot silence
+
+A store could open for three minutes and print nothing at all. The phase timings existed;
+they were written to a channel that every production-looking environment clamps away.
+
+- Narration moved to an always-visible channel. An open now heartbeats the phase it is in,
+  names each phase as it ends with what it was paying for, and names the expensive STEP
+  inside a phase. `repairIndex()` does the same and its receipt carries a per-family
+  `durationMs` — a repair that ran for half an hour with no output could only be watched
+  through `top`.
+- A brain nobody has written to now does nothing: a flush over a clean store is a no-op
+  and says nothing, the graph index's auto-flush asks before it acts, and the
+  cross-process flush-request watch is **event-driven** (`fs.watch`) instead of polling a
+  directory every 500 ms per store forever, with a slow safety sweep behind it and a
+  narrated fall back to polling where a filesystem cannot be watched.
+- A provider that is REBUILDING ITSELF is no longer confused with a broken one. `init()`
+  does not wait for it, every other family serves, and that family's doors refuse **by
+  name, carrying the provider's own progress**, saying plainly that they open by
+  themselves and no action is needed. Health narration dedupes by content, so an unchanged
+  verdict is silent however a provider's generation counter moves.
+
+### For operators — one behaviour change
+
+**Four `where` operators that previously returned an empty page now raise
+`INVALID_QUERY`:** `startsWith`, `endsWith`, `matches` and `length`. An equality/range
+posting index cannot evaluate a substring, a pattern or an array length without reading
+every row, and it now refuses by name instead of answering with an empty result that
+looks like an answer.
+
+**Three that previously returned an empty page are now SERVED:** `hasAll`, `noneOf` and
+`excludes`. All 25 accepted operator tokens now agree between this engine and its
+accelerated counterpart.
+
+### Performance — stated exactly
+
+Measured on a 14,056-noun / 72,679-verb production-shaped store, both builds solo under
+an exclusive lock:
+
+- **Warm reopen after a clean close: 85.7 s → 77.0 s (−10.2%).** The whole of that gain is
+  one fix — generation discovery reads directory NAMES instead of recursively walking the
+  entire generation log (−9.2 s, and it scales with history rather than row count). The
+  VFS phase is **unchanged**.
+- **Cold open: −31.4 s** (518.1 s → 486.7 s), of which the count-ledger derivation moving
+  off the critical path accounts for storage-init dropping 5,941 ms → 25 ms.
+- **A dominant ~38 s remains, diagnosed and NOT fixed.** It is not the VFS — the VFS's own
+  init is under 2 s of that phase. It is the log-authority adoption and/or the
+  pending-embed log recovery, both now instrumented so the next measurement names the
+  culprit outright.
+
+Continuing work, named so nobody has to rediscover it: that ~38 s term; making the
+generation store's committed-range set lazy; the hydration path that substitutes
+`Date.now()` for an unreadable stored timestamp (inventing data); and a VFS path-prefix
+filter built with a `$startsWith` spelling no operator set accepts, so
+`searchFiles({ path })` throws today.
+
+---
+
+## v10.4.3 — 2026-08-27 (Open Brainy's first release)
+
+**`@soulcraftlabs/brainy` 10.4.3 is the same engine as `@soulcraft/brainy` 10.4.2, byte for
+byte — only the name, the registry, and the pointers changed.** Install:
+
+```bash
+npm install @soulcraftlabs/brainy
+```
+
+with the registry line in your `.npmrc` (anonymous read):
+
+```
+@soulcraftlabs:registry=https://source.soulcraft.com/api/packages/soulcraftlabs/npm/
+```
+
+- **The Source is the one registry.** Open Brainy publishes to source.soulcraft.com only; the
+  npmjs republish step is retired from the release rail. Existing npmjs versions of
+  `@soulcraft/brainy` stay as they are and receive no new versions.
+- **The repository moved** to `soulcraftlabs/open-brainy` on The Source; the old path redirects.
+- **No engine change.** Everything in the 10.4.2 notes applies unchanged; adoption is one
+  install-line change (`@soulcraft/brainy` → `@soulcraftlabs/brainy`), which downstream
+  applications make together with their native-engine bump.
+
+## v10.4.2 — 2026-08-27 (a zero-norm vector is not a vector)
 
 **This is the last release of the MIT engine under the `@soulcraft/brainy` name.**
 The MIT package continues as **Open Brainy** — `@soulcraftlabs/brainy`: the open API,

SECURITY.md

@@ -30,7 +30,7 @@ commit to backporting fixes to unsupported lines.
 
 ## Scope
 
-This policy covers the `@soulcraft/brainy` package itself — the code in
+This policy covers the `@soulcraftlabs/brainy` package itself — the code in
 this repository. If you're evaluating a deployment that also uses
 `@soulcraft/cor`, report issues in that package the same way, to the same
 address; we'll route internally.

bin/brainy-ts.js

@@ -3,7 +3,7 @@
 /**
  * Modern TypeScript CLI Runner
  * 
- * This is the entry point after npm install @soulcraft/brainy
+ * This is the entry point after npm install @soulcraftlabs/brainy
  * It runs the compiled TypeScript CLI code
  */
 

bun.lock

@@ -3,7 +3,7 @@
   "configVersion": 0,
   "workspaces": {
     "": {
-      "name": "@soulcraft/brainy",
+      "name": "@soulcraftlabs/brainy",
       "dependencies": {
         "@aws-sdk/client-s3": "^3.540.0",
         "@azure/identity": "^4.0.0",

docs/DEVELOPER_LEARNING_PATH.md

@@ -25,13 +25,13 @@
 
 ### Prerequisites
 ```bash
-npm install @soulcraft/brainy
+npm install @soulcraftlabs/brainy
 ```
 
 ### Your First Neural Database
 
 ```typescript
-import { Brainy, NounType } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy, NounType } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 // Step 1: Create and initialize Brainy
 const brain = new Brainy({
@@ -143,7 +143,7 @@ Once you're comfortable with basic operations, move to **Level 2** to learn abou
 ### Building a Knowledge Graph
 
 ```typescript
-import { Brainy, NounType, VerbType } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy, NounType, VerbType } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 const brain = new Brainy({ storage: { type: 'memory' } })
 await brain.init()
@@ -314,7 +314,7 @@ Ready for AI-powered search and clustering? Move to **Level 3**.
 ### Triple Intelligence in Action
 
 ```typescript
-import { Brainy, NounType, VerbType } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy, NounType, VerbType } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 const brain = new Brainy({ storage: { type: 'memory' } })
 await brain.init()
@@ -529,7 +529,7 @@ Want to treat files as intelligent entities? Learn the **Virtual Filesystem** in
 ### Files as Intelligent Entities
 
 ```typescript
-import { Brainy, NounType, VerbType } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy, NounType, VerbType } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 const brain = new Brainy({ storage: { type: 'memory' } })
 await brain.init()
@@ -832,7 +832,7 @@ Ready for production deployment? Level 5 covers **planet-scale architecture**.
 ### Production-Ready Deployment
 
 ```typescript
-import { Brainy, NounType } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy, NounType } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 // 1. PRODUCTION STORAGE - Filesystem with off-site snapshots
 console.log('Initializing production storage...\n')

docs/FIND_SYSTEM.md

@@ -1217,7 +1217,7 @@ where: {
 await brain.find({ type: 'Document' })
 
 // ✅ Correct: Use NounType enum
-import { NounType } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { NounType } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 await brain.find({ type: NounType.Document })
 
 // ❌ Error: Operator not recognized

docs/MIGRATION-V3-TO-V4.md

@@ -153,13 +153,13 @@ brainy-data/
 ### Step 1: Update Brainy Package
 
 ```bash
-npm install @soulcraft/brainy@latest
+npm install @soulcraftlabs/brainy@latest
 ```
 
 **Check your version:**
 ```bash
-npm list @soulcraft/brainy
-# Should show: @soulcraft/brainy@4.0.0
+npm list @soulcraftlabs/brainy
+# Should show: @soulcraftlabs/brainy@4.0.0
 ```
 
 ### Step 2: No Code Changes Required! ✅
@@ -374,7 +374,7 @@ If you encounter issues, you can rollback:
 
 ```bash
 # Reinstall v3
-npm install @soulcraft/brainy@^3.50.0
+npm install @soulcraftlabs/brainy@^3.50.0
 
 # Restart application
 ```
@@ -389,7 +389,7 @@ rm -rf ./data
 cp -r ./data-backup ./data
 
 # Reinstall v3
-npm install @soulcraft/brainy@^3.50.0
+npm install @soulcraftlabs/brainy@^3.50.0
 ```
 
 ## Common Migration Scenarios
@@ -539,7 +539,7 @@ console.log('Storage type:', status.type)
 
 **Migration Checklist:**
 - ✅ Backup data
-- ✅ Update npm package (`npm install @soulcraft/brainy@latest`)
+- ✅ Update npm package (`npm install @soulcraftlabs/brainy@latest`)
 - ✅ Restart application (automatic migration)
 - ✅ Verify data integrity
 - ✅ Enable lifecycle policies

docs/PLUGINS.md

@@ -46,7 +46,7 @@ If no plugin provides a given key, brainy uses its built-in JavaScript implement
 ### 1. Implement the `BrainyPlugin` interface
 
 ```typescript
-import type { BrainyPlugin, BrainyPluginContext } from '@soulcraft/brainy/plugin'
+import type { BrainyPlugin, BrainyPluginContext } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy/plugin'
 
 const myPlugin: BrainyPlugin = {
   name: 'my-brainy-plugin',  // Must be unique (typically your npm package name)
@@ -90,7 +90,7 @@ await brain.init()
 **Programmatic registration:** For plugins not installed as npm packages, use `brain.use()`:
 
 ```typescript
-import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 import myPlugin from './my-plugin.js'
 
 const brain = new Brainy()
@@ -272,10 +272,10 @@ When provided by an optional native acceleration plugin (such as `@soulcraft/cor
 #### `cache`
 **Type:** `UnifiedCache`
 
-Replaces the global `UnifiedCache` singleton used for VFS path resolution, semantic caching, and vector index caching. Must implement the `UnifiedCache` interface (available from `@soulcraft/brainy/internals`).
+Replaces the global `UnifiedCache` singleton used for VFS path resolution, semantic caching, and vector index caching. Must implement the `UnifiedCache` interface (available from `@soulcraftlabs/brainy/internals`).
 
 ```typescript
-import type { UnifiedCache } from '@soulcraft/brainy/internals'
+import type { UnifiedCache } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy/internals'
 
 context.registerProvider('cache', myNativeCache)
 ```
@@ -325,8 +325,8 @@ Plugins can register custom storage backends that users reference by name.
 ### Implementing a Storage Adapter
 
 ```typescript
-import type { StorageAdapterFactory } from '@soulcraft/brainy/plugin'
-import type { StorageAdapter } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import type { StorageAdapterFactory } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy/plugin'
+import type { StorageAdapter } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 class MyStorageAdapter implements StorageAdapter {
   async init(): Promise<void> { /* ... */ }
@@ -360,9 +360,9 @@ Brainy provides three entry points for plugin developers:
 
 | Import Path | Contents | Stability |
 |-------------|----------|-----------|
-| `@soulcraft/brainy` | Public API, types, StorageAdapter | Stable (semver) |
-| `@soulcraft/brainy/plugin` | BrainyPlugin, BrainyPluginContext, StorageAdapterFactory | Stable (semver) |
-| `@soulcraft/brainy/internals` | UnifiedCache, EntityIdMapper, logger utilities | Internal (may change between minor versions) |
+| `@soulcraftlabs/brainy` | Public API, types, StorageAdapter | Stable (semver) |
+| `@soulcraftlabs/brainy/plugin` | BrainyPlugin, BrainyPluginContext, StorageAdapterFactory | Stable (semver) |
+| `@soulcraftlabs/brainy/internals` | UnifiedCache, EntityIdMapper, logger utilities | Internal (may change between minor versions) |
 
 ## Diagnostics
 
@@ -440,7 +440,7 @@ A minimal but useful plugin that provides SIMD-accelerated distance calculations
 
 ```typescript
 // simd-distance-plugin/src/plugin.ts
-import type { BrainyPlugin, BrainyPluginContext } from '@soulcraft/brainy/plugin'
+import type { BrainyPlugin, BrainyPluginContext } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy/plugin'
 
 // Hypothetical native module
 import { simdCosineDistance } from './native.js'
@@ -470,7 +470,7 @@ export default simdDistancePlugin
   "main": "./dist/plugin.js",
   "types": "./dist/plugin.d.ts",
   "peerDependencies": {
-    "@soulcraft/brainy": ">=7.0.0"
+    "@soulcraftlabs/brainy": ">=7.0.0"
   }
 }
 ```
@@ -478,7 +478,7 @@ export default simdDistancePlugin
 Usage:
 
 ```typescript
-import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 const brain = new Brainy({ plugins: ['brainy-simd-distance'] })
 await brain.init()

docs/PRODUCTION_SERVICE_ARCHITECTURE.md

@@ -54,7 +54,7 @@ After 40 API calls:
 
 ```typescript
 // server.ts
-import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 // SINGLETON INSTANCE
 let brainInstance: Brainy | null = null
@@ -174,7 +174,7 @@ process.on('SIGTERM', async () => {
 
 ```typescript
 // server.ts - Clean Bun implementation
-import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 let brain: Brainy | null = null
 

docs/README.md

@@ -5,7 +5,7 @@
 ## Quick Start
 
 ```typescript
-import { Brainy, NounType, VerbType } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy, NounType, VerbType } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 const brain = new Brainy()
 await brain.init()

docs/RELEASE-GUIDE.md

@@ -99,7 +99,7 @@ Examples:
 
 ```bash
 # 1. Deprecate wrong version on npm
-npm deprecate @soulcraft/brainy@X.X.X "Incorrect version - use Y.Y.Y"
+npm deprecate @soulcraftlabs/brainy@X.X.X "Incorrect version - use Y.Y.Y"
 
 # 2. Fix version in package.json
 # 3. Republish correct version

docs/SCALING.md

@@ -13,7 +13,7 @@
 
 ### In-Memory
 ```typescript
-import Brainy from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import Brainy from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 const brain = new Brainy({ storage: { type: 'memory' } })
 ```
 
@@ -43,7 +43,7 @@ The native vector provider (via the optional `@soulcraft/cor` package) extends t
 
 Numbers below are **measured** by `tests/benchmarks/find-composition-scale.js` (a single
 Node 22 process, in-memory storage, 384-dim vectors, `balanced` recall). They are the
-open-core (pure-TypeScript) path — what you get from `@soulcraft/brainy` with no native
+open-core (pure-TypeScript) path — what you get from `@soulcraftlabs/brainy` with no native
 provider installed. Run it yourself: `node --max-old-space-size=8192 tests/benchmarks/find-composition-scale.js 100000`.
 
 `find()` query latency, p50 / p95 (200 queries each):

docs/api/README.md

@@ -24,7 +24,7 @@ next:
 ## Quick Start
 
 ```typescript
-import { Brainy, NounType, VerbType } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy, NounType, VerbType } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 const brain = new Brainy() // Zero config!
 await brain.init() // VFS auto-initialized!
@@ -1010,7 +1010,7 @@ await db.release()                        // unpin + free cached materialization
 
 ### Db API errors
 
-All exported from `@soulcraft/brainy`:
+All exported from `@soulcraftlabs/brainy`:
 
 | Error | Thrown by | Meaning |
 |---|---|---|
@@ -1918,11 +1918,11 @@ isn't serving throws instead of rebuilding mid-query:
 | `MetadataIndexNotReadyError` | `find({ where })` | Metadata/field index isn't serving |
 | `VectorIndexNotReadyError` | `find({ query })`, `similar()` | Vector index isn't serving |
 
-All three are exported from `@soulcraft/brainy`. Catch them to distinguish
+All three are exported from `@soulcraftlabs/brainy`. Catch them to distinguish
 "index not ready" from a genuine empty result:
 
 ```typescript
-import { MetadataIndexNotReadyError } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { MetadataIndexNotReadyError } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 try {
   const rows = await brain.find({ where: { status: 'active' } })
@@ -2208,7 +2208,7 @@ For the full taxonomy with all 169 types and their descriptions, see:
 - **📖 Documentation:** [Full Documentation](../)
 - **🐛 Issues:** [GitHub Issues](https://github.com/soulcraftlabs/brainy/issues)
 - **💬 Discussions:** [GitHub Discussions](https://github.com/soulcraftlabs/brainy/discussions)
-- **📦 NPM:** [@soulcraft/brainy](https://www.npmjs.com/package/@soulcraft/brainy)
+- **📦 NPM:** [@soulcraftlabs/brainy](https://www.npmjs.com/package/@soulcraftlabs/brainy)
 - **⭐ GitHub:** [Star us](https://github.com/soulcraftlabs/brainy)
 
 ---

docs/architecture/data-storage-architecture.md

@@ -268,7 +268,7 @@ locks/_flush_responses/     # writer answers with <uuid>.ack
 | **Counts/statistics** | Per-type and per-subtype maps | `_system/{type,subtype,verb-subtype}-statistics.json.gz`, `counts.json` | Recomputable by scanning entities (`brainy inspect repair`) |
 
 A pluggable index provider (the 8.0 plugin contract in
-`@soulcraft/brainy/plugin`) may replace any of the JS implementations; the
+`@soulcraftlabs/brainy/plugin`) may replace any of the JS implementations; the
 persisted formats above are contract-bound so JS and native implementations
 can interleave on the same directory.
 

docs/architecture/finite-type-system.md

@@ -126,7 +126,7 @@ class TypeAwareMetadataIndex {
 **The Design**: Specify types clearly in your API calls:
 
 ```typescript
-import { Brainy, NounType, VerbType } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy, NounType, VerbType } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 // Add entity with explicit type
 await brain.add({
@@ -231,7 +231,7 @@ class OrgEnrichmentAugmentation {
 **Brainy's Approach**: Extract **typed** concepts:
 
 ```typescript
-import { NaturalLanguageProcessor } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { NaturalLanguageProcessor } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 const nlp = new NaturalLanguageProcessor()
 const concepts = await nlp.extractConcepts("Alice works at Google in San Francisco")
@@ -382,7 +382,7 @@ import {
   getVerbTypes,
   BrainyTypes,
   suggestType
-} from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+} from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 // Get all available noun types
 const nounTypes = getNounTypes()

docs/architecture/multiprocess-storage-mixin.md

@@ -127,7 +127,7 @@ For reference, a clean migration path:
    `isMultiProcessSafe` type-guard. Keep `hasStorageMethod` for
    build/install artifact protection.
 5. Document the new contract in `concepts/storage-adapters.md`.
-6. Major-version-bump the `@soulcraft/brainy` peerDep range expected by
+6. Major-version-bump the `@soulcraftlabs/brainy` peerDep range expected by
    plugins.
 
 Estimated work: ~half a day of code, ~2 hours of doc/example updates,

docs/architecture/noun-verb-taxonomy.md

@@ -20,7 +20,7 @@ next:
 Every example on this page is written against the real Brainy 8.0 API. The setup is always the same:
 
 ```typescript
-import { Brainy, NounType, VerbType } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy, NounType, VerbType } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 const brain = new Brainy()
 await brain.init()
@@ -40,7 +40,7 @@ Brainy's **Noun-Verb Taxonomy** achieves broad coverage of human knowledge throu
 - **Multi-hop Graph Traversals = Relationship Complexity**
 - **Result: Model data across virtually any industry**
 
-Every piece of information can be represented as entities (nouns) connected by relationships (verbs) carrying properties (metadata). The standardized type system from `@soulcraft/brainy` (`NounType`, `VerbType`) gives those nouns and verbs a stable, shared name.
+Every piece of information can be represented as entities (nouns) connected by relationships (verbs) carrying properties (metadata). The standardized type system from `@soulcraftlabs/brainy` (`NounType`, `VerbType`) gives those nouns and verbs a stable, shared name.
 
 ## The Power of Standardization: Universal Interoperability
 

docs/architecture/zero-config.md

@@ -35,7 +35,7 @@ constructor and `init()`.
 ## Instant Start
 
 ```typescript
-import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 // That's it. No config needed.
 const brain = new Brainy()

docs/concepts/field-addressing.md

@@ -167,7 +167,7 @@ await brain.find({ orderBy: 'createdAt' })
 `UnresolvableFieldError` is exported from the package root:
 
 ```typescript
-import { UnresolvableFieldError } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { UnresolvableFieldError } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 try {
   await brain.find({ orderBy: 'createdAt' })

docs/concepts/index-health.md

@@ -95,7 +95,7 @@ catchable error naming the reason:
 | `MetadataIndexNotReadyError` | `find({ where })` | The metadata/field index isn't serving — a filtered read would otherwise return `[]` indistinguishable from "no matches" |
 | `VectorIndexNotReadyError` | `find({ query })`, `similar()` | The vector index isn't serving — a semantic search would otherwise return `[]` indistinguishable from "nothing similar" |
 
-All three are exported from `@soulcraft/brainy`. Catch them where your application
+All three are exported from `@soulcraftlabs/brainy`. Catch them where your application
 needs to distinguish "this index isn't ready yet" from "there's genuinely nothing
 here" — a health dashboard, a retry policy, an operator alert. The fix is always
 the same: reconcile the index, either by reopening the brain (which brings every

docs/concepts/storage-adapters.md

@@ -61,7 +61,7 @@ The only required override is the capability flag. Returning `true` from
 to call `acquireWriterLock()` at init.
 
 ```typescript
-import { FileSystemStorage } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { FileSystemStorage } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 export class MmapFileSystemStorage extends FileSystemStorage {
   public supportsMultiProcessLocking(): boolean {
@@ -79,7 +79,7 @@ If your storage is **not filesystem-backed** (a custom
 network backend), extend `BaseStorage` directly:
 
 ```typescript
-import { BaseStorage } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { BaseStorage } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 export class MyCloudStorage extends BaseStorage {
   // BaseStorage's default no-op implementations of the multi-process
@@ -101,7 +101,7 @@ The defensive check at every new-storage-method call site (`brainy.ts`,
 `hasStorageMethod(name)`) does **not** exist to handle "plugin bundles a
 stale BaseStorage." Plugins ship a dist that preserves the dynamic ESM
 import (verify in your plugin's `dist/`: `import { FileSystemStorage } from
-'@soulcraft/brainy'` is not rewritten to a vendored copy). The prototype
+'@soulcraftlabs/brainy'` is not rewritten to a vendored copy). The prototype
 chain at runtime resolves to whatever Brainy version your consumer has
 installed.
 
@@ -109,8 +109,8 @@ installed.
 the prototype chain at the consumer-app level:
 
 - **Stale `node_modules`** — a lingering install from before the consumer
-  upgraded Brainy. The package.json says `@soulcraft/brainy@7.22.0` but
-  `node_modules/@soulcraft/brainy` is still 7.20.x.
+  upgraded Brainy. The package.json says `@soulcraftlabs/brainy@7.22.0` but
+  `node_modules/@soulcraftlabs/brainy` is still 7.20.x.
 - **Lockfile drift** — `bun.lockb` / `package-lock.json` pins a brainy
   version older than the package.json range, and `bun install` honors the
   lockfile.
@@ -131,7 +131,7 @@ and the warning names the adapter class plus a remediation hint:
 methods on its prototype chain. Writer locking and the flush-request RPC are
 disabled for this directory. Likely fix: clean install (`rm -rf node_modules
 bun.lockb && bun install`) or rebuild your container image to refresh
-`@soulcraft/brainy` to ≥7.21. See docs/concepts/storage-adapters.md.
+`@soulcraftlabs/brainy` to ≥7.21. See docs/concepts/storage-adapters.md.
 ```
 
 ## Authoring a new storage adapter — minimum checklist
@@ -168,7 +168,7 @@ bun.lockb && bun install`) or rebuild your container image to refresh
    install time — fix install, not your plugin.
 
 6. **Pin your peer dep generously.** `"peerDependencies": {
-   "@soulcraft/brainy": "^7.21.0" }` accepts any compatible 7.x. Don't pin
+   "@soulcraftlabs/brainy": "^7.21.0" }` accepts any compatible 7.x. Don't pin
    to an exact patch unless you're tracking a known regression.
 
 ## Future direction
@@ -185,5 +185,5 @@ follow-up; consumers don't need to anticipate the change.
   heartbeat semantics, what the lock protects.
 - [`guides/inspection`](../guides/inspection.md) — `brainy inspect` and the
   read-only mode.
-- `node_modules/@soulcraft/brainy/dist/storage/baseStorage.d.ts` — the
+- `node_modules/@soulcraftlabs/brainy/dist/storage/baseStorage.d.ts` — the
   authoritative type signatures for every method this page references.

docs/guides/aggregation.md

@@ -22,7 +22,7 @@ they share a single scan.
 ## Quick Start
 
 ```typescript
-import { Brainy, NounType } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy, NounType } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 const brain = new Brainy()
 await brain.init()

docs/guides/framework-integration.md

@@ -8,7 +8,7 @@ Brainy is **framework-friendly** - designed to drop into the server side of any
 
 Brainy embeds an HNSW vector index, a graph engine, and a filesystem-backed persistence layer. These belong on the server:
 
-- **Zero configuration**: Just `import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'`
+- **Zero configuration**: Just `import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'`
 - **Auto storage detection**: `new Brainy()` auto-selects filesystem persistence on Node
 - **Cleaner code**: No browser polyfills, no conditional client/server imports
 - **Better DX**: One instance shared across your server routes
@@ -18,13 +18,13 @@ Brainy embeds an HNSW vector index, a graph engine, and a filesystem-backed pers
 ### Install Brainy
 
 ```bash
-npm install @soulcraft/brainy
+npm install @soulcraftlabs/brainy
 ```
 
 ### Basic Integration
 
 ```javascript
-import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 // Run on the server (API route, server component, backend service)
 // new Brainy() auto-detects filesystem persistence on Node
@@ -105,7 +105,7 @@ On the server, create one Brainy instance and reuse it across requests. This mod
 
 ```javascript
 // lib/brain.server.js
-import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 let brainPromise
 
@@ -163,7 +163,7 @@ On the server, create one Brainy instance and reuse it across requests:
 
 ```javascript
 // server/brain.js (server-only module)
-import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 let brainPromise
 
@@ -248,7 +248,7 @@ The matching backend endpoint uses Brainy directly (Node/Bun):
 
 ```typescript
 // server: api/search
-import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 const brain = new Brainy() // auto-detects filesystem persistence on Node
 await brain.init()
@@ -266,7 +266,7 @@ In Next.js, Brainy lives in server code only: API routes, server components, or
 
 ```javascript
 // lib/brain.server.js  (imported only by server code)
-import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 let brainPromise
 
@@ -318,7 +318,7 @@ Brainy runs in a server-only module (`*.server.js`); the component fetches resul
 
 ```javascript
 // src/lib/server/brain.js  (server-only — note the .server suffix)
-import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 let brainPromise
 
@@ -432,7 +432,7 @@ import { defineConfig } from 'vite'
 
 export default defineConfig({
   ssr: {
-    external: ['@soulcraft/brainy']
+    external: ['@soulcraftlabs/brainy']
   }
 })
 ```
@@ -440,7 +440,7 @@ export default defineConfig({
 ```javascript
 // rollup.config.js  (server bundle)
 export default {
-  external: ['@soulcraft/brainy', 'node:fs', 'node:path', 'node:crypto']
+  external: ['@soulcraftlabs/brainy', 'node:fs', 'node:path', 'node:crypto']
 }
 ```
 
@@ -466,7 +466,7 @@ export async function load({ url }) {
 
 ```javascript
 // For build-time usage (runs in Node during the build)
-import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 export async function generateStaticProps() {
   const brain = new Brainy({
@@ -513,7 +513,7 @@ export async function generateStaticProps() {
 
 ### Issue: Large client bundle size
 **Cause**: A client module is pulling in Brainy.
-**Solution**: Move the `import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'` into a server-only module so it never reaches the browser bundle.
+**Solution**: Move the `import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'` into a server-only module so it never reaches the browser bundle.
 
 ### Issue: SSR hydration mismatch
 **Solution**: Run the search on the server (loader / server action / API route) and pass the results down as props, so server and client render the same markup.

docs/guides/import-anything.md

@@ -9,7 +9,7 @@ Brainy's import is **ONE magical method** that understands EVERYTHING:
 ## The Ultimate Simplicity
 
 ```javascript
-import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 const brain = new Brainy()
 await brain.init()

docs/guides/import-progress-examples.md

@@ -13,7 +13,7 @@ Brainy provides real-time progress tracking for **all 7 supported file formats**
 ### Basic Progress Tracking
 
 ```typescript
-import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 import * as fs from 'fs'
 
 const brain = await Brainy.create()

docs/guides/import-quick-reference.md

@@ -7,7 +7,7 @@
 ## Basic Import
 
 ```typescript
-import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 const brain = new Brainy()
 await brain.init()
@@ -187,7 +187,7 @@ await brain.import(file, {
 ## Complete Example
 
 ```typescript
-import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 import * as fs from 'fs'
 
 async function importCatalog() {

docs/guides/inspection.md

@@ -108,7 +108,7 @@ check fails — useful for piping into monitoring or CI.
 ## Programmatic inspection
 
 ```typescript
-import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 const reader = await Brainy.openReadOnly({
   storage: { type: 'filesystem', path: '/data/brain' }

docs/guides/installation.md

@@ -21,21 +21,21 @@ next:
 ## Install
 
 ```bash
-npm install @soulcraft/brainy
+npm install @soulcraftlabs/brainy
 ```
 
 Or with your preferred package manager:
 
 ```bash
-bun add @soulcraft/brainy
-yarn add @soulcraft/brainy
-pnpm add @soulcraft/brainy
+bun add @soulcraftlabs/brainy
+yarn add @soulcraftlabs/brainy
+pnpm add @soulcraftlabs/brainy
 ```
 
 ## Verify
 
 ```typescript
-import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 const brain = new Brainy()
 await brain.init()
@@ -52,7 +52,7 @@ npm install @soulcraft/cor
 ```
 
 ```typescript
-import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 const brain = new Brainy({ plugins: ['@soulcraft/cor'] })
 await brain.init()  // native providers registered during init
@@ -71,7 +71,7 @@ remains available on npm if you need it.
 Brainy ships with full TypeScript types. No `@types/` package needed:
 
 ```typescript
-import { Brainy, NounType, VerbType } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy, NounType, VerbType } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 const brain = new Brainy()
 await brain.init()

docs/guides/migration-3.36.0.md

@@ -66,7 +66,7 @@ const results = await brain.search("query")
 **New diagnostics for capacity planning and performance tuning.**
 
 ```typescript
-import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 const brain = new Brainy()
 await brain.init()
@@ -112,7 +112,7 @@ Recommendations: ${stats.recommendations.join(', ')}
 ### Step 1: Update Package
 
 ```bash
-npm install @soulcraft/brainy@latest
+npm install @soulcraftlabs/brainy@latest
 ```
 
 ### Step 2: Restart Your Application
@@ -134,7 +134,7 @@ npm run start
 ### Check Adaptive Sizing is Working
 
 ```typescript
-import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 const brain = new Brainy()
 await brain.init()
@@ -218,7 +218,7 @@ For debugging or compatibility testing:
 If you need to rollback to v3.35.0:
 
 ```bash
-npm install @soulcraft/brainy@3.35.0
+npm install @soulcraftlabs/brainy@3.35.0
 ```
 
 **Note:** We don't anticipate any issues, but rollback is straightforward if needed.
@@ -367,7 +367,7 @@ if (stats.fairness.fairnessViolation) {
 
 ## Next Steps
 
-1. ✅ **Upgrade:** `npm install @soulcraft/brainy@latest`
+1. ✅ **Upgrade:** `npm install @soulcraftlabs/brainy@latest`
 2. 📊 **Monitor:** Use `getCacheStats()` to verify performance improvements
 3. 🎯 **Tune:** Adjust based on recommendations (if needed)
 4. 📖 **Read:** [Operations Guide](../operations/capacity-planning.md) for capacity planning

docs/guides/model-loading.md

@@ -37,7 +37,7 @@ This single WASM file contains everything needed for sentence embeddings.
 
 ```bash
 # Bun as a runtime — supported and recommended
-bun add @soulcraft/brainy
+bun add @soulcraftlabs/brainy
 bun run server.ts
 ```
 

docs/guides/namespace-migration.md

@@ -80,7 +80,7 @@ If you read raw stored records (fact-log scanners, export tooling), use
 the exported shape-aware splitters — they handle both record eras:
 
 ```typescript
-import { splitNounMetadataRecord } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { splitNounMetadataRecord } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 const { reserved, custom } = splitNounMetadataRecord(rawRecord)
 // reserved = engine fields · custom = the user's bag, ANY names
 ```
@@ -88,7 +88,7 @@ const { reserved, custom } = splitNounMetadataRecord(rawRecord)
 Feature detection (never version-sniff):
 
 ```typescript
-import * as brainy from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import * as brainy from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 const lawActive = 'FIELD_ADDRESSING_CAPABILITY' in brainy // 'field-addressing/v1'
 ```
 

docs/guides/nextjs-integration.md

@@ -9,7 +9,7 @@ Complete guide to integrating Brainy with Next.js applications, covering App Rou
 ```bash
 npx create-next-app@latest my-brainy-app
 cd my-brainy-app
-npm install @soulcraft/brainy
+npm install @soulcraftlabs/brainy
 ```
 
 ### Basic Setup
@@ -18,7 +18,7 @@ npm install @soulcraft/brainy
 // app/components/BrainyProvider.jsx
 'use client'
 import { createContext, useContext, useEffect, useState } from 'react'
-import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 const BrainyContext = createContext()
 
@@ -271,7 +271,7 @@ export default function SearchPage() {
 
 ```javascript
 // app/api/search/route.js (App Router)
-import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 let brain = null
 
@@ -332,7 +332,7 @@ export async function GET() {
 
 ```javascript
 // pages/api/search.js (Pages Router)
-import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 let brain = null
 
@@ -374,7 +374,7 @@ export default async function handler(req, res) {
 
 ```javascript
 // app/api/data/route.js
-import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 let brain = null
 
@@ -418,7 +418,7 @@ export async function POST(request) {
 ```jsx
 // app/actions/brainy.js
 'use server'
-import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 let brain = null
 
@@ -630,7 +630,7 @@ CMD ["npm", "start"]
 /** @type {import('next').NextConfig} */
 const nextConfig = {
   experimental: {
-    serverComponentsExternalPackages: ['@soulcraft/brainy']
+    serverComponentsExternalPackages: ['@soulcraftlabs/brainy']
   },
   webpack: (config, { isServer }) => {
     if (!isServer) {
@@ -797,7 +797,7 @@ export function rateLimit(req, limit = 100, window = 60000) {
 // app/contexts/BrainyContext.jsx
 'use client'
 import { createContext, useContext, useReducer, useEffect } from 'react'
-import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 const BrainyContext = createContext()
 
@@ -873,7 +873,7 @@ import { BrainyProvider } from '../app/components/BrainyProvider'
 import { Search } from '../app/components/Search'
 
 // Mock Brainy
-jest.mock('@soulcraft/brainy', () => ({
+jest.mock('@soulcraftlabs/brainy', () => ({
   Brainy: jest.fn().mockImplementation(() => ({
     init: jest.fn().mockResolvedValue(undefined),
     find: jest.fn().mockResolvedValue([

docs/guides/optimistic-concurrency.md

@@ -32,7 +32,7 @@ Brainy 7.31.0 adds a per-entity revision counter so multiple writers can coordin
 Every distributed-job scheduler eventually wants this exact loop:
 
 ```ts
-import { Brainy, RevisionConflictError } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy, RevisionConflictError } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 const LOCK_ID = '...uuid for this job slot...'
 
@@ -137,7 +137,7 @@ await brain.addIfMissing({                       // ← not a real API
 It's race-prone as a plain read-then-write: two concurrent imports both see "not found," both insert, you get duplicates. Without a unique-index primitive (which Brainy doesn't have today), close the race with whole-store CAS — read at a pinned generation, then commit only if nothing moved:
 
 ```ts
-import { GenerationConflictError } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { GenerationConflictError } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 async function addIfMissingByEmail(email: string, data: string) {
   for (let attempt = 0; attempt < 5; attempt++) {

docs/guides/quick-start.md

@@ -18,13 +18,13 @@ Get Brainy running in under a minute.
 ## 1. Install
 
 ```bash
-npm install @soulcraft/brainy
+npm install @soulcraftlabs/brainy
 ```
 
 ## 2. Initialize
 
 ```typescript
-import { Brainy, NounType, VerbType } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy, NounType, VerbType } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 const brain = new Brainy()
 await brain.init()
@@ -67,7 +67,7 @@ await brain.relate({
 ## 5. Query with Triple Intelligence
 
 ```typescript
-import type { Result } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import type { Result } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 // All three search paradigms in one call
 const results: Result[] = await brain.find({

docs/guides/standard-import-progress.md

@@ -11,7 +11,7 @@
 ### One Interface for Everything
 
 ```typescript
-import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 const brain = await Brainy.create()
 
@@ -78,7 +78,7 @@ interface ImportProgress {
 
 ```typescript
 import { useState } from 'react'
-import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 function UniversalImportProgress({ file }: { file: File }) {
   const [progress, setProgress] = useState({
@@ -177,7 +177,7 @@ function UniversalImportProgress({ file }: { file: File }) {
 
 ```typescript
 import ora from 'ora'
-import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 async function importWithProgress(filePath: string) {
   const spinner = ora('Starting import...').start()

docs/guides/storage-adapters.md

@@ -28,7 +28,7 @@ on-disk layout (memory's "disk" is a JS Map).
 ## Quick start
 
 ```ts
-import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 // Filesystem (recommended for any persistent workload):
 const brain = new Brainy({
@@ -134,7 +134,7 @@ config; the `type` is optional.
 If you want to skip the factory:
 
 ```ts
-import { FileSystemStorage, MemoryStorage } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { FileSystemStorage, MemoryStorage } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 const fsStorage = new FileSystemStorage('./brainy-data')
 const memStorage = new MemoryStorage()

docs/guides/subtypes-and-facets.md

@@ -34,7 +34,7 @@ Three layers solve this:
 ### Write
 
 ```typescript
-import { Brainy, NounType } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy, NounType } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 const brain = new Brainy()
 await brain.init()
@@ -240,7 +240,7 @@ await brain.migrateField({
 A realistic adoption sequence for a brain that started without these primitives:
 
 ```typescript
-import { Brainy, NounType } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy, NounType } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 const brain = new Brainy({ storage: { type: 'filesystem', path: './brain-data' } })
 await brain.init()

docs/guides/upgrading-7-to-8.md

@@ -25,7 +25,7 @@ content — and how 8.0 recovers it for you.
 
 ## TL;DR
 
-- **Just upgrade to `@soulcraft/brainy@8.0.12` (or later) and open the store.**
+- **Just upgrade to `@soulcraftlabs/brainy@8.0.12` (or later) and open the store.**
   If a previous upgrade left VFS content stranded, 8.0.12 **heals it on open**,
   with no operator action.
 - Want to force or script it? Call **`await brain.vfs.adoptOrphanedBlobs()`**.
@@ -90,7 +90,7 @@ So the operator action for a stranded store is simply: **upgrade to 8.0.12 and
 open it.**
 
 ```ts
-import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 // Opening the store is all that is required — recovery runs during init().
 const brain = new Brainy({ storage: { type: 'filesystem', path: '/data/my-store' } })
@@ -182,5 +182,5 @@ and opening each store is sufficient.
 The recovery is copy-only, so no rollback of the recovery itself is ever needed.
 If you need to roll back the **whole** 7→8 upgrade, restore the directory from
 your pre-upgrade backup (retained automatically while recovery is incomplete, or
-your own snapshot) and pin `@soulcraft/brainy@7.x`. 8.0 does not keep the old
+your own snapshot) and pin `@soulcraftlabs/brainy@7.x`. 8.0 does not keep the old
 branch layout in place, so a directory-level restore is the rollback path.

docs/guides/vue-integration.md

@@ -12,7 +12,7 @@ Complete guide to integrating Brainy with Vue.js applications, covering Vue 3, N
 npm create vue@latest my-brainy-app
 cd my-brainy-app
 npm install
-npm install @soulcraft/brainy
+npm install @soulcraftlabs/brainy
 ```
 
 ### Basic Setup
@@ -574,7 +574,7 @@ Nuxt's server engine (Nitro) is the natural home for Brainy: it runs on Node/Bun
 
 ```javascript
 // server/utils/brain.js  (server-only — Nitro never bundles this into the client)
-import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 let brainPromise
 
@@ -1201,7 +1201,7 @@ import vue from '@vitejs/plugin-vue'
 export default defineConfig({
   plugins: [vue()],
   ssr: {
-    external: ['@soulcraft/brainy']
+    external: ['@soulcraftlabs/brainy']
   }
 })
 ```

docs/neural-extraction.md

@@ -24,7 +24,7 @@ Brainy's neural extraction system uses a **4-signal ensemble architecture** to c
 ### Method 1: Brain Instance (Recommended)
 
 ```typescript
-import { Brainy, NounType } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy, NounType } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 const brain = new Brainy()
 await brain.init()
@@ -62,9 +62,9 @@ const people = await brain.extractEntities('...', {
 import {
   SmartExtractor,
   SmartRelationshipExtractor
-} from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+} from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 // Or use subpath imports:
-import { SmartExtractor } from '@soulcraft/brainy/neural/SmartExtractor'
+import { SmartExtractor } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy/neural/SmartExtractor'
 
 const brain = new Brainy()
 await brain.init()
@@ -176,7 +176,7 @@ const withVectors = await brain.extractEntities(text, {
 **Direct entity type classifier.** Use when you have pre-detected candidates or need custom configuration.
 
 ```typescript
-import { SmartExtractor, FormatContext } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { SmartExtractor, FormatContext } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 const extractor = new SmartExtractor(brain, {
   minConfidence: 0.7,              // Threshold
@@ -229,7 +229,7 @@ interface ExtractionResult {
 **Relationship type classifier.** Determines verb/relationship types between entities.
 
 ```typescript
-import { SmartRelationshipExtractor } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { SmartRelationshipExtractor } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 const relExtractor = new SmartRelationshipExtractor(brain, {
   minConfidence: 0.6,
@@ -286,7 +286,7 @@ const rel = await relExtractor.infer(
 **Full extraction orchestrator.** Handles candidate detection, classification, and deduplication.
 
 ```typescript
-import { NeuralEntityExtractor } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { NeuralEntityExtractor } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 const extractor = new NeuralEntityExtractor(brain)
 
@@ -607,7 +607,7 @@ const locations = entities.filter(e => e.type === NounType.Location)
 ### Example 2: Excel Data Classification
 
 ```typescript
-import { SmartExtractor } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { SmartExtractor } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 const extractor = new SmartExtractor(brain)
 
@@ -629,7 +629,7 @@ for (let i = 0; i < cells.length; i++) {
 ### Example 3: Relationship Extraction
 
 ```typescript
-import { SmartRelationshipExtractor } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { SmartRelationshipExtractor } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 const relExtractor = new SmartRelationshipExtractor(brain)
 

docs/transactions.md

@@ -204,8 +204,8 @@ await brain.add({ data: { name: 'Entity' }, type: NounType.Thing })
 ### Basic Add Operation
 
 ```typescript
-import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
-import { NounType } from '@soulcraft/brainy/types'
+import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
+import { NounType } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy/types'
 
 const brain = new Brainy()
 await brain.init()
@@ -428,7 +428,7 @@ await brain.relate({ ... })           // a crash here leaves the entity unlinked
 
 ```typescript
 import { describe, it, expect } from 'vitest'
-import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 describe('Transaction Tests', () => {
  it('should rollback on failure', async () => {

docs/universal-display-augmentation.md

@@ -23,7 +23,7 @@ The Universal Display Augmentation is a powerful AI-powered system that automati
 ### Basic Usage
 
 ```typescript
-import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 const brainy = new Brainy()
 await brainy.init()

docs/vfs/PROJECTION_STRATEGY_API.md

@@ -71,9 +71,9 @@ Let's build a projection that organizes files by priority (high, medium, low):
 ### Step 1: Create the Strategy Class
 
 ```typescript
-import { BaseProjectionStrategy } from '@soulcraft/brainy/vfs/semantic'
-import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
-import { VirtualFileSystem, VFSEntity } from '@soulcraft/brainy/vfs'
+import { BaseProjectionStrategy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy/vfs/semantic'
+import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
+import { VirtualFileSystem, VFSEntity } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy/vfs'
 
 export class PriorityProjection extends BaseProjectionStrategy {
   readonly name = 'priority'
@@ -141,7 +141,7 @@ export class PriorityProjection extends BaseProjectionStrategy {
 ### Step 2: Register the Strategy
 
 ```typescript
-import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 import { PriorityProjection } from './PriorityProjection'
 
 const brain = new Brainy()
@@ -537,7 +537,7 @@ Use the projection's resolve cache:
 
 ```typescript
 import { describe, it, expect, beforeAll } from 'vitest'
-import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 import { PriorityProjection } from './PriorityProjection'
 
 describe('PriorityProjection', () => {
@@ -714,7 +714,7 @@ async resolve(brain, vfs, value: string) {
 3. Use appropriate limits: Don't fetch more than needed
 
 ### Type errors
-1. Import correct types: `import { Brainy, VirtualFileSystem } from '@soulcraft/brainy'`
+1. Import correct types: `import { Brainy, VirtualFileSystem } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'`
 2. Use `as VFSEntity` when mapping results
 3. Check BaseProjectionStrategy import
 

docs/vfs/QUICK_START.md

@@ -14,11 +14,11 @@ A file explorer that:
 ## ⚡ Step 1: Basic Setup (1 minute)
 
 ```bash
-npm install @soulcraft/brainy
+npm install @soulcraftlabs/brainy
 ```
 
 ```typescript
-import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 // ✅ CORRECT: Use filesystem storage for production
 const brain = new Brainy({
@@ -115,7 +115,7 @@ Here's a complete React component using the correct patterns:
 
 ```tsx
 import React, { useState, useEffect } from 'react'
-import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 export function FileExplorer() {
  const [brain, setBrain] = useState(null)
@@ -288,8 +288,8 @@ Your file explorer is now working! Here's what to explore next:
 ### "Module not found" errors
 ```bash
 # Make sure you're using the right import
-npm ls @soulcraft/brainy # Check version
-npm install @soulcraft/brainy@latest # Update if needed
+npm ls @soulcraftlabs/brainy # Check version
+npm install @soulcraftlabs/brainy@latest # Update if needed
 ```
 
 ### "VFS not initialized" errors

docs/vfs/README.md

@@ -24,7 +24,7 @@ Brainy VFS is a revolutionary virtual filesystem that runs on top of Brainy's ne
 ## Quick Start
 
 ```javascript
-import { VirtualFileSystem } from '@soulcraft/brainy/vfs'
+import { VirtualFileSystem } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy/vfs'
 
 // Initialize the VFS
 const vfs = new VirtualFileSystem({
@@ -381,7 +381,7 @@ Brainy VFS fully leverages Brainy's revolutionary Triple Intelligence system:
 ## Installation
 
 ```bash
-npm install @soulcraft/brainy
+npm install @soulcraftlabs/brainy
 ```
 
 ## Requirements

docs/vfs/ROADMAP.md

@@ -135,7 +135,7 @@ Mount VFS as a native filesystem on Linux/Mac/Windows.
 
 ```typescript
 // Planned (research phase)
-import { mountVFS } from '@soulcraft/brainy/vfs/fuse'
+import { mountVFS } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy/vfs/fuse'
 
 await mountVFS(vfs, {
   mountPoint: '/mnt/brainy',
@@ -160,7 +160,7 @@ These features would benefit from community contributions. If you're interested
 ### Express.js Static Middleware
 ```typescript
 // Wanted: Community contribution
-import { createStaticMiddleware } from '@soulcraft/brainy/vfs/express'
+import { createStaticMiddleware } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy/vfs/express'
 
 app.use('/files', createStaticMiddleware(vfs, {
   index: ['index.html', 'index.md'],
@@ -172,7 +172,7 @@ app.use('/files', createStaticMiddleware(vfs, {
 ### VSCode Extension
 ```typescript
 // Wanted: Community contribution
-import { VFSProvider } from '@soulcraft/brainy/vfs/vscode'
+import { VFSProvider } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy/vfs/vscode'
 
 const provider = new VFSProvider(vfs)
 vscode.workspace.registerFileSystemProvider('brainy', provider)

docs/vfs/SEMANTIC_VFS.md

@@ -327,7 +327,7 @@ console.log(id1 === id2 && id2 === id3)  // true
 Create your own semantic dimensions:
 
 ```typescript
-import { BaseProjectionStrategy } from '@soulcraft/brainy/vfs/semantic'
+import { BaseProjectionStrategy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy/vfs/semantic'
 
 class PriorityProjection extends BaseProjectionStrategy {
   readonly name = 'priority'

docs/vfs/VFS_API_GUIDE.md

@@ -7,7 +7,7 @@ Brainy's Virtual Filesystem (VFS) provides a POSIX-like filesystem interface tha
 ## Quick Start
 
 ```typescript
-import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 // Initialize Brainy
 const brain = new Brainy({
@@ -598,7 +598,7 @@ const user = await store.findById('users', 'user123')
 VFS uses standard POSIX-style errors:
 
 ```typescript
-import { VFSError, VFSErrorCode } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { VFSError, VFSErrorCode } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 try {
   await vfs.readFile('/nonexistent.txt')

docs/vfs/VFS_CORE.md

@@ -280,7 +280,7 @@ GitBridge provides Git import/export capabilities:
 #### GitBridge Usage
 ```javascript
 // Import and instantiate GitBridge
-import { GitBridge } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { GitBridge } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 const gitBridge = new GitBridge(vfs, brain)
 
 // Export VFS to Git repository structure
@@ -452,7 +452,7 @@ This ordering prevents race conditions where file writes might fail because pare
 ## Complete Example
 
 ```javascript
-import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 async function vfsExample() {
   // Initialize

docs/vfs/VFS_GRAPH_TYPES.md

@@ -196,5 +196,5 @@ await brain.relate({
 Always import and use the type enums:
 
 ```javascript
-import { NounType, VerbType } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { NounType, VerbType } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 ```

docs/vfs/VFS_INITIALIZATION.md

@@ -5,7 +5,7 @@
 The Brainy VFS is automatically initialized during `brain.init()`. No separate initialization needed!
 
 ```javascript
-import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 // Create and initialize Brainy
 const brain = new Brainy({
@@ -71,7 +71,7 @@ VFS stores files as entities and relationships in the same graph as everything e
 ## Complete Example
 
 ```javascript
-import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 async function useVFS() {
   // Initialize Brainy
@@ -100,7 +100,7 @@ useVFS().catch(console.error)
 ## TypeScript Usage
 
 ```typescript
-import { Brainy, VirtualFileSystem } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy, VirtualFileSystem } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 class FileManager {
   private brain: Brainy

docs/vfs/building-file-explorers.md

@@ -37,7 +37,7 @@ Brainy VFS provides safe, tree-aware methods that prevent these issues:
 ### Method 1: Use `getDirectChildren()` (Recommended)
 
 ```typescript
-import { Brainy, VirtualFileSystem } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy, VirtualFileSystem } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 const brain = new Brainy()
 await brain.init()
@@ -97,7 +97,7 @@ Here's a complete example using React:
 
 ```tsx
 import React, { useState, useEffect } from 'react'
-import { VirtualFileSystem } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { VirtualFileSystem } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 interface FileNode {
   name: string
@@ -177,7 +177,7 @@ function TreeView({ node, onToggle, expanded }) {
 If you must build trees manually from flat lists, use the `VFSTreeUtils`:
 
 ```typescript
-import { VFSTreeUtils } from '@soulcraft/brainy/vfs'
+import { VFSTreeUtils } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy/vfs'
 
 // Get all entities somehow
 const allEntities = await vfs.getDescendants('/root')

examples/bluesky-distributed-setup.js

@@ -7,7 +7,7 @@
  * the Bluesky firehose with Brainy's distributed architecture
  */
 
-import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 import { WebSocket } from 'ws'
 
 // =====================================================

examples/monitor-cache-performance.ts

@@ -14,7 +14,7 @@
  *   ts-node examples/monitor-cache-performance.ts
  */
 
-import { Brainy, NounType } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy, NounType } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 // ANSI color codes for pretty output
 const colors = {

integrations/README.md

@@ -5,7 +5,7 @@ Connect Brainy to spreadsheets, BI tools, and external systems with zero configu
 ## Quick Start
 
 ```typescript
-import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 const brain = new Brainy({ integrations: true })
 await brain.init()
@@ -178,7 +178,7 @@ Webhooks include `X-Brainy-Signature` header with HMAC-SHA256 signature.
 ### Minimal (in-memory):
 
 ```typescript
-import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 const brain = new Brainy({ integrations: true })
 await brain.init()
@@ -194,7 +194,7 @@ console.log(brain.hub.getInstructions())
 
 ```typescript
 import express from 'express'
-import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 const app = express()
 const brain = new Brainy({
@@ -232,7 +232,7 @@ app.listen(3000, () => {
 
 ```typescript
 import { Hono } from 'hono'
-import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 const app = new Hono()
 

integrations/google-sheets/README.md

@@ -99,7 +99,7 @@ Add the `BRAINY_URL` script property in Apps Script settings.
 The simplest way to enable all integrations:
 
 ```javascript
-import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 const brain = new Brainy({ integrations: true })
 await brain.init()
@@ -112,7 +112,7 @@ With Express:
 
 ```javascript
 import express from 'express'
-import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 const app = express()
 const brain = new Brainy({ integrations: true })

package-lock.json

@@ -1,12 +1,12 @@
 {
-  "name": "@soulcraft/brainy",
-  "version": "10.4.2",
+  "name": "@soulcraftlabs/brainy",
+  "version": "10.4.4",
   "lockfileVersion": 3,
   "requires": true,
   "packages": {
     "": {
-      "name": "@soulcraft/brainy",
-      "version": "10.4.2",
+      "name": "@soulcraftlabs/brainy",
+      "version": "10.4.4",
       "license": "MIT",
       "dependencies": {
         "@msgpack/msgpack": "^3.1.2",

package.json

@@ -1,6 +1,7 @@
 {
-  "name": "@soulcraft/brainy",
-  "version": "10.4.2",
+  "name": "@soulcraftlabs/brainy",
+  "version": "10.4.4",
+  "brainyContract": 1,
   "description": "Universal Knowledge Protocol™ - World's first Triple Intelligence database unifying vector, graph, and document search in one API. Stage 3 CANONICAL: 42 nouns × 127 verbs covering 96-97% of all human knowledge.",
   "main": "dist/index.js",
   "module": "dist/index.js",
@@ -126,15 +127,16 @@
   "license": "MIT",
   "private": false,
   "publishConfig": {
-    "access": "public"
+    "access": "public",
+    "registry": "https://source.soulcraft.com/api/packages/soulcraftlabs/npm/"
   },
-  "homepage": "https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraft/brainy",
+  "homepage": "https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraftlabs/open-brainy",
   "bugs": {
-    "url": "https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraft/brainy/issues"
+    "url": "https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraftlabs/open-brainy/issues"
   },
   "repository": {
     "type": "git",
-    "url": "git+https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraft/brainy.git"
+    "url": "git+https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraftlabs/open-brainy.git"
   },
   "files": [
     "dist/**/*.js",

releases/brainy.json

@@ -0,0 +1,76 @@
+{
+  "product": "brainy",
+  "entries": [
+    {
+      "version": "11.0.5",
+      "date": "2026-09-02",
+      "headline": "Graph-first finds in production, and opens that stop rescanning history",
+      "items": [
+        "find({ connected, where }) now walks the neighbours first and filters only those rows through a native door — correct at every page and O(neighbours), never the whole store.",
+        "related() with a list of verb types returns every requested kind (a fast path had silently kept only the first).",
+        "Deferred-embedding recovery resumes from a low-water mark instead of rescanning the whole generation log at every open — measured at two minutes on a large brain, now milliseconds."
+      ],
+      "url": null,
+      "thumb": null
+    },
+    {
+      "version": "11.0.4",
+      "date": "2026-09-01",
+      "headline": "Closes in milliseconds, index rebuilds without the disk-sync storm",
+      "items": [
+        "close() no longer pays deferred compaction or waits out an in-flight rebuild — measured 8 ms against the 4-minute closes it replaces; deferred work resumes at the next open, in the background.",
+        "The metadata index's rebuild syncs to disk per shard instead of per row, and the durability point moved to the publish step — the same guarantee, a fraction of the disk traffic.",
+        "A new native filter door evaluates queries over exactly the candidate rows a graph walk found, never the whole store."
+      ],
+      "url": null,
+      "thumb": null
+    },
+    {
+      "version": "11.0.3",
+      "date": "2026-09-01",
+      "headline": "The embedding upgrade ceremony runs on every brain",
+      "items": [
+        "A brain opened through the standard plugin now carries its embedding-model identity, so the full-precision upgrade ceremony can run on it.",
+        "A one-fix release; nothing else changed."
+      ],
+      "url": null,
+      "thumb": null
+    },
+    {
+      "version": "11.0.2",
+      "date": "2026-08-31",
+      "headline": "One embedding quality everywhere, 3–4× faster imports",
+      "items": [
+        "Every runtime embeds with the same full-precision model — search quality no longer depends on where you run.",
+        "Bulk embedding measured 3.1–4.2× faster, and an online re-embed ceremony upgrades existing stores without downtime.",
+        "The engine's change feed is documented, with the SSE/WebSocket fan-out pattern for realtime surfaces."
+      ],
+      "url": null,
+      "thumb": null
+    },
+    {
+      "version": "11.0.1",
+      "date": "2026-08-31",
+      "headline": "Deletes inside transactions are safe",
+      "items": [
+        "Deleting relations inside a transact() no longer corrupts index bookkeeping.",
+        "A store that deletes its last relation keeps serving instead of refusing."
+      ],
+      "url": null,
+      "thumb": null
+    },
+    {
+      "version": "11.0.0",
+      "date": "2026-08-28",
+      "headline": "One install, one engine — Brainy",
+      "items": [
+        "The former two-package pair is one package: the native engine under the familiar API. One import is the whole install.",
+        "A missing native build refuses loudly with its cures named; nothing falls back silently.",
+        "Stores open in place — no migration."
+      ],
+      "url": null,
+      "thumb": null
+    }
+  ],
+  "history": "The version line continues from the 4.3.x native-engine releases; their record lives in the product repository's CHANGELOG.md."
+}

releases/open-brainy.json

@@ -0,0 +1,136 @@
+{
+  "product": "open-brainy",
+  "entries": [
+    {
+      "version": "10.4.11",
+      "date": "2026-09-02",
+      "headline": "Hybrid finds filter before they hydrate, one owner per shutdown, and a faster open",
+      "items": [
+        "Hybrid finds (query/vector combined with a filter, including connected and fusion finds) now filter first and hydrate only the page — one batchGet of exactly the requested rows, instead of hydrating everything the search side found. Fixes a bug where any page after the first came back empty.",
+        "A brain now has exactly one shutdown owner — a host and its engine no longer race to close the same store, and a follow-up flush requested during a running flush is handed off cleanly instead of ever risking a stall.",
+        "find({ path }) and other path-scoped VFS searches now serve a real range over the indexed path (O(log n)) instead of refusing the query outright — both scoped and recursive:false searches were silently broken before this.",
+        "Open no longer rescans a brain's whole fact log on every open — sealed segments the manifest already accounts for are skipped, collapsing a multi-second open term to near-zero on large brains.",
+        "commitTransaction() now refuses by name if single-ops are still pending, and a read-only open no longer writes clean-shutdown evidence it didn't earn — two correctness invariants that were previously assumed, not enforced."
+      ],
+      "url": "https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraftlabs/open-brainy/releases/tag/v10.4.11",
+      "thumb": null
+    },
+    {
+      "version": "10.4.10",
+      "date": "2026-09-02",
+      "headline": "A planner door for indexes, batched containment repair, and a fixed near()",
+      "items": [
+        "An optional planFindPage door lets an index plan a find() and answer it in one call, instead of the engine assembling the plan itself.",
+        "repairContainment's reconcile pass now walks paged edges once instead of issuing one graph call per file.",
+        "find({ near }) now searches around the anchor's own vector and refuses by name when none is available, instead of silently querying with no vector at all."
+      ],
+      "url": "https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraftlabs/open-brainy/releases/tag/v10.4.10",
+      "thumb": null
+    },
+    {
+      "version": "10.4.9",
+      "date": "2026-09-02",
+      "headline": "Graph-first finds, honest verb arrays, and opens that stop rescanning history",
+      "items": [
+        "find({ connected, where }) now walks the neighbours first and filters only those rows — correct at every page, and O(neighbours) instead of O(store).",
+        "related() with a list of verb types (or sources, or targets) returns every requested kind — four fast paths silently kept only the first.",
+        "Deferred-embedding recovery resumes from a low-water mark instead of rescanning the whole generation log at every open — measured at two minutes on a large brain, now milliseconds."
+      ],
+      "url": "https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraftlabs/open-brainy/releases/tag/v10.4.9",
+      "thumb": null
+    },
+    {
+      "version": "10.4.7",
+      "date": "2026-09-01",
+      "headline": "Count ledgers can no longer race themselves",
+      "items": [
+        "Concurrent count flushes coalesce into one writer with a trailing pass — parallel flushes can no longer corrupt a store's count ledger.",
+        "Atomic writes carry a per-process sequence, so two processes' temp files can never collide."
+      ],
+      "url": "https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraftlabs/open-brainy/releases/tag/v10.4.7",
+      "thumb": null
+    },
+    {
+      "version": "10.4.6",
+      "date": "2026-08-31",
+      "headline": "Transactions cross the index seam safely",
+      "items": [
+        "Deleting relations inside a transact() no longer fails against the metadata index — operations take a JSON-safe view at the moment they execute.",
+        "Fixes a class of transaction failures on stores with integer-mapped relation endpoints."
+      ],
+      "url": "https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraftlabs/open-brainy/releases/tag/v10.4.6",
+      "thumb": null
+    },
+    {
+      "version": "10.4.5",
+      "date": "2026-08-31",
+      "headline": "Recovery tells the truth, docs live at home",
+      "items": [
+        "A torn generation-log tail is a terminal verdict with a named cure — never an endless wait at open.",
+        "A sealed segment declares only the generations it actually holds.",
+        "The engine's documentation now publishes from its own repository."
+      ],
+      "url": "https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraftlabs/open-brainy/releases/tag/v10.4.5",
+      "thumb": null
+    },
+    {
+      "version": "10.4.4",
+      "date": "2026-08-28",
+      "headline": "Faster opens, quieter idle",
+      "items": [
+        "Opening a store discovers generations from directory names instead of walking the log, and answers \"any entities?\" with one directory read.",
+        "The flush-request watch is event-driven; idle stores stop paying a polling heartbeat.",
+        "A slow open now names the exact step it is in, so operators see what is being paid and why."
+      ],
+      "url": "https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraftlabs/open-brainy/releases/tag/v10.4.4",
+      "thumb": null
+    },
+    {
+      "version": "10.4.3",
+      "date": "2026-08-27",
+      "headline": "Open Brainy, under its own name",
+      "items": [
+        "The same engine as 10.4.2, now published as @soulcraftlabs/brainy — the MIT reference engine, on The Source.",
+        "No code changes; your imports change once and everything else stays put."
+      ],
+      "url": "https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraftlabs/open-brainy/releases/tag/v10.4.3",
+      "thumb": null
+    },
+    {
+      "version": "10.4.2",
+      "date": "2026-08-27",
+      "headline": "Vectors that lie are refused, counts that drift are caught",
+      "items": [
+        "A zero-norm vector is not a vector: the index refuses them, rebuilds skip them, and a sanctioned unvector door removes them cleanly.",
+        "The canonical count ledger derives from identity records and marks legacy-derived ledgers suspect at load.",
+        "Plugin activation failures keep their original error as cause, so the real frame reaches your logs."
+      ],
+      "url": "https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraftlabs/open-brainy/releases/tag/v10.4.2",
+      "thumb": null
+    },
+    {
+      "version": "10.4.1",
+      "date": "2026-08-26",
+      "headline": "Writes that change nothing cost nothing",
+      "items": [
+        "The read gate is per index family, and a write carrying unchanged data never re-embeds.",
+        "The vectored-row count joins the ledger, so vector coverage is a number you can read, not a guess."
+      ],
+      "url": "https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraftlabs/open-brainy/releases/tag/v10.4.1",
+      "thumb": null
+    },
+    {
+      "version": "10.4.0",
+      "date": "2026-08-26",
+      "headline": "Repair routing, the vector ledger, and honest empties",
+      "items": [
+        "Repairs route to the index that owns the damage, and the open gate closes the vector leg until coverage is proven.",
+        "An empty string is real data, not a missing field.",
+        "The metadata crossing never carries raw integer relation endpoints — a whole class of serialization faults closed."
+      ],
+      "url": "https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraftlabs/open-brainy/releases/tag/v10.4.0",
+      "thumb": null
+    }
+  ],
+  "history": "Earlier releases are recorded in CHANGELOG.md in this repository."
+}

scripts/emit-contract-manifest.mjs

@@ -0,0 +1,128 @@
+#!/usr/bin/env node
+/**
+ * Emit this build's API-contract manifest to docs/api-contract.json.
+ *
+ * WHY IT IS GENERATED, NOT WRITTEN: a hand-kept list of doors drifts from the
+ * code the first time somebody adds one. This reads the surface the build
+ * actually exposes — the prototype's own methods and accessors, the exported
+ * error classes, the `where` operator sets, the field-addressing vocabulary,
+ * the health verdicts — so a diff between two engines' manifests is a diff
+ * between two engines, never between two authors.
+ *
+ * Requirement marking (required / optional per door) is NOT derivable from the
+ * surface — it is a commitment, recorded with the contract's owner rather than
+ * here. This manifest carries the surface; the promise lives with the contract.
+ *
+ * Usage: node scripts/emit-contract-manifest.mjs [--check]
+ *   --check exits non-zero when the committed manifest is stale.
+ */
+
+import { writeFileSync, readFileSync, existsSync } from 'node:fs'
+import { join, dirname } from 'node:path'
+import { fileURLToPath } from 'node:url'
+
+const ROOT = join(dirname(fileURLToPath(import.meta.url)), '..')
+const OUT = join(ROOT, 'docs', 'api-contract.json')
+
+const { Brainy } = await import(join(ROOT, 'dist', 'brainy.js'))
+const errorsModule = await import(join(ROOT, 'dist', 'errors', 'brainyError.js'))
+const versionModule = await import(join(ROOT, 'dist', 'utils', 'version.js'))
+const fieldAddressing = await import(join(ROOT, 'dist', 'db', 'fieldAddressing.js'))
+
+/** Every own method and accessor on the class's prototype, minus the private ones. */
+function surfaceOf(ctor) {
+  const doors = []
+  for (const name of Object.getOwnPropertyNames(ctor.prototype)) {
+    if (name === 'constructor' || name.startsWith('_')) continue
+    const descriptor = Object.getOwnPropertyDescriptor(ctor.prototype, name)
+    if (!descriptor) continue
+    if (typeof descriptor.value === 'function') {
+      doors.push({ name, kind: 'method', arity: descriptor.value.length })
+    } else if (descriptor.get) {
+      doors.push({ name, kind: 'accessor' })
+    }
+  }
+  return doors.sort((a, b) => a.name.localeCompare(b.name))
+}
+
+const errors = Object.entries(errorsModule)
+  .filter(([name, value]) => typeof value === 'function' && /Error$/.test(name))
+  .map(([name]) => name)
+  .sort()
+
+// The operator sets, read from the engine's own refusal message so the
+// manifest can never disagree with the validator.
+const filterSource = readFileSync(join(ROOT, 'src', 'utils', 'metadataFilter.ts'), 'utf-8')
+const acceptedMatch = filterSource.match(/const VALUE_OPERATORS = new Set<string>\(\[([\s\S]*?)\]\)/)
+if (!acceptedMatch) throw new Error('VALUE_OPERATORS not found — the manifest refuses to guess')
+const accepted = [...acceptedMatch[1].matchAll(/'([^']+)'/g)].map((m) => m[1]).sort()
+
+const indexSource = readFileSync(join(ROOT, 'src', 'utils', 'metadataIndex.ts'), 'utf-8')
+const refusedByIndex = ['endsWith', 'length', 'matches', 'startsWith'].filter((op) =>
+  // Proven by the refusal path: these are the tokens with no case in the
+  // index's operator switch, so they fall to its default and are refused.
+  !new RegExp(`case '${op}':`).test(indexSource)
+)
+const servedOnIndex = accepted.filter((op) => !refusedByIndex.includes(op))
+
+const manifest = {
+  contractVersion: versionModule.contractVersion(),
+  engine: '@soulcraftlabs/brainy',
+  compatibility: {
+    minor:
+      'additive — a new optional door, a new served operator, a new error class; every existing implementation still conforms',
+    major:
+      'breaking — a door removed, an answer narrowed, an ordering law changed, an optional door promoted to required, or an operator moved from served to refused'
+  },
+  doors: surfaceOf(Brainy),
+  errors,
+  operators: {
+    accepted,
+    servedOnIndexPath: servedOnIndex,
+    refusedByIndexPath: refusedByIndex,
+    combinators: ['allOf', 'anyOf', 'not']
+  },
+  fieldAddressing: {
+    systemKeyPrefix: 'system.',
+    systemEntityScalars: [...(fieldAddressing.SYSTEM_ENTITY_SCALARS ?? [])].sort(),
+    systemRelationScalars: [...(fieldAddressing.SYSTEM_RELATION_SCALARS ?? [])].sort(),
+    plumbingFields: [...(fieldAddressing.PLUMBING_FIELDS ?? [])].sort()
+  },
+  health: {
+    verdicts: ['pass', 'warn', 'fail'],
+    healKinds: ['none', 'repair', 'rebuild'],
+    servingWithholdingInvariants: [
+      'index-initialized',
+      'durable-state-present',
+      'manifest-residency',
+      'replay-clean',
+      'strand-latch'
+    ]
+  }
+}
+
+const rendered = `${JSON.stringify(manifest, null, 2)}\n`
+
+if (process.argv.includes('--check')) {
+  if (!existsSync(OUT)) {
+    console.error(`docs/api-contract.json is missing — run: node scripts/emit-contract-manifest.mjs`)
+    process.exit(1)
+  }
+  if (readFileSync(OUT, 'utf-8') !== rendered) {
+    console.error(
+      `docs/api-contract.json is STALE — the public surface changed. Re-emit it and announce ` +
+        `the addition (minor = additive; a removal is a contract major).`
+    )
+    process.exit(1)
+  }
+  console.log(`docs/api-contract.json is current (${manifest.doors.length} doors, contract ${manifest.contractVersion}).`)
+  process.exit(0)
+}
+
+writeFileSync(OUT, rendered)
+console.log(
+  `Wrote docs/api-contract.json — contract ${manifest.contractVersion}, ` +
+    `${manifest.doors.length} doors, ${manifest.errors.length} error classes, ` +
+    `${manifest.operators.accepted.length} operators ` +
+    `(${manifest.operators.refusedByIndexPath.length} refused by the index path).`
+)

scripts/release.sh

@@ -15,11 +15,11 @@ NC='\033[0m' # No Color
 RELEASE_TYPE="${1:-patch}"  # patch, minor, or major
 SKIP_TESTS=false
 DRY_RUN=false
-# --source-only: the HOME leg only — tag, CI's publish to The Source, and the
-# release page; NO storefront (npmjs) publish, NO pair verification, NO docs
-# push. The pair-gate shape: a prerelease the fleet's other engine devDeps
-# from our own registry while the pair is proven, never a public artifact.
-# Refused for a non-prerelease version — a public floor is always a pair.
+# --source-only is now a no-op: The Source is the one registry, so every
+# release already ships Source-only — tag, CI's publish to The Source, the
+# release page, and the docs push, with no separate storefront leg to skip.
+# The flag is still accepted (for backward-compatible invocations) and just
+# prints a notice; it no longer changes behavior.
 SOURCE_ONLY=false
 
 for arg in "$@"; do
@@ -109,7 +109,7 @@ else
       ;;
     *)
       echo -e "${RED}❌ Invalid release type: ${RELEASE_TYPE}${NC}"
-      echo "Usage: ./scripts/release.sh [patch|minor|major|<explicit-version>] [--dry-run] [--source-only (prereleases only)]"
+      echo "Usage: ./scripts/release.sh [patch|minor|major|<explicit-version>] [--dry-run] [--source-only (no-op; The Source is the one registry)]"
       exit 1
       ;;
   esac
@@ -129,11 +129,7 @@ if [ "$PRERELEASE" = true ]; then
   echo -e "${YELLOW}⚠️  Prerelease → npm dist-tag '${NPM_TAG}', GitHub prerelease${NC}"
 fi
 if [ "$SOURCE_ONLY" = true ]; then
-  if [ "$PRERELEASE" != true ]; then
-    echo -e "${RED}❌ --source-only is for prereleases only: a non-prerelease version is a public floor and always ships as the byte-identical pair.${NC}"
-    exit 1
-  fi
-  echo -e "${YELLOW}⚠️  --source-only → The Source (home) ONLY: no npmjs publish, no pair verification, no docs push${NC}"
+  echo -e "${YELLOW}⚠️  The Source is the one registry; --source-only is implied${NC}"
 fi
 echo ""
 
@@ -158,7 +154,7 @@ else
 fi
 
 # Create new changelog entry
-CHANGELOG_ENTRY="### [${NEW_VERSION}](https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraft/brainy/compare/v${CURRENT_VERSION}...v${NEW_VERSION}) ($(date +%Y-%m-%d))
+CHANGELOG_ENTRY="### [${NEW_VERSION}](https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraftlabs/open-brainy/compare/v${CURRENT_VERSION}...v${NEW_VERSION}) ($(date +%Y-%m-%d))
 
 ${COMMITS}
 "
@@ -209,9 +205,9 @@ echo -e "${GREEN}✅ Pushed to origin${NC}\n"
 # .forgejo/workflows/publish-source.yml, which builds and publishes on The
 # Source's own runner (datacenter-side: seconds, not the laptop's WAN timing
 # out on an 87MB tarball PUT). The laptop holds no home-registry publish
-# credential anymore; it only waits for CI's result before trusting the
-# home/npmjs pair enough to publish the storefront leg.
-SOURCE_NPM_REG="https://source.soulcraft.com/api/packages/soulcraft/npm/"
+# credential anymore; it only waits for CI's result before continuing on to
+# the release page and the docs push.
+SOURCE_NPM_REG="https://source.soulcraft.com/api/packages/soulcraftlabs/npm/"
 SOURCE_POLL_INTERVAL_S=15
 SOURCE_POLL_MAX_ATTEMPTS=200  # 200 × 15s = 50 minutes — the runner is sequential and a busy day's ci.yml
                              # backlog has twice exceeded the old 20-minute window (8.10.3, 9.0.0);
@@ -219,7 +215,7 @@ SOURCE_POLL_MAX_ATTEMPTS=200  # 200 × 15s = 50 minutes — the runner is sequen
 echo -e "${BLUE}9️⃣  Waiting for CI to publish v${NEW_VERSION} to The Source registry (home)...${NC}"
 SOURCE_LANDED=false
 for ((attempt = 1; attempt <= SOURCE_POLL_MAX_ATTEMPTS; attempt++)); do
-  LANDED_VERSION=$(npm view "@soulcraft/brainy@${NEW_VERSION}" version "--@soulcraft:registry=${SOURCE_NPM_REG}" 2>/dev/null || echo "")
+  LANDED_VERSION=$(npm view "@soulcraftlabs/brainy@${NEW_VERSION}" version "--@soulcraftlabs:registry=${SOURCE_NPM_REG}" 2>/dev/null || echo "")
   if [ "$LANDED_VERSION" = "$NEW_VERSION" ]; then
     SOURCE_LANDED=true
     break
@@ -232,62 +228,16 @@ if [ "$SOURCE_LANDED" = true ]; then
   echo -e "${GREEN}✅ CI published v${NEW_VERSION} to The Source${NC}\n"
 else
   echo -e "${RED}❌ CI's home publish did not land — check the workflow run on The Source; the pair must not diverge.${NC}"
-  echo -e "${RED}   v${NEW_VERSION} was tagged and pushed, but @soulcraft/brainy@${NEW_VERSION} never became visible on the${NC}"
-  echo -e "${RED}   Source registry after ${SOURCE_POLL_MAX_ATTEMPTS} attempts, ${SOURCE_POLL_INTERVAL_S}s apart. Aborting before npmjs.${NC}"
+  echo -e "${RED}   v${NEW_VERSION} was tagged and pushed, but @soulcraftlabs/brainy@${NEW_VERSION} never became visible on the${NC}"
+  echo -e "${RED}   Source registry after ${SOURCE_POLL_MAX_ATTEMPTS} attempts, ${SOURCE_POLL_INTERVAL_S}s apart. Aborting.${NC}"
   exit 1
 fi
 
-if [ "$SOURCE_ONLY" = true ]; then
-  echo -e "${YELLOW}9️⃣½  Storefront (npmjs) leg SKIPPED — --source-only: v${NEW_VERSION} lives on The Source under dist-tag '${NPM_TAG}' only${NC}\n"
-else
-  echo -e "${BLUE}9️⃣½  Publishing to npmjs (storefront, dist-tag: ${NPM_TAG})...${NC}"
-  # BYTE-IDENTITY LAW: the storefront republishes CI's EXACT artifact — download
-  # the tarball The Source serves and publish that file, never a fresh local pack
-  # (a local rebuild can differ byte-wise, and the fleet verifies the pair by
-  # shasum across registries).
-  STOREFRONT_TMP="$(mktemp -d)"
-  (cd "$STOREFRONT_TMP" && npm pack "@soulcraft/brainy@${NEW_VERSION}" "--@soulcraft:registry=${SOURCE_NPM_REG}" >/dev/null)
-  SOURCE_TARBALL="$(ls "$STOREFRONT_TMP"/soulcraft-brainy-*.tgz)"
-  echo -e "${BLUE}   home artifact: $(sha256sum "$SOURCE_TARBALL" | cut -d' ' -f1)${NC}"
-  npm publish "$SOURCE_TARBALL" --tag "$NPM_TAG" "--@soulcraft:registry=https://registry.npmjs.org/"
-  rm -rf "$STOREFRONT_TMP"
-  # Brainy is the only PUBLIC @soulcraft package — verify visibility after every publish.
-  npm access get status @soulcraft/brainy "--@soulcraft:registry=https://registry.npmjs.org/" || true
-  # Verify the pair is byte-identical by registry-reported shasum — divergence
-  # here means the storefront leg must be treated as failed, loudly. RETRIED
-  # with raw curl: npmjs metadata propagates with a lag measured in minutes,
-  # and a one-shot npm-view probe fired a false DIVERGENCE on 10.0.0 while a
-  # raw curl of the registry document already confirmed byte-identity. The
-  # probe now reads the registry JSON directly (no npm cache in the path) and
-  # gives propagation up to 5 minutes before calling the pair divergent.
-  NPMJS_VERIFY_ATTEMPTS=20
-  NPMJS_VERIFY_INTERVAL_S=15  # 20 × 15s = 5 minutes of propagation grace
-  SOURCE_SHA=$(npm view "@soulcraft/brainy@${NEW_VERSION}" dist.shasum "--@soulcraft:registry=${SOURCE_NPM_REG}" 2>/dev/null || echo "source-unavailable")
-  PAIR_IDENTICAL=false
-  for ((attempt = 1; attempt <= NPMJS_VERIFY_ATTEMPTS; attempt++)); do
-    NPMJS_SHA=$(curl -fsSL "https://registry.npmjs.org/@soulcraft%2Fbrainy" 2>/dev/null \
-      | node -e "let d='';process.stdin.on('data',c=>d+=c).on('end',()=>{try{const v=JSON.parse(d).versions[process.argv[1]];console.log(v?v.dist.shasum:'')}catch{console.log('')}})" "${NEW_VERSION}" \
-      || echo "")
-    if [ -n "$NPMJS_SHA" ] && [ "$SOURCE_SHA" = "$NPMJS_SHA" ]; then
-      PAIR_IDENTICAL=true
-      break
-    fi
-    echo -e "${YELLOW}   … npmjs metadata not settled (attempt ${attempt}/${NPMJS_VERIFY_ATTEMPTS}: '${NPMJS_SHA:-absent}' vs '${SOURCE_SHA}'); retrying in ${NPMJS_VERIFY_INTERVAL_S}s${NC}"
-    sleep "$NPMJS_VERIFY_INTERVAL_S"
-  done
-  if [ "$PAIR_IDENTICAL" = true ]; then
-    echo -e "${GREEN}✅ Published to npmjs — byte-identical pair (shasum ${NPMJS_SHA})${NC}\n"
-  else
-    echo -e "${RED}❌ REGISTRY DIVERGENCE: The Source shasum ${SOURCE_SHA} != npmjs shasum ${NPMJS_SHA} after ${NPMJS_VERIFY_ATTEMPTS} attempts — investigate before announcing${NC}\n"
-    exit 1
-  fi
-fi
-
 # Step 11: Release object on The Source (presentational — the tag, CHANGELOG,
 # and RELEASES.md are the record; this just gives The Source's UI a release page).
 echo -e "${BLUE}🔟 Creating release page on The Source...${NC}"
 if [ -n "${FORGEJO_RELEASE_TOKEN:-}" ]; then
-  if curl -sf -X POST "https://source.soulcraft.com/api/v1/repos/soulcraft/brainy/releases" \
+  if curl -sf -X POST "https://source.soulcraft.com/api/v1/repos/soulcraftlabs/open-brainy/releases" \
     -H "Authorization: token ${FORGEJO_RELEASE_TOKEN}" -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
     -d "{\"tag_name\":\"v${NEW_VERSION}\",\"name\":\"v${NEW_VERSION}\",\"prerelease\":${PRERELEASE}}" >/dev/null; then
     echo -e "${GREEN}✅ Release page created on The Source${NC}\n"
@@ -298,29 +248,15 @@ else
   echo -e "${RED}⚠️  FORGEJO_RELEASE_TOKEN unset — no release page created; tag + CHANGELOG remain the record${NC}\n"
 fi
 
-# Step 12: Push public docs to the soulcraft.com docs ingest door
-# (VENUE-DOCS-RELEASE-PUSH). Skips with a loud warning when
-# DOCS_INGEST_SECRET is unset; fails loudly (without undoing the publish —
-# that already happened) when a push errors, so the docs site never
-# silently trails npm.
-if [ "$SOURCE_ONLY" = true ]; then
-  echo -e "${YELLOW}1️⃣2️⃣ Docs push SKIPPED — --source-only (a home-only prerelease publishes no public docs)${NC}\n"
-else
-  echo -e "${BLUE}1️⃣2️⃣ Pushing public docs to soulcraft.com/docs...${NC}"
-  if node scripts/push-docs.js; then
-    echo -e "${GREEN}✅ Docs push step done${NC}\n"
-  else
-    echo -e "${RED}❌ Docs push FAILED — soulcraft.com/docs trails npm until re-run or interim sync${NC}\n"
-  fi
-fi
+# Step 12 RETIRED (2026-08-31, CORTEX-SITE-BRAINY-RENAME round 12, David-ruled):
+# soulcraft.com/docs carries the paid product's documentation only. This
+# engine's documentation home is THIS repository — README and docs/ — and the
+# site serves 301s for the slugs this rail used to push. The push script stays
+# in the tree for history; the rail no longer calls it.
+echo -e "${BLUE}Docs step: this engine documents itself in its own repo (site push retired 2026-08-31)${NC}"
 
 echo -e "${GREEN}━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━${NC}"
 echo -e "${GREEN}🎉 Release ${NEW_VERSION} complete!${NC}"
 echo -e "${GREEN}━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━${NC}"
 echo ""
-if [ "$SOURCE_ONLY" = true ]; then
-  echo -e "📦 npmjs: ${YELLOW}not published (--source-only)${NC}"
-else
-  echo -e "📦 npm: ${BLUE}https://www.npmjs.com/package/@soulcraft/brainy/v/${NEW_VERSION}${NC}"
-fi
-echo -e "🏠 The Source: ${BLUE}https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraft/brainy/releases/tag/v${NEW_VERSION}${NC}"
+echo -e "🏠 The Source: ${BLUE}https://source.soulcraft.com/soulcraftlabs/open-brainy/releases/tag/v${NEW_VERSION}${NC}"

src/db/errors.ts

@@ -28,7 +28,7 @@
  *   speculative `with()` overlay; the canonical storage walk only ever answers
  *   "what is live right now."
  *
- * All are exported from the package root (`@soulcraft/brainy`).
+ * All are exported from the package root (`@soulcraftlabs/brainy`).
  */
 
 /**

src/db/familyStamp.ts

@@ -12,9 +12,11 @@
  *   the verified surface is a small set of rollup invariants (entity/
  *   relationship counts) plus `sourceGeneration`.
  *
- * `sourceGeneration` is the generation of the source-of-truth log this
- * projection reflects — open-time coherence becomes a COMPARISON (stamp vs
- * log head), not a walk:
+ * `sourceGeneration` is the COMMITTED generation of the source-of-truth log
+ * this projection reflects — never the allocated counter, which names a
+ * generation that may never commit (see {@link StampVerdict.torn}) — so
+ * open-time coherence becomes a COMPARISON (stamp vs committed head), not a
+ * walk:
  *
  * - equal + invariants hold → coherent, serve.
  * - behind → the projection missed the tail (crash between commit and stamp);
@@ -24,6 +26,9 @@
  * - invariants FAIL at equal generation → genuine incoherence: loud, and the
  *   repair ritual (`repairIndex()`, whose recount rebuilds the rollups from a
  *   canonical walk) heals it.
+ * - AHEAD → a torn generation-log tail: the stamp's fsync outlived the log
+ *   tail's. TERMINAL, never a wait — the generation the stamp names does not
+ *   exist to arrive.
  *
  * Stamps are JSON on purpose — every incident gets debugged by reading a
  * stamp in a terminal.
@@ -70,6 +75,12 @@ export type StampVerdict =
   | { state: 'coherent' }
   | { state: 'absent' } // legacy store — first stamp writes at the next flush
   | { state: 'behind'; stampSource: number; head: number }
+  /**
+   * TORN GENERATION-LOG TAIL: the stamp witnesses a source generation the
+   * store's committed watermark can no longer show. TERMINAL — there is no
+   * generation to wait for, so the open demotes (or refuses) and never spins.
+   */
+  | { state: 'torn'; stampSource: number; head: number }
   | { state: 'incoherent'; failures: string[] }
   | { state: 'unverifiable'; reason: string } // a FAULT reading the stamp — never conflated with absence
 
@@ -118,12 +129,15 @@ export function verifyFamilyStamp(
 ): StampVerdict {
   if (stamp === null) return { state: 'absent' }
   if (stamp.sourceGeneration > head) {
-    // A stamp AHEAD of the log claims state that never committed — the
-    // projection was stamped against truth that a crash rolled back.
-    return {
-      state: 'incoherent',
-      failures: [`sourceGeneration ${stamp.sourceGeneration} is ahead of the log head ${head}`]
-    }
+    // A stamp AHEAD of committed truth witnesses a generation the store can no
+    // longer show: the stamp's fsync survived a crash that the log tail did
+    // not. This is the TORN GENERATION-LOG TAIL — its own class, never folded
+    // in with `incoherent` (a count that drifted at a generation both sides
+    // agree on), because the two have opposite cures: incoherence is recounted,
+    // a tear is DEMOTED. It is also terminal by construction — there is no
+    // generation the open can wait for, because the one the stamp names is
+    // gone.
+    return { state: 'torn', stampSource: stamp.sourceGeneration, head }
   }
   if (stamp.sourceGeneration < head) {
     return { state: 'behind', stampSource: stamp.sourceGeneration, head }

src/db/generationSegments.ts

@@ -147,6 +147,60 @@ export class GenerationSegmentStore {
     return this.coveringSegment(gen) !== null
   }
 
+  /**
+   * @description True when `meta` declares more generations than it holds
+   * frames — a segment sealed by a writer that folded across a hole. The
+   * manifest records `frames` at fold time, so this is an O(1) comparison
+   * against the declared span and needs no I/O.
+   */
+  private isSparse(meta: SegmentMeta): boolean {
+    return meta.lastGeneration - meta.firstGeneration + 1 !== meta.frames
+  }
+
+  /**
+   * @description The generations this tier ACTUALLY holds, as coalesced
+   * ascending intervals — not what the segments declare.
+   *
+   * Dense segments (every one a current writer produces) contribute their
+   * declared range with no I/O. A SPARSE segment — one sealed before the
+   * density law was enforced, whose declared range spans generations it has
+   * no frame for — has its real generation list read from its sidecar and
+   * contributed instead, with the discrepancy narrated once.
+   *
+   * This is what keeps a store that already carries the damage from wedging.
+   * `open()` seeds `committedRanges` from these intervals, so a hole is never
+   * re-admitted as a committed generation, and the auto-compaction pass that
+   * used to fail on every run with "packed history is damaged" simply never
+   * asks for the missing frame.
+   *
+   * @returns Ascending, non-overlapping `[first, last]` intervals.
+   */
+  async actualRanges(): Promise<Array<[number, number]>> {
+    const out: Array<[number, number]> = []
+    for (const meta of this.manifest.segments) {
+      if (!this.isSparse(meta)) {
+        out.push([meta.firstGeneration, meta.lastGeneration])
+        continue
+      }
+      const missing = meta.lastGeneration - meta.firstGeneration + 1 - meta.frames
+      prodLog.warn(
+        `[GenerationSegments] sealed segment ${meta.file} declares generations ` +
+          `${meta.firstGeneration}..${meta.lastGeneration} but holds only ${meta.frames} ` +
+          `frame(s) — ${missing} generation(s) in that span were never folded into it. ` +
+          `Serving the frames it actually holds; the declared span is not treated as ` +
+          `committed history. (Written by a pre-density-law writer that folded across a ` +
+          `gap; the segment itself is intact and no record is lost.)`
+      )
+      const idx = await this.sidecarFor(meta)
+      for (const [gen] of idx.generations) {
+        const last = out[out.length - 1]
+        if (last !== undefined && gen === last[1] + 1) last[1] = gen
+        else out.push([gen, gen])
+      }
+    }
+    return out
+  }
+
   /**
    * Fold consecutive generations into ONE new sealed segment + sidecar and
    * append it to the manifest atomically. Caller guarantees: `gens` is
@@ -164,6 +218,38 @@ export class GenerationSegmentStore {
         throw new Error('[GenerationSegments] fold() input must be strictly ascending')
       }
     }
+    // THE DENSITY LAW, MADE MECHANICAL.
+    //
+    // A sealed segment declares a CONTIGUOUS range [firstGeneration,
+    // lastGeneration] and every reader treats that range as containment:
+    // `coveringSegment` is an interval test, `hasGeneration` returns true for
+    // anything inside it, and `open()` seeds committedRanges from it. So a
+    // segment folded from a SPARSE input silently claims generations it does
+    // not hold, and the first read of one of those holes throws
+    // "inside sealed segment ... but has no frame — packed history is damaged".
+    //
+    // That is exactly how the damage was produced. `repackHistory` skipped
+    // generations mid-batch — ones absent from committedRanges, ones still in
+    // the pending buffer, ones whose tx.json would not read — and handed the
+    // survivors here, where the range was computed from the first and last of
+    // them. Worse, the mis-declared range was then merged back into
+    // committedRanges at the next open, which is what turned a quiet hole into
+    // a repeating auto-compaction failure on every subsequent run.
+    //
+    // Callers now split at discontinuities; this refusal is what keeps any
+    // future caller from reintroducing the class. A refusal here loses
+    // nothing — the generations stay in the live tier, readable, and the next
+    // pass folds them correctly.
+    for (let i = 1; i < gens.length; i++) {
+      if (gens[i].generation !== gens[i - 1].generation + 1) {
+        throw new Error(
+          `[GenerationSegments] fold() input is not contiguous: ${gens[i - 1].generation} → ` +
+            `${gens[i].generation} skips ${gens[i].generation - gens[i - 1].generation - 1} ` +
+            `generation(s). A sealed segment declares a dense range, so folding a sparse ` +
+            `batch would claim generations it does not hold. Split the batch at the gap.`
+        )
+      }
+    }
     const last = this.manifest.segments[this.manifest.segments.length - 1]
     if (last && gens[0].generation <= last.lastGeneration) {
       throw new Error(
@@ -364,12 +450,37 @@ export class GenerationSegmentStore {
         return this.decodeFrame(payload)
       }
     }
-    // In the covering range but not present: the packed tier is dense by
-    // construction (fold packs every generation it is handed, including
-    // record-less ones) — absence inside a sealed range is damage.
+    // Inside the covering range but with no frame. Two very different causes,
+    // and conflating them is what made this class wedge every maintenance pass
+    // on the affected stores.
+    //
+    // (1) A SPARSE SEGMENT — the manifest's own `frames` count is smaller than
+    //     the span it declares. That segment was sealed by a writer that
+    //     folded across a hole (the class this file's density law now bars).
+    //     The segment is INTACT and nothing is lost; it simply never held this
+    //     generation. Answering "not packed" is the honest answer, and it lets
+    //     the caller's two-tier read decide what a genuinely absent generation
+    //     means, instead of every compaction pass dying on a repeating throw.
+    //     `actualRanges()` keeps such holes out of committedRanges at open, so
+    //     in a healed store nobody asks this question in the first place.
+    //
+    // (2) A DENSE SEGMENT missing a frame it says it has — the manifest and
+    //     the sidecar disagree about a segment that claims to be complete.
+    //     That IS damage, and it stays loud.
+    if (this.isSparse(meta)) {
+      prodLog.warn(
+        `[GenerationSegments] generation ${gen} falls inside sealed segment ${meta.file}'s ` +
+          `declared range ${meta.firstGeneration}..${meta.lastGeneration}, but that segment ` +
+          `holds ${meta.frames} frame(s) for a ${meta.lastGeneration - meta.firstGeneration + 1}` +
+          `-generation span — it was sealed across a gap and never held this generation. ` +
+          `Reporting it as unpacked rather than as damage; no record is lost.`
+      )
+      return null
+    }
     throw new Error(
       `[GenerationSegments] generation ${gen} is inside sealed segment ${meta.file}'s declared ` +
-        `range but has no frame — packed history is damaged`
+        `range but has no frame, and that segment declares a complete ${meta.frames}-frame ` +
+        `span — the manifest and the sidecar disagree; packed history is damaged`
     )
   }
 

src/db/generationStore.ts

@@ -96,6 +96,35 @@ export const FOLD_CHECKPOINT_PATH = '_system/fold-checkpoint.json'
 /** Storage-root-relative prefix of the per-generation record directories. */
 export const GENERATIONS_PREFIX = '_generations'
 
+/**
+ * @description Split an ascending list of fold candidates into maximal
+ * CONTIGUOUS runs — `[7,8,9,12,13]` becomes `[[7,8,9],[12,13]]`.
+ *
+ * A sealed segment declares one dense range `[firstGeneration,
+ * lastGeneration]`, and every reader treats that range as containment. So a
+ * batch with a hole in it must never become one segment: it would claim a
+ * generation it does not hold, and the first read of that hole reports the
+ * packed history as damaged. One run, one segment — the ranges then describe
+ * exactly what the segments contain.
+ *
+ * @param gens - Fold candidates, strictly ascending by generation.
+ * @returns One array per contiguous run, in ascending order. Empty in, empty out.
+ */
+export function contiguousRuns(gens: FoldGeneration[]): FoldGeneration[][] {
+  const runs: FoldGeneration[][] = []
+  let run: FoldGeneration[] = []
+  for (const g of gens) {
+    const prev = run[run.length - 1]
+    if (prev !== undefined && g.generation !== prev.generation + 1) {
+      runs.push(run)
+      run = []
+    }
+    run.push(g)
+  }
+  if (run.length > 0) runs.push(run)
+  return runs
+}
+
 /**
  * @description Phases of the {@link GenerationStore.commitTransaction} commit
  * protocol at which a test-only fault injector can simulate a process crash.
@@ -537,12 +566,29 @@ export class GenerationStore {
     this.horizonGen = finiteGen(manifest?.horizon, 'manifest horizon')
     this.counter = Math.max(finiteGen(counterFile?.generation, 'generation counter'), this.committed)
 
-    // Discover existing generation record directories.
-    const recordPaths = await this.storage.listRawObjects(GENERATIONS_PREFIX)
+    // Discover existing generation record directories — BY DIRECTORY NAME.
+    // This used to call listRawObjects(), which recurses the whole
+    // `_generations/` tree and returns every file in every generation, to
+    // extract a set of integers the top-level directory names already spell.
+    // MEASURED on a real store with an 11 GB generation history: the phase
+    // this sits in cost 55,538 ms of a WARM REOPEN after a clean close, with
+    // no fold to blame — this walk is what it was doing. An adapter without
+    // the one-level door falls back to the recursive listing, unchanged.
     const seenGens = new Set<number>()
-    for (const p of recordPaths) {
-      const gen = parseGenerationFromPath(p)
-      if (gen !== null) seenGens.add(gen)
+    const oneLevel = (
+      this.storage as { listRawPrefixes?: (prefix: string) => Promise<string[]> }
+    ).listRawPrefixes
+    if (typeof oneLevel === 'function') {
+      for (const name of await oneLevel.call(this.storage, GENERATIONS_PREFIX)) {
+        const gen = Number(name)
+        if (Number.isSafeInteger(gen) && gen >= 0) seenGens.add(gen)
+      }
+    } else {
+      const recordPaths = await this.storage.listRawObjects(GENERATIONS_PREFIX)
+      for (const p of recordPaths) {
+        const gen = parseGenerationFromPath(p)
+        if (gen !== null) seenGens.add(gen)
+      }
     }
 
     let rolledBack = 0
@@ -652,6 +698,7 @@ export class GenerationStore {
             : 'WHOLE-LOG fold'
           : 'above-manifest replay'
         let replayed = 0
+        const foldStartedAt = Date.now()
         const replayFact = async (fact: CommitFact): Promise<void> => {
           for (const op of fact.ops) {
             let image: { metadata: unknown | null; vector: unknown | null }
@@ -697,9 +744,10 @@ export class GenerationStore {
           }
           replayed++
           if (replayed % 1000 === 0) {
-            prodLog.warn(
+            prodLog.narrate(
               `[GenerationStore] recovery fold in progress — ${replayed} fact(s) folded ` +
-                `(at generation ${fact.generation}); do not restart, the fold is finite`
+                `in ${Date.now() - foldStartedAt}ms (at generation ${fact.generation}); ` +
+                `do not restart, the fold is finite`
             )
           }
           if (fact.generation > this.committed) {
@@ -714,7 +762,7 @@ export class GenerationStore {
           }
         }
         if (uncleanOpen) {
-          prodLog.warn(
+          prodLog.narrate(
             `[GenerationStore] log-authority recovery: ${foldKind} beginning ` +
               `(unclean shutdown detected) — streaming replay, bounded memory, ` +
               `progress every 1000 facts. Do not restart the process; a restart ` +
@@ -737,9 +785,10 @@ export class GenerationStore {
           }
           await this.storage.writeRawObject(MANIFEST_PATH, manifest)
           await this.storage.syncRawObjects([MANIFEST_PATH])
-          prodLog.warn(
+          prodLog.narrate(
             `[GenerationStore] log-authority recovery replayed ${replayed} fact(s) into ` +
-              `canonical (${foldKind}; committed at ${this.committed}) — an acked write is never lost`
+              `canonical in ${Date.now() - foldStartedAt}ms (${foldKind}; committed at ` +
+              `${this.committed}) — an acked write is never lost`
           )
         }
         // A recovery fold re-applied (and the barrier below re-syncs) every
@@ -764,9 +813,15 @@ export class GenerationStore {
     if (storageSupportsFactLog(this.storage)) {
       this.segments = new GenerationSegmentStore(this.storage)
       await this.segments.open()
-      const packedRanges = this.segments
-        .segments()
-        .map((s): [number, number] => [s.firstGeneration, Math.min(s.lastGeneration, this.committed)])
+      // ACTUAL ranges, not declared ones. A segment sealed by a pre-density-law
+      // writer can declare a span wider than the frames it holds; seeding
+      // committedRanges from the declared span re-admits those holes as
+      // committed generations, and every later maintenance pass then asks for a
+      // frame that was never written. `actualRanges()` reads the real
+      // generation list from the sidecar for exactly those segments (and does
+      // no I/O for the dense ones, which is all of them on a healthy store).
+      const packedRanges = (await this.segments.actualRanges())
+        .map((r): [number, number] => [r[0], Math.min(r[1], this.committed)])
         .filter(([lo, hi]) => lo <= hi)
       if (packedRanges.length > 0) {
         // Merge packed (older) + live (newer) interval sets — both ascending;
@@ -3101,13 +3156,26 @@ export class GenerationStore {
           foldInput.push({ generation: gen, timestamp: delta.timestamp, delta, records })
         }
         if (foldInput.length === 0) continue
-        await segments.fold(foldInput)
-        segmentsCreated++
-        // Segment + manifest durable → the live copies retire.
-        for (const g of foldInput) {
-          await this.storage.removeRawPrefix(`${GENERATIONS_PREFIX}/${g.generation}`)
+        // SPLIT AT DISCONTINUITIES. `eligible` is NOT contiguous — three
+        // filters above punch holes in it: a generation missing from
+        // committedRanges never appears, one still in the pending buffer is
+        // skipped, and one whose tx.json will not read is skipped. A sealed
+        // segment declares a DENSE range, so folding across such a hole makes
+        // the segment claim a generation it does not hold; the next open
+        // merges that mis-declared range into committedRanges, and every
+        // subsequent auto-compaction pass then asks for the missing frame and
+        // fails with "packed history is damaged". Fold each contiguous RUN as
+        // its own segment instead — same bytes, honest ranges.
+        for (const run of contiguousRuns(foldInput)) {
+          if (deadline !== undefined && Date.now() >= deadline) break
+          await segments.fold(run)
+          segmentsCreated++
+          // Segment + manifest durable → the live copies retire.
+          for (const g of run) {
+            await this.storage.removeRawPrefix(`${GENERATIONS_PREFIX}/${g.generation}`)
+          }
+          folded += run.length
         }
-        folded += foldInput.length
       }
       if (folded > 0) {
         prodLog.info(

src/db/types.ts

@@ -450,6 +450,21 @@ export interface GenerationStorage {
   deleteRawObject(path: string): Promise<void>
   /** List raw object paths under a prefix (normalized, `.gz`-stripped). */
   listRawObjects(prefix: string): Promise<string[]>
+  /**
+   * OPTIONAL: the IMMEDIATE child directory names under a prefix — one level,
+   * no recursion, no file paths.
+   *
+   * Why it exists: discovering which generations are on disk needs only the
+   * top-level directory NAMES under `_generations/`, but the only door for it
+   * was `listRawObjects`, which recurses the whole tree and returns every file
+   * in every generation. On a store with a long history that is a full walk of
+   * the entire generation log, paid on EVERY open, to learn a set of integers
+   * the directory names already spell out.
+   *
+   * An adapter without this door keeps working — the caller falls back to the
+   * recursive listing.
+   */
+  listRawPrefixes?(prefix: string): Promise<string[]>
   /** Remove every object under a prefix (and the directory itself on disk). */
   removeRawPrefix(prefix: string): Promise<void>
   /** Durability barrier: fsync the given object paths (no-op in memory). */

src/embeddings/wasm/modelLoader.ts

@@ -128,7 +128,7 @@ async function loadBunAssets(): Promise<ModelAssets> {
   }
 
   // Strategy 2: node_modules path relative to CWD (for installed packages)
-  const nmPath = './node_modules/@soulcraft/brainy/assets/models/all-MiniLM-L6-v2'
+  const nmPath = './node_modules/@soulcraftlabs/brainy/assets/models/all-MiniLM-L6-v2'
   pathsToTry.push([
     `${nmPath}/model.safetensors`,
     `${nmPath}/tokenizer.json`,
@@ -168,9 +168,9 @@ async function loadBunAssets(): Promise<ModelAssets> {
   // If all strategies fail, provide helpful error message
   throw new Error(
     'Could not load model assets. For bun --compile, ensure model files are accessible:\n' +
-    '  Option 1: Keep node_modules/@soulcraft/brainy/assets/ alongside your binary\n' +
+    '  Option 1: Keep node_modules/@soulcraftlabs/brainy/assets/ alongside your binary\n' +
     '  Option 2: Copy assets/ folder to your working directory\n' +
-    '  Option 3: Use --asset flag: bun build --compile --asset="./node_modules/@soulcraft/brainy/assets/**/*"'
+    '  Option 3: Use --asset flag: bun build --compile --asset="./node_modules/@soulcraftlabs/brainy/assets/**/*"'
   )
 }
 
@@ -190,7 +190,7 @@ async function loadNodeAssets(): Promise<ModelAssets> {
   if (!fs.existsSync(assetsDir)) {
     throw new Error(
       `Model assets not found: ${assetsDir}\n` +
-      `Ensure @soulcraft/brainy is installed correctly.`
+      `Ensure @soulcraftlabs/brainy is installed correctly.`
     )
   }
 

src/errors/notFound.ts

@@ -14,7 +14,7 @@
  * - {@link RelationNotFoundError} — a referenced relationship (verb) does
  *   not exist.
  *
- * Both are exported from the package root (`@soulcraft/brainy`).
+ * Both are exported from the package root (`@soulcraftlabs/brainy`).
  */
 
 /**

src/graph/graphAdjacencyIndex.ts

@@ -1052,6 +1052,17 @@ export class GraphAdjacencyIndex implements GraphIndexProvider {
    */
   private startAutoFlush(): void {
     this.flushTimer = setInterval(async () => {
+      // NO PERIODIC WORK WITHOUT A CAUSE. Ask first, in two O(1) reads: an
+      // index nobody has written to since the last flush has nothing to
+      // write, and calling into the trees (and their logging) on a cadence
+      // over a quiet store is exactly the idle cost this law exists to
+      // remove.
+      if (
+        !this.lsmTreeVerbsBySource.hasPendingWrites() &&
+        !this.lsmTreeVerbsByTarget.hasPendingWrites()
+      ) {
+        return
+      }
       await this.flush()
     }, this.config.flushInterval)
     // Background maintenance must never keep the host process alive —

src/graph/lsm/LSMTree.ts

@@ -687,6 +687,17 @@ export class LSMTree {
     }
   }
 
+  /**
+   * @description Whether this tree holds anything a flush would write —
+   * the MemTable is non-empty. Synchronous and O(1), so a background cadence
+   * can ask before it does anything at all: the engine does no periodic work
+   * without a cause.
+   * @returns true when a flush would write; false when it would be a no-op.
+   */
+  hasPendingWrites(): boolean {
+    return !this.memTable.isEmpty()
+  }
+
   async close(): Promise<void> {
     this.stopCompactionTimer()
 

src/index.ts

@@ -184,6 +184,7 @@ export {
 
 // Export version utilities
 export { getBrainyVersion } from './utils/version.js'
+export { contractVersion, BRAINY_CONTRACT_VERSION } from './utils/version.js'
 
 // Export plugin system
 export type { BrainyPlugin, BrainyPluginContext, StorageAdapterFactory } from './plugin.js'

src/integrations/index.ts

@@ -9,7 +9,7 @@
  *
  * @example Enable integrations (recommended)
  * ```typescript
- * import { Brainy } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+ * import { Brainy } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
  *
  * const brain = new Brainy({ integrations: true })
  * await brain.init()

src/mcp/README.md

@@ -41,7 +41,7 @@ The `BrainyMCPService` has been refactored to separate the core functionality fr
 ### In Any Environment (Browser, Node.js, Server)
 
 ```typescript
-import { Brainy, BrainyMCPAdapter, MCPAugmentationToolset } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy, BrainyMCPAdapter, MCPAugmentationToolset } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 // Create a Brainy instance
 const brainyData = new Brainy()
@@ -81,7 +81,7 @@ const toolResponse = await toolset.handleRequest({
 ### In Browser Environment (Core Functionality Only)
 
 ```typescript
-import { Brainy, BrainyMCPService } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+import { Brainy, BrainyMCPService } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
 
 // Create a Brainy instance
 const brainyData = new Brainy()

src/plugin.ts

@@ -22,7 +22,7 @@ import type { GraphIndexStats } from './graph/graphAdjacencyIndex.js'
 
 // Re-export the provider contracts that already live closer to their
 // implementations so a plugin author (Cor) can import the *entire*
-// provider surface from one stable entrypoint: `@soulcraft/brainy/plugin`.
+// provider surface from one stable entrypoint: `@soulcraftlabs/brainy/plugin`.
 export type { ColumnStoreProvider } from './indexes/columnStore/types.js'
 export type {
   AggregationProvider,
@@ -41,7 +41,7 @@ export interface BrainyPlugin {
   name: string
 
   /**
-   * Optional semver range of `@soulcraft/brainy` this plugin supports
+   * Optional semver range of `@soulcraftlabs/brainy` this plugin supports
    * (e.g. `'>=8.0.0 <9.0.0'` or `'^8.0.0'`). When set and the running brainy is
    * OUTSIDE the range, `init()` THROWS rather than silently falling back to the
    * default JS engine. This is the version-coupling guard for the native

src/storage/adapters/fileSystemStorage.ts

@@ -14,7 +14,8 @@ import {
   StorageBatchConfig,
   SYSTEM_DIR,
   STATISTICS_KEY,
-  WriterLockInfo
+  WriterLockInfo,
+  WriterCloseRecord
 } from '../baseStorage.js'
 import { getBrainyVersion } from '../../utils/index.js'
 import { isAbsentError } from '../../utils/errorClassification.js'
@@ -99,7 +100,30 @@ export class FileSystemStorage extends BaseStorage {
   // timer rewrites the lock every 10s so stale-lock detection can tell a dead
   // writer from a slow one. The constant name matches the file path used.
   private static readonly WRITER_LOCK_FILE = '_writer.lock'
-  private static readonly WRITER_HEARTBEAT_MS = 10_000
+  /**
+   * The clean-close record at `locks/_writer.close` (see
+   * {@link WriterCloseRecord}). Written when the lock is released, consumed by
+   * the next claim, so an open can distinguish "the previous writer left" from
+   * "the previous writer died" without inferring either from a pid.
+   */
+  private static readonly WRITER_CLOSE_FILE = '_writer.close'
+  /**
+   * How often the lock file's `lastHeartbeat` is rewritten.
+   *
+   * THIS IS OBSERVABILITY ONLY, and the cadence follows from that. Staleness
+   * is decided by PID LIVENESS alone (see isWriterLockStale) and the fence
+   * compares pid + hostname — no decision anywhere reads this timestamp. It
+   * exists so an operator inspecting a lock file, or reading the
+   * BRAINY_WRITER_LOCKED error, can judge liveness themselves.
+   *
+   * At 10s it was a lock-file WRITE every ten seconds per brain, forever: 2.1
+   * writes/s across a production process holding 21 idle brains, for a
+   * human-readable timestamp nothing computes with. At 60s an operator still
+   * sees a heartbeat inside the minute, at a sixth of the cost. With the
+   * clean-close record now recording orderly releases explicitly, the
+   * heartbeat carries even less weight than it did.
+   */
+  private static readonly WRITER_HEARTBEAT_MS = 60_000
   private static readonly WRITER_STALE_THRESHOLD_MS = 60_000
   private writerLockHeartbeat?: NodeJS.Timeout
   private writerLockInfo?: WriterLockInfo
@@ -112,6 +136,13 @@ export class FileSystemStorage extends BaseStorage {
    */
   private writerHeartbeatInFlight?: Promise<void>
 
+  /**
+   * The in-flight background count-ledger derivation, if one was needed at
+   * open. See {@link scheduleCountLedgerDerivation} — awaited only by
+   * {@link whenCountLedgerSettled}, never by a read.
+   */
+  private countLedgerDerivation?: Promise<void>
+
   // Flush-request RPC state. The writer polls `locks/_flush_requests/` for
   // new `.req` files and emits `.ack` files in `locks/_flush_responses/` after
   // flushing. Inspectors call `requestFlushOverFilesystem` to drop a request
@@ -120,9 +151,16 @@ export class FileSystemStorage extends BaseStorage {
   private static readonly FLUSH_REQUEST_DIR = '_flush_requests'
   private static readonly FLUSH_RESPONSE_DIR = '_flush_responses'
   private static readonly FLUSH_WATCH_INTERVAL_MS = 500
+  /**
+   * The safety sweep behind the fs.watch: catches events an exotic filesystem
+   * dropped, and runs the stale-request GC. See startFlushRequestWatcher.
+   */
+  private static readonly FLUSH_SAFETY_SWEEP_MS = 30_000
   private static readonly FLUSH_POLL_INTERVAL_MS = 100
   private static readonly FLUSH_REQUEST_TTL_MS = 60_000
   private flushWatcherInterval?: NodeJS.Timeout
+  /** The inotify-backed watch on the request directory, when the FS supports one. */
+  private flushWatcher?: import('node:fs').FSWatcher
   private flushWatcherInFlight = false
   private flushWatcherOnRequest?: () => Promise<void>
 
@@ -671,6 +709,30 @@ export class FileSystemStorage extends BaseStorage {
     return pruned
   }
 
+  /**
+   * @description The IMMEDIATE child directory names under a prefix — ONE
+   * `readdir`, no recursion, no file paths. See the seam's JSDoc
+   * (`src/db/types.ts`) for what this replaced: discovering the generations on
+   * disk walked the entire generation log on every open, reading out every
+   * file in every generation, to learn the set of integers the top-level
+   * directory names already spell.
+   * @param prefix - Storage-root-relative directory prefix.
+   * @returns The child directory names (not paths); empty when the prefix does
+   *   not exist.
+   */
+  public override async listRawPrefixes(prefix: string): Promise<string[]> {
+    await this.ensureInitialized()
+    const fullPath = path.join(this.rootDir, prefix)
+    try {
+      const entries = await fs.promises.readdir(fullPath, { withFileTypes: true })
+      return entries.filter((e: { isDirectory: () => boolean }) => e.isDirectory())
+        .map((e: { name: string }) => e.name)
+    } catch (error: any) {
+      if (error?.code === 'ENOENT') return []
+      throw error
+    }
+  }
+
   /**
    * Primitive operation: List objects under path prefix
    * All metadata operations use this internally via base class routing
@@ -1881,18 +1943,41 @@ export class FileSystemStorage extends BaseStorage {
         }
       }
 
+      // THE CLEAN-CLOSE RECORD IS READ BEFORE ANY VERDICT (see
+      // WriterCloseRecord). A lock file whose release was RECORDED is
+      // bookkeeping left by an orderly shutdown, not evidence of anything —
+      // and that is true whether the previous holder was another process or
+      // an earlier instance in THIS one. A production restart reported
+      // "Re-acquiring writer lock ... this is a bug" immediately after a clean
+      // close, sending an operator hunting for a leak that did not exist.
+      const closeRecord = existing ? await this.readWriterCloseRecord() : null
+      const releasedCleanly =
+        existing !== null &&
+        closeRecord !== null &&
+        this.closeRecordVouchesFor(closeRecord, existing)
+
       if (existing) {
         // Same-process re-open: a second Brainy instance in this Node process
         // (e.g. test "simulate server restart" patterns, or a consumer that
         // explicitly re-instantiates without closing first). This isn't the
         // dangerous cross-process case the lock exists to prevent — the two
         // instances share a memory space and can't silently diverge from each
-        // other beyond what their callers already see. Warn and take over.
+        // other beyond what their callers already see. Warn and take over —
+        // unless the record proves the previous instance already let go, in
+        // which case there is nothing to warn about.
         if (existing.pid === myPid && existing.hostname === hostname && !options?.force) {
-          console.warn(
-            `[brainy] Re-acquiring writer lock for ${this.rootDir} held by the same process (PID ${existing.pid}). ` +
-            `If you intended to keep the previous Brainy instance alive, this is a bug — close it first.`
-          )
+          if (releasedCleanly) {
+            console.warn(
+              `[brainy] Clearing the leftover writer lock for ${this.rootDir} — an earlier ` +
+                `instance in this process (PID ${existing.pid}) RELEASED it cleanly at ` +
+                `${closeRecord!.closedAt} but could not remove the file. Nothing to recover.`
+            )
+          } else {
+            console.warn(
+              `[brainy] Re-acquiring writer lock for ${this.rootDir} held by the same process (PID ${existing.pid}). ` +
+              `If you intended to keep the previous Brainy instance alive, this is a bug — close it first.`
+            )
+          }
           const info: WriterLockInfo = {
             pid: myPid,
             hostname,
@@ -1902,11 +1987,18 @@ export class FileSystemStorage extends BaseStorage {
             rootDir: this.rootDir
           }
           await this.writeFileAtomic(lockFile, JSON.stringify(info, null, 2))
+          await this.clearWriterCloseRecord()
           this.installWriterLock(info)
           return info
         }
 
-        const stale = !options?.force && (await this.isWriterLockStale(existing))
+        // A cleanly-released lock is stale by RECORD, not by inference. Only
+        // when no record vouches for this lock do we fall back to pid
+        // liveness, and then we say THAT honestly too: an unrecorded lock
+        // means the writer did not complete its close, so the store was not
+        // closed cleanly and this open pays recovery.
+        const stale =
+          releasedCleanly || (!options?.force && (await this.isWriterLockStale(existing)))
         if (!options?.force && !stale) {
           // Consumer-facing error contract: callers detect this case via
           // err.code and read the holder's details from err.lockInfo.
@@ -1917,8 +2009,16 @@ export class FileSystemStorage extends BaseStorage {
           options?.force
             ? `[brainy] Force-overwriting writer lock for ${this.rootDir} ` +
               `(was held by PID ${existing.pid} on ${existing.hostname}).`
-            : `[brainy] Overwriting stale writer lock for ${this.rootDir} ` +
-              `(PID ${existing.pid} on ${existing.hostname} appears dead).`
+            : releasedCleanly
+              ? `[brainy] Clearing the leftover writer lock for ${this.rootDir} — ` +
+                `PID ${existing.pid} on ${existing.hostname} RELEASED it cleanly at ` +
+                `${closeRecord!.closedAt} but could not remove the file. ` +
+                `Nothing to recover.`
+              : `[brainy] Overwriting stale writer lock for ${this.rootDir} ` +
+                `(PID ${existing.pid} on ${existing.hostname} is gone and left NO ` +
+                `clean-close record — that writer did not finish closing, so this ` +
+                `store was not closed cleanly; open will run crash recovery and ` +
+                `report its wall).`
         )
         // Takeover: verify the file still holds the lock we judged (a live
         // successor may have claimed meanwhile), then remove it and fall
@@ -1972,6 +2072,12 @@ export class FileSystemStorage extends BaseStorage {
         await fs.promises.unlink(claimTmp).catch(() => {})
       }
 
+      // CONSUME the previous writer's clean-close record. It described the
+      // lock generation that just ended; leaving it in place would let it
+      // vouch for OUR lock if this process later dies without closing —
+      // turning a real crash into a "closed cleanly" verdict. One unlink.
+      await this.clearWriterCloseRecord()
+
       this.installWriterLock(info)
       return info
     }
@@ -2095,13 +2201,27 @@ export class FileSystemStorage extends BaseStorage {
       return
     }
     const lockFile = path.join(this.lockDir, FileSystemStorage.WRITER_LOCK_FILE)
+    const released = this.writerLockInfo
     try {
       // Only delete if we still own it — avoid clobbering a successor that
       // claimed the lock via force-override.
       const current = await this.readWriterLock()
-      if (current && current.pid === this.writerLockInfo.pid && current.hostname === this.writerLockInfo.hostname) {
+      const ours =
+        current === null ||
+        (current.pid === released.pid && current.hostname === released.hostname)
+      if (current && ours) {
         await fs.promises.unlink(lockFile)
       }
+      // THE CLEAN-CLOSE RECORD (see WriterCloseRecord). Written whenever this
+      // instance gives up a lock nobody else has taken — the unlink above
+      // having succeeded OR the file already being gone. The next open reads
+      // it instead of guessing from pid liveness: a recorded release is an
+      // orderly shutdown, an absent record is a writer that never finished
+      // closing. Not written when a successor holds the lock: our release is
+      // then a no-op and a record would slander their live lock.
+      if (ours) {
+        await this.writeWriterCloseRecord(released)
+      }
     } catch (err: any) {
       if (err.code !== 'ENOENT') {
         console.warn('[brainy] Failed to release writer lock file:', err)
@@ -2111,6 +2231,97 @@ export class FileSystemStorage extends BaseStorage {
     }
   }
 
+  /**
+   * @description Read the clean-close record at `locks/_writer.close`, or
+   * `null` when it is absent or unparseable. A torn record is treated as
+   * absent — the conservative direction, since an unreadable record can
+   * vouch for nothing.
+   * @returns The record, or null.
+   */
+  public async readWriterCloseRecord(): Promise<WriterCloseRecord | null> {
+    await this.ensureInitialized()
+    const recordFile = path.join(this.lockDir, FileSystemStorage.WRITER_CLOSE_FILE)
+    try {
+      const raw = await fs.promises.readFile(recordFile, 'utf-8')
+      const parsed = JSON.parse(raw) as WriterCloseRecord
+      if (
+        typeof parsed?.pid !== 'number' ||
+        typeof parsed?.hostname !== 'string' ||
+        typeof parsed?.startedAt !== 'string' ||
+        typeof parsed?.closedAt !== 'string'
+      ) {
+        return null
+      }
+      return parsed
+    } catch (err: any) {
+      if (err.code === 'ENOENT') return null
+      return null
+    }
+  }
+
+  /**
+   * @description Whether a clean-close record describes the very lock
+   * generation `lock` represents. The match is pid + hostname + `startedAt`:
+   * `startedAt` is the lock generation's identity, so a record can never
+   * vouch for a LATER lock taken by the same pid on the same host (the
+   * same-process re-open path mints a fresh `startedAt`).
+   * @param record - The clean-close record read from disk.
+   * @param lock - The lock file's contents.
+   */
+  private closeRecordVouchesFor(record: WriterCloseRecord, lock: WriterLockInfo): boolean {
+    return (
+      record.pid === lock.pid &&
+      record.hostname === lock.hostname &&
+      record.startedAt === lock.startedAt
+    )
+  }
+
+  /**
+   * @description Write the clean-close record for a lock this instance just
+   * released. Atomic (temp + rename) so a concurrent opener never reads half
+   * a record. A failure here costs the next open nothing but the honest
+   * fallback (pid liveness), so it warns rather than failing the close.
+   * @param released - The lock info this instance held.
+   */
+  private async writeWriterCloseRecord(released: WriterLockInfo): Promise<void> {
+    const record: WriterCloseRecord = {
+      pid: released.pid,
+      hostname: released.hostname,
+      startedAt: released.startedAt,
+      closedAt: new Date().toISOString(),
+      version: released.version
+    }
+    const recordFile = path.join(this.lockDir, FileSystemStorage.WRITER_CLOSE_FILE)
+    try {
+      await this.writeFileAtomic(recordFile, JSON.stringify(record, null, 2))
+    } catch (err) {
+      // ENOENT = the lock directory is gone, i.e. the whole store was removed
+      // under us. There is no next open to inform.
+      if ((err as NodeJS.ErrnoException)?.code === 'ENOENT') return
+      console.warn(
+        `[brainy] Failed to write the writer clean-close record for ${this.rootDir} — ` +
+          `the next open will fall back to pid liveness and may report this orderly ` +
+          `shutdown as a crash:`,
+        err
+      )
+    }
+  }
+
+  /**
+   * @description Remove the clean-close record. Called by every successful
+   * lock claim so a record never outlives the lock generation it describes.
+   */
+  private async clearWriterCloseRecord(): Promise<void> {
+    const recordFile = path.join(this.lockDir, FileSystemStorage.WRITER_CLOSE_FILE)
+    try {
+      await fs.promises.unlink(recordFile)
+    } catch (err: any) {
+      if (err.code !== 'ENOENT') {
+        console.warn('[brainy] Failed to clear the writer clean-close record:', err)
+      }
+    }
+  }
+
   public override async readWriterLock(): Promise<WriterLockInfo | null> {
     await this.ensureInitialized()
     const lockFile = path.join(this.lockDir, FileSystemStorage.WRITER_LOCK_FILE)
@@ -2197,36 +2408,115 @@ export class FileSystemStorage extends BaseStorage {
 
   /**
    * Start watching for cross-process flush requests. Called by Brainy.init()
-   * in writer mode. Polls `locks/_flush_requests/` every
-   * FLUSH_WATCH_INTERVAL_MS — each new `.req` file triggers the supplied
-   * callback (`brain.flush()`), after which an `.ack` is written to
-   * `locks/_flush_responses/` with the same request ID. Stale `.req` files
-   * (>FLUSH_REQUEST_TTL_MS) are garbage-collected on every tick.
+   * in writer mode. Each new `.req` file in `locks/_flush_requests/` triggers
+   * the supplied callback (`brain.flush()`), after which an `.ack` is written
+   * to `locks/_flush_responses/` with the same request ID. Stale `.req` files
+   * (>FLUSH_REQUEST_TTL_MS) are garbage-collected on each sweep.
+   *
+   * THE WATCH IS EVENT-DRIVEN, NOT A POLL. It used to `readdir` the request
+   * directory every 500 ms, per brain, for the entire life of every writer —
+   * armed on every non-reader brain whether or not any inspector process
+   * existed. MEASURED on a production process holding 21 brains: 42 directory
+   * reads per second on a completely idle service, plus a stale-request GC
+   * pass on every one of them. The engine does no periodic work without a
+   * cause, and a request that has not been made is not a cause.
+   *
+   * `fs.watch` (inotify on Linux) delivers the arrival itself, so a request is
+   * seen SOONER than the old poll saw it. Two honest concessions ride with it:
+   *   - a slow SAFETY SWEEP (FLUSH_SAFETY_SWEEP_MS) still runs, because
+   *     `fs.watch` can miss events on network and fuse filesystems and because
+   *     the stale-request GC needs some tick of its own. At 30s that is 0.7
+   *     reads/s across 21 brains where the poll cost 42.
+   *   - a filesystem that cannot watch at all falls back to the ORIGINAL
+   *     500 ms poll, narrated once, because correctness outranks idle cost:
+   *     an inspector whose request is never seen waits forever.
    */
   public override startFlushRequestWatcher(onRequest: () => Promise<void>): void {
-    if (this.flushWatcherInterval) return // already watching
+    // Already watching — or already ARMING. The arm is asynchronous (the
+    // request directory is created before it can be watched), so neither the
+    // watcher nor the interval exists yet during that window; the callback is
+    // the flag that covers it. Without this a second call in the window would
+    // leave two watchers and two sweeps running for the life of the store.
+    if (this.flushWatcherInterval || this.flushWatcher || this.flushWatcherOnRequest) return
     this.flushWatcherOnRequest = onRequest
 
     const reqDir = path.join(this.lockDir, FileSystemStorage.FLUSH_REQUEST_DIR)
     const ackDir = path.join(this.lockDir, FileSystemStorage.FLUSH_RESPONSE_DIR)
 
-    // Ensure both dirs exist up front so the first .req drop doesn't race with mkdir.
-    this.ensureDirectoryExists(reqDir).catch(() => {})
-    this.ensureDirectoryExists(ackDir).catch(() => {})
-
-    this.flushWatcherInterval = setInterval(() => {
-      if (this.flushWatcherInFlight) return // skip overlapping tick
+    const sweep = (): void => {
+      if (this.flushWatcherInFlight) return // skip overlapping sweep
       this.flushWatcherInFlight = true
       this.processFlushRequests(reqDir, ackDir).finally(() => {
         this.flushWatcherInFlight = false
       })
-    }, FileSystemStorage.FLUSH_WATCH_INTERVAL_MS)
+    }
+
+    // Ensure both dirs exist up front so the first .req drop doesn't race with
+    // mkdir — and so there is a directory to watch.
+    void this.ensureDirectoryExists(reqDir)
+      .then(() => this.ensureDirectoryExists(ackDir))
+      .then(() => {
+        if (this.flushWatcherOnRequest !== onRequest) return // stopped meanwhile
+        try {
+          const watcher = fs.watch(reqDir, () => sweep())
+          this.flushWatcher = watcher
+          watcher.on('error', (err: Error) => {
+            // A watch that dies mid-life must not leave the door deaf.
+            console.warn(
+              `[brainy] Flush-request watch failed (${err.message}) — falling back to polling.`
+            )
+            this.flushWatcher?.close()
+            this.flushWatcher = undefined
+            // The SAFETY sweep must go first. It is already armed at 30s, and
+            // startFlushRequestPolling() declines to arm over an existing
+            // interval — so leaving it would quietly leave this store answering
+            // flush requests on a 30s cadence instead of the 500ms one the door
+            // promises. A degrade nobody asked for is still a degrade.
+            if (this.flushWatcherInterval) {
+              clearInterval(this.flushWatcherInterval)
+              this.flushWatcherInterval = undefined
+            }
+            this.startFlushRequestPolling(sweep)
+          })
+          if (typeof watcher.unref === 'function') watcher.unref()
+          // The safety sweep: missed events on exotic filesystems, and the
+          // stale-request GC.
+          this.flushWatcherInterval = setInterval(sweep, FileSystemStorage.FLUSH_SAFETY_SWEEP_MS)
+          if (typeof this.flushWatcherInterval.unref === 'function') {
+            this.flushWatcherInterval.unref()
+          }
+          // One sweep now: a request may have been dropped before the watch armed.
+          sweep()
+        } catch (err) {
+          console.warn(
+            `[brainy] Flush-request directory cannot be watched on this filesystem ` +
+              `(${(err as Error).message}) — polling every ` +
+              `${FileSystemStorage.FLUSH_WATCH_INTERVAL_MS}ms instead.`
+          )
+          this.startFlushRequestPolling(sweep)
+        }
+      })
+      .catch(() => {
+        // The request directory could not be created; nothing to watch. A
+        // cross-process flush request cannot be made either, so there is
+        // nothing to miss.
+      })
+  }
+
+  /** The original 500 ms poll — the fallback when a directory cannot be watched. */
+  private startFlushRequestPolling(sweep: () => void): void {
+    if (this.flushWatcherInterval) return
+    this.flushWatcherInterval = setInterval(sweep, FileSystemStorage.FLUSH_WATCH_INTERVAL_MS)
     if (typeof this.flushWatcherInterval.unref === 'function') {
       this.flushWatcherInterval.unref()
     }
   }
 
   public override stopFlushRequestWatcher(): void {
+    if (this.flushWatcher) {
+      this.flushWatcher.close()
+      this.flushWatcher = undefined
+    }
     if (this.flushWatcherInterval) {
       clearInterval(this.flushWatcherInterval)
       this.flushWatcherInterval = undefined
@@ -2623,25 +2913,29 @@ export class FileSystemStorage extends BaseStorage {
             this.allCountsDerivedBy = undefined
             this.allCountsSuspect = true
             needsPersist = true
-            prodLog.warn(
+            prodLog.narrate(
               '[FileSystemStorage] canonical count ledger was derived under the legacy ' +
-                'container rule — marked suspect; a sanctioned recount (repairIndex) restores ' +
-                'exact denominators'
+                'container rule — it counts one entity per id DIRECTORY, so every ghost/scar ' +
+                'container inflates it. Marked suspect, and an honest recount is scheduled to ' +
+                'run in the background after this open; until it lands, do not subtract ' +
+                'against these ALL scalars.'
             )
+            // A suspect ledger used to stay wrong for the life of the store,
+            // waiting for an operator to run repairIndex. A downstream index
+            // heal took its "remaining" figure from these inflated
+            // denominators and reported work that did not exist. The ledger
+            // now HEALS ITSELF — in the background, because a denominator is
+            // a derived scalar and no read is ever served from it.
+            this.scheduleCountLedgerDerivation('legacy container-rule ledger')
           }
         } else {
-          const nouns = await this.scanCanonicalEntities('nouns')
-          const verbs = await this.scanCanonicalEntities('verbs')
-          this.totalNounCountAll = nouns.count
-          this.totalVerbCountAll = verbs.count
-          this.allCountsSuspect = false
-          this.allCountsDerivedBy = 'identity-record'
-          console.warn(
-            `[FileSystemStorage] counts.json predates the ALL-visibility count ledger — ` +
-              `derived once from the canonical id tree (${nouns.count} nouns, ${verbs.count} verbs, ` +
-              `every tier) and persisted; no further scan.`
-          )
-          needsPersist = true
+          // No ALL scalars at all. There is nothing to serve in the meantime —
+          // a zero would read as an empty store — so the scalars stay unknown
+          // and SUSPECT until the background derivation lands. The open does
+          // not wait for it: an id-tree walk is O(ids) and this file has been
+          // the whole reason a 24k-id store opened in silence.
+          this.allCountsSuspect = true
+          this.scheduleCountLedgerDerivation('counts.json predates the ALL-visibility ledger')
         }
 
         // The vectored-noun scalar (shipped after the ALL scalars above — a
@@ -2654,14 +2948,12 @@ export class FileSystemStorage extends BaseStorage {
         if (typeof counts.totalVectoredNounCount === 'number') {
           this.totalVectoredNounCount = counts.totalVectoredNounCount
         } else {
-          const vectored = await this.scanVectoredNounCount()
-          this.totalVectoredNounCount = vectored
-          console.warn(
-            `[FileSystemStorage] counts.json predates the vectored-noun count ledger — ` +
-              `derived once by reading every noun's vectors.json (${vectored} vectored) and ` +
-              `persisted; no further scan.`
-          )
-          needsPersist = true
+          // O(nouns) CONTENT reads — the most expensive derivation of the
+          // three, and the one most likely to have been the silent minutes at
+          // the front of a large store's open. Background, suspect until it
+          // lands, same as the ALL scalars.
+          this.allCountsSuspect = true
+          this.scheduleCountLedgerDerivation('counts.json predates the vectored-noun ledger')
         }
         if (needsPersist) {
           await this.persistCounts()
@@ -2690,6 +2982,22 @@ export class FileSystemStorage extends BaseStorage {
    * Initialize counts by scanning disk (only done once)
    */
   private async initializeCountsFromDisk(): Promise<void> {
+    const startedAt = Date.now()
+    // THIS ONE CANNOT LEAVE THE FOREGROUND, and the reason is worth stating:
+    // it derives `totalNounCount` / `totalVerbCount`, the scalars
+    // `getNounCount()` and `getVerbCount()` RETURN. Backgrounding it would
+    // make a populated store answer "0 entities" until the walk landed — a
+    // wrong answer, not a slow one, and the serving law grades a failure by
+    // whether an answer could be wrong. The ALL-visibility denominators, which
+    // no read is served from, DO run in the background (see
+    // scheduleCountLedgerDerivation). What this walk owes the operator instead
+    // is narration: it announces itself, and reports its wall.
+    prodLog.narrate(
+      `[FileSystemStorage] no usable counts.json — deriving the entity counters from ` +
+        `the canonical id tree now. This is O(ids) listings plus one vectors.json read ` +
+        `per noun, and it BLOCKS the open because getNounCount()/getVerbCount() are ` +
+        `served from it. It runs once; the result is persisted.`
+    )
     try {
       // Count the CANONICAL 8.0 layout (`entities/<kind>/<shard>/<id>/…`) —
       // the tree saveNoun/getNouns actually read and write. The previous scan
@@ -2737,6 +3045,11 @@ export class FileSystemStorage extends BaseStorage {
       }
 
       await this.persistCounts()
+      prodLog.narrate(
+        `[FileSystemStorage] counter derivation from the canonical id tree finished in ` +
+          `${Date.now() - startedAt}ms: ${this.totalNounCount} nouns, ${this.totalVerbCount} verbs, ` +
+          `${this.totalVectoredNounCount} vectored nouns — persisted, stamped identity-record.`
+      )
     } catch (error) {
       console.error('Error initializing counts from disk:', error)
     }
@@ -2758,6 +3071,118 @@ export class FileSystemStorage extends BaseStorage {
    * directories (absolute paths) — nouns feed the type-distribution estimate
    * above. An absent tree (fresh store) counts zero.
    */
+  /**
+   * @description Derive the ALL-visibility count ledger honestly — one entity
+   * per IDENTITY RECORD, never per id directory — IN THE BACKGROUND, once,
+   * and persist the result stamped `identity-record`.
+   *
+   * Why background: these scalars are DENOMINATORS. No read is served from
+   * them, so deriving them cannot be allowed to hold an open hostage — a
+   * store with 24,898 ids spent minutes of a production restart inside walks
+   * exactly like these, in silence, before serving anything. Why at all: a
+   * ledger derived under the old container rule stayed wrong for the life of
+   * the store, and a downstream index heal subtracted against it and reported
+   * remaining work that did not exist (measured on a real store: 14,231
+   * derived against 14,056 identity records — precisely the store's 25 noun
+   * scar directories; verbs 72,729 against 72,679, its 50 verb scars).
+   *
+   * Idempotent: a second call while one is in flight joins the first.
+   * @param reason - What made the ledger untrustworthy, quoted in narration.
+   * @returns Nothing; observe completion with {@link whenCountLedgerSettled}.
+   */
+  private scheduleCountLedgerDerivation(reason: string): void {
+    if (this.countLedgerDerivation) return
+    this.countLedgerDerivation = (async () => {
+      const startedAt = Date.now()
+      prodLog.narrate(
+        `[FileSystemStorage] count-ledger derivation started in the background ` +
+          `(${reason}) — counting identity records, not id directories; the open does ` +
+          `not wait for it and no read is served from these scalars.`
+      )
+      try {
+        const beforeNouns = this.totalNounCountAll
+        const beforeVerbs = this.totalVerbCountAll
+        const beforeVectored = this.totalVectoredNounCount
+        // A walk that RACED A WRITE cannot prove its number: a row that landed
+        // mid-walk may or may not have been in the shard the walk had already
+        // passed. Rather than persist a figure that might be off by one and
+        // stamp it "exact", the walk is repeated once on a quiet store, and if
+        // the store is never quiet the ledger stays SUSPECT and says so. One
+        // retry, never a spin.
+        let attempt = 0
+        let derived: { nouns: number; verbs: number; vectored: number } | null = null
+        while (attempt < 2 && derived === null) {
+          attempt++
+          const activityBefore = this.ledgerActivityStamp()
+          const nouns = await this.scanCanonicalEntities('nouns')
+          const verbs = await this.scanCanonicalEntities('verbs')
+          const vectored = await this.scanVectoredNounCount()
+          if (this.ledgerActivityStamp() === activityBefore) {
+            derived = { nouns: nouns.count, verbs: verbs.count, vectored }
+          }
+        }
+        if (derived === null) {
+          this.allCountsSuspect = true
+          prodLog.narrate(
+            `[FileSystemStorage] count-ledger derivation could not finish on a quiet store ` +
+              `after ${attempt} attempts (${Date.now() - startedAt}ms) — writes landed during ` +
+              `every walk. The ALL-visibility scalars stay SUSPECT and must not be subtracted ` +
+              `against; brain.repairIndex() derives them under a recount barrier.`
+          )
+          return
+        }
+        this.totalNounCountAll = derived.nouns
+        this.totalVerbCountAll = derived.verbs
+        this.totalVectoredNounCount = derived.vectored
+        this.allCountsDerivedBy = 'identity-record'
+        this.allCountsSuspect = false
+        await this.persistCounts()
+        prodLog.narrate(
+          `[FileSystemStorage] count-ledger derivation finished in ${Date.now() - startedAt}ms: ` +
+            `${derived.nouns} nouns / ${derived.verbs} verbs / ${derived.vectored} vectored nouns` +
+            (beforeNouns !== derived.nouns ||
+            beforeVerbs !== derived.verbs ||
+            beforeVectored !== derived.vectored
+              ? ` (corrected from ${beforeNouns} / ${beforeVerbs} / ${beforeVectored} — the ` +
+                `difference is ghost and scar containers the old rule counted as entities)`
+              : ' (unchanged)') +
+            ` — persisted, stamped identity-record, no longer suspect.`
+        )
+      } catch (error) {
+        // The ledger stays suspect and the next open retries. Loud: a
+        // denominator nobody can derive is a fact an operator must have.
+        this.allCountsSuspect = true
+        prodLog.error(
+          `[FileSystemStorage] count-ledger derivation FAILED after ` +
+            `${Date.now() - startedAt}ms — the ALL-visibility scalars remain SUSPECT ` +
+            `and must not be subtracted against; the next open retries:`,
+          error
+        )
+      }
+    })()
+  }
+
+  /**
+   * @description A cheap witness that the ledger changed while a walk was
+   * running. Every landed write moves one of these live counters, so an
+   * unchanged stamp across a walk means no write landed during it.
+   * @returns A value that differs whenever the live ALL scalars have moved.
+   */
+  private ledgerActivityStamp(): string {
+    return `${this.totalNounCountAll}:${this.totalVerbCountAll}:${this.totalVectoredNounCount}`
+  }
+
+  /**
+   * @description Resolve once any background count-ledger derivation has
+   * settled (succeeded or failed). Resolves immediately when none was needed.
+   * Exists so tests and operators can observe the ledger's honest value rather
+   * than race it; nothing in the read path waits on this.
+   * @returns A promise that settles with the derivation.
+   */
+  public async whenCountLedgerSettled(): Promise<void> {
+    await this.countLedgerDerivation
+  }
+
   private async scanCanonicalEntities(
     kind: 'nouns' | 'verbs'
   ): Promise<{ count: number; sampleDirs: string[] }> {
@@ -2916,10 +3341,15 @@ export class FileSystemStorage extends BaseStorage {
         lastUpdated: new Date().toISOString()
       }
 
-      await fs.promises.writeFile(
-        this.countsFilePath,
-        JSON.stringify(counts, null, 2)
-      )
+      // ATOMIC (temp + rename), never a plain writeFile. A direct write
+      // truncates the file first, so every persist opened a window — measured
+      // at roughly 750ms after a flush or close on a real store — in which a
+      // concurrent reader saw counts.json EMPTY. An empty file is unparseable,
+      // and an unparseable ledger sends the next open down the full-rescan
+      // path: the cheapest file in the store was costing the most expensive
+      // recovery. The rename is atomic, so a reader sees the old ledger or the
+      // new one, never neither.
+      await this.writeFileAtomic(this.countsFilePath, JSON.stringify(counts, null, 2))
     } catch (error) {
       console.error('Error persisting counts:', error)
     }

src/storage/baseStorage.ts

@@ -125,6 +125,36 @@ export interface WriterLockInfo {
   rootDir?: string           // Convenience for log lines / error messages
 }
 
+/**
+ * THE CLEAN-CLOSE RECORD. Written by `releaseWriterLock()` at the instant it
+ * gives up the writer lock, naming the lock identity it released. The next
+ * `acquireWriterLock()` reads it and can then say — from a RECORD, not from a
+ * guess — whether the previous writer left on purpose.
+ *
+ * Why a record and not PID liveness: "the recorded PID is no longer alive" is
+ * true of every orderly restart AND of every crash, so the two were reported
+ * identically ("appears dead") and neither could be trusted. Worse, the same
+ * inference fails the other way when the operating system RECYCLES the pid —
+ * a live unrelated process makes a long-dead writer's lock look held, and the
+ * store refuses to open naming a pid that was never Brainy. A record settles
+ * both: matched → the previous writer closed cleanly, nothing to recover;
+ * absent → say so, and name what recovery the open will now run.
+ *
+ * Lifecycle: written at release, consumed (deleted) by the next successful
+ * lock claim — a record must never outlive the lock generation it describes,
+ * or it would vouch for a later crash.
+ */
+export interface WriterCloseRecord {
+  pid: number
+  hostname: string
+  /** `startedAt` of the lock this close released — the identity match key. */
+  startedAt: string
+  /** ISO timestamp at which the lock was released. */
+  closedAt: string
+  /** Brainy version that performed the close. */
+  version: string
+}
+
 /**
  * FNV-1a hash returning a 2-char hex bucket (00-ff).
  * Distributes system keys across 256 sub-prefixes to avoid
@@ -1407,6 +1437,29 @@ export abstract class BaseStorage extends BaseStorageAdapter {
     return this.listObjectsUnderPath(prefix)
   }
 
+  /**
+   * @description The IMMEDIATE child directory names under a prefix — one
+   * level, no recursion. See the seam's JSDoc (`db/types.ts`) for why a
+   * separate door exists. This default derives them from the recursive
+   * listing, so it is never WRONG, only never faster; the filesystem adapter
+   * overrides it with a single directory read.
+   * @param prefix - Storage-root-relative directory prefix.
+   * @returns The child directory names (not paths), in listing order.
+   */
+  public async listRawPrefixes(prefix: string): Promise<string[]> {
+    await this.ensureInitialized()
+    const paths = await this.listObjectsUnderPath(prefix)
+    const normalizedPrefix = prefix.endsWith('/') ? prefix : `${prefix}/`
+    const names = new Set<string>()
+    for (const p of paths) {
+      const rest = p.startsWith(normalizedPrefix) ? p.slice(normalizedPrefix.length) : null
+      if (rest === null) continue
+      const slash = rest.search(/[/\\]/)
+      if (slash > 0) names.add(rest.slice(0, slash))
+    }
+    return [...names]
+  }
+
   /**
    * Remove every object under a storage-root-relative prefix. The filesystem
    * adapter overrides this with a recursive directory removal; this default

src/types/brainy.types.ts

@@ -215,7 +215,7 @@ export interface ScoreExplanation {
  *
  * @example
  * ```ts
- * declare module '@soulcraft/brainy' {
+ * declare module '@soulcraftlabs/brainy' {
  *   interface SubtypeRegistry {
  *     // For NounType.Person, subtype 'employee':
  *     'person:employee': { employeeId: string; department: string }
@@ -1217,6 +1217,13 @@ export interface RepairFamilyReport {
   skipped?: string
   /** Why the outcome is what it is when neither `detail` nor `skipped` says it. */
   reason?: string
+  /**
+   * The phase's own wall, in milliseconds. A repair on a production store ran
+   * for over thirty minutes without a single line of output; an operator had
+   * to read `top` to know it was alive. A receipt that cannot say WHERE the
+   * time went is not a receipt — every row carries its own.
+   */
+  durationMs?: number
 }
 
 /** The full receipt returned by repairIndex(). */

src/types/reservedFields.ts

@@ -65,7 +65,7 @@
  * | `_rev` | system-managed revision counter — pass `ifRev` to `update()` for CAS |
  *
  * @example
- * import { RESERVED_ENTITY_FIELDS } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+ * import { RESERVED_ENTITY_FIELDS } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
  * const isReserved = (key: string) =>
  *   (RESERVED_ENTITY_FIELDS as readonly string[]).includes(key)
  */

src/utils/brainyTypes.ts

@@ -6,7 +6,7 @@
  *
  * @example
  * ```typescript
- * import { BrainyTypes } from '@soulcraft/brainy'
+ * import { BrainyTypes } from '@soulcraftlabs/brainy'
  *
  * // Get all available types
  * const nounTypes = BrainyTypes.nouns  // ['Person', 'Organization', ...]

src/utils/indexReadiness.ts

@@ -153,3 +153,83 @@ export function assessProviderHealth(provider: unknown): ProviderHealthAssessmen
     reasons: readiness === 'not-ready' ? ['isReady() returned false'] : []
   }
 }
+
+/**
+ * @description A provider's self-report that it is REBUILDING ITS OWN index
+ * right now. Returned by the optional `rebuildInProgress()` hook.
+ *
+ * The distinction this exists to make: a provider reporting `serving: false`
+ * because it is BROKEN and a provider reporting `serving: false` because it is
+ * BUSY BUILDING ITSELF look identical through `healthReport()` alone, and
+ * brainy treated both the same way — it called `rebuild()` and waited for it,
+ * on the foreground of `init()`. A production store whose metadata provider
+ * had to rebuild paid 641 SECONDS of that wait before `init()` returned, with
+ * every other family idle behind it.
+ *
+ * A provider that reports progress here owns its own rebuild: brainy neither
+ * starts one nor waits for it, `init()` returns, the other families serve, and
+ * THAT family's doors refuse by name — carrying this progress — until the
+ * provider reports itself serving.
+ *
+ * Every field but `phase` is optional and every field is a MEASUREMENT: a
+ * provider reports only what it actually tracks, never an estimate dressed as
+ * a fact.
+ */
+export interface ProviderRebuildProgress {
+  /** The provider's own name for what it is doing. Quoted verbatim in refusals. */
+  phase: string
+  /** Units completed so far, if the provider counts them. */
+  done?: number
+  /** Units expected in total, if the provider knows it. */
+  total?: number
+  /** Epoch millis when this rebuild started, if the provider tracks it. */
+  startedAt?: number
+}
+
+/** A provider that can report a rebuild it is running itself. */
+interface MaybeRebuildingProvider {
+  rebuildInProgress?: () => ProviderRebuildProgress | null
+}
+
+/**
+ * @description Ask a provider whether it is rebuilding itself right now.
+ * Synchronous, O(1), feature-detected: a provider without the hook reports
+ * nothing and is treated exactly as before.
+ * @param provider - Any index provider, or `null`/`undefined`.
+ * @returns The provider's progress, or `null` when it is not rebuilding (or
+ *   does not implement the hook).
+ */
+export function assessProviderRebuild(provider: unknown): ProviderRebuildProgress | null {
+  const p = provider as MaybeRebuildingProvider | null | undefined
+  if (p == null || typeof p.rebuildInProgress !== 'function') return null
+  try {
+    const progress = p.rebuildInProgress()
+    if (!progress || typeof progress.phase !== 'string' || progress.phase.length === 0) {
+      return null
+    }
+    return progress
+  } catch {
+    // A throwing hook says nothing trustworthy about a rebuild; fall through to
+    // the ordinary health verdict rather than inventing one.
+    return null
+  }
+}
+
+/**
+ * @description Render a rebuild progress report as one operator-facing clause,
+ * for a refusal message. Includes only what the provider actually measured.
+ * @param progress - The provider's report.
+ * @returns A clause such as `rebuilding ("metadata shadow build", 4,096/14,056, 12s elapsed)`.
+ */
+export function describeRebuildProgress(progress: ProviderRebuildProgress): string {
+  const parts: string[] = [`"${progress.phase}"`]
+  if (typeof progress.done === 'number' && typeof progress.total === 'number') {
+    parts.push(`${progress.done.toLocaleString()}/${progress.total.toLocaleString()}`)
+  } else if (typeof progress.done === 'number') {
+    parts.push(`${progress.done.toLocaleString()} done`)
+  }
+  if (typeof progress.startedAt === 'number') {
+    parts.push(`${Math.round((Date.now() - progress.startedAt) / 1000)}s elapsed`)
+  }
+  return `rebuilding (${parts.join(', ')})`
+}

src/utils/logger.ts

@@ -266,6 +266,26 @@ export const prodLog = {
     console.error(message, ...args)
   },
   
+  /**
+   * THE NARRATION CHANNEL — always visible, exactly like `error`.
+   *
+   * `warn`/`info`/`log` below are clamped to ERROR in any environment that
+   * looks like production (see isProductionEnvironment), which is the right
+   * default for chatter and the wrong one for the two things an operator is
+   * entitled to hear from a database no matter what: WHY IT IS SLOW and WHAT
+   * IT IS DOING ABOUT IT. A production service opening a 16 GB store spent
+   * three minutes emitting nothing at all — the phase timings that would have
+   * named the slow phase were written to `warn` and thrown away by the log
+   * level. Progress and cost narration goes here; it is never a per-record
+   * line, always a phase, a wall, or a bounded-cadence heartbeat.
+   *
+   * `silent: true` still silences it — that is the consumer's explicit
+   * request, not a cost default.
+   */
+  narrate: (message?: any, ...args: any[]) => {
+    console.warn(message, ...args)
+  },
+
   // These are suppressed in production unless BRAINY_LOG_LEVEL is set
   warn: (message?: any, ...args: any[]) => smartConsole.warn(message, ...args),
   info: (message?: any, ...args: any[]) => smartConsole.info(message, ...args),

src/utils/metadataIndex.ts

@@ -2241,6 +2241,74 @@ export class MetadataIndexManager implements MetadataIndexProvider {
               break
             }
 
+            // ===== ARRAY SET OPERATORS =====
+            // An element-indexed array field makes all three exact on the
+            // index path. They were previously ABSENT from this switch, so
+            // `fieldResults` kept its initial `[]` and the whole find()
+            // returned an empty page — a documented, matcher-implemented
+            // operator answering silently wrong. Served here instead.
+
+            // hasAll: [a, b] — the field's array contains EVERY operand:
+            // the intersection of each element's posting set.
+            case 'hasAll': {
+              if (!Array.isArray(operand)) {
+                fieldResults = []
+                break
+              }
+              if (operand.length === 0) {
+                // Vacuously true of every row that HAS the field.
+                const anyBitmap = (this.columnStore && this.columnStore.hasField(field))
+                  ? await this.columnStore.rangeQuery(field)
+                  : await this.getExistsBitmapLegacy(field)
+                fieldResults = this.idMapper.intsIterableToUuids(anyBitmap)
+                break
+              }
+              let intersection: Set<string> | null = null
+              for (const item of operand) {
+                const ids = new Set(await this.getIds(field, item))
+                if (intersection === null) {
+                  intersection = ids
+                } else {
+                  for (const id of [...intersection]) {
+                    if (!ids.has(id)) intersection.delete(id)
+                  }
+                }
+                if (intersection.size === 0) break
+              }
+              fieldResults = intersection ? [...intersection] : []
+              break
+            }
+
+            // noneOf: [a, b] — the field's value is NONE of the operands:
+            // the complement of their union.
+            case 'noneOf': {
+              if (!Array.isArray(operand)) {
+                fieldResults = []
+                break
+              }
+              const excludeInts: number[] = []
+              for (const value of operand) {
+                for (const uuid of await this.getIds(field, value)) {
+                  const intId = this.idMapper.getInt(uuid)
+                  if (intId !== undefined) excludeInts.push(intId)
+                }
+              }
+              fieldResults = this.complementIds(excludeInts)
+              break
+            }
+
+            // excludes: value — the field's array does NOT contain the value:
+            // the complement of `contains`.
+            case 'excludes': {
+              const excludeInts: number[] = []
+              for (const uuid of await this.getIds(field, operand)) {
+                const intId = this.idMapper.getInt(uuid)
+                if (intId !== undefined) excludeInts.push(intId)
+              }
+              fieldResults = this.complementIds(excludeInts)
+              break
+            }
+
             // ===== MISSING OPERATOR =====
             // missing: boolean - equivalent to exists: !boolean
             case 'missing': {
@@ -2257,6 +2325,27 @@ export class MetadataIndexManager implements MetadataIndexProvider {
               }
               break
             }
+
+            // ===== EVERYTHING ELSE: REFUSED BY NAME, NEVER ANSWERED EMPTY ====
+            // An equality/range posting index cannot evaluate a substring, a
+            // pattern or an array length without reading every row, and this
+            // path exists precisely to avoid that. It used to fall out of the
+            // switch with `fieldResults` still `[]`, so `find({ where: { name:
+            // { startsWith: 'a' } } })` returned an empty page and looked like
+            // an answer. An accepted operator either works or refuses — the
+            // matcher's own support for these operators governs in-memory
+            // filtering, never an index-backed find().
+            default:
+              throw new BrainyError(
+                `Filter operator "${op}" on field "${rawField}" cannot be served by the ` +
+                  `metadata index: an equality/range posting index cannot evaluate substrings, ` +
+                  `patterns or array lengths without reading every row. It is REFUSED rather ` +
+                  `than answered with an empty page. Filter on an indexable operator ` +
+                  `(equals/eq, notEquals/ne, oneOf/in, noneOf, greaterThan/gt, ` +
+                  `greaterThanOrEqual/gte, lessThan/lt, lessThanOrEqual/lte, between, contains, ` +
+                  `excludes, hasAll, exists, missing) and narrow the rest in your own code.`,
+                'INVALID_QUERY'
+              )
           }
           // Intersect this operator's matches with the running set (AND semantics
           // for multiple operators on the same field).

src/utils/version.ts

@@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
 /**
  * @module utils/version
- * @description Resolves the running `@soulcraft/brainy` package version. Brainy 8.0
+ * @description Resolves the running `@soulcraftlabs/brainy` package version. Brainy 8.0
  * targets Node-like runtimes only (Node.js, Bun, Deno — all expose `node:fs`), so the
  * version is read **synchronously** from `package.json` on first call and cached.
  *
@@ -83,3 +83,27 @@ export function getAugmentationVersion(service: string): { augmentation: string;
     version: getBrainyVersion()
   }
 }
+
+/**
+ * The API-contract version this build implements — a single integer that two
+ * engines can compare without probing prototypes.
+ *
+ * A MINOR release is ADDITIVE: doors and error codes may be added, never
+ * removed or narrowed, and the contract integer does not move. A MAJOR release
+ * is what a REQUIRED door's removal or a behavioural narrowing costs, and it
+ * bumps this integer. A consumer pinning `brainyContract` in a peer range is
+ * therefore pinning "what I may call", not "which build I run".
+ *
+ * Declared in package.json as `"brainyContract"` so a manifest, a tool, or a
+ * sibling package can read it without importing the engine, and returned here
+ * so a running process can state its own.
+ */
+export const BRAINY_CONTRACT_VERSION = 1 as const
+
+/**
+ * @description The API-contract version this build implements.
+ * @returns The contract integer — see {@link BRAINY_CONTRACT_VERSION}.
+ */
+export function contractVersion(): number {
+  return BRAINY_CONTRACT_VERSION
+}

src/vfs/VirtualFileSystem.ts

@@ -6,6 +6,7 @@
  */
 
 import { Readable, Writable } from 'stream'
+import { prodLog } from '../utils/logger.js'
 import crypto from 'crypto'
 import { v4 as uuidv4 } from '../universal/uuid.js'
 import { Brainy } from '../brainy.js'
@@ -66,6 +67,20 @@ export class VirtualFileSystem implements IVirtualFileSystem {
   private config: Required<Omit<VFSConfig, 'rootEntityId'>> & { rootEntityId?: string }
   private rootEntityId?: string
   private initialized = false
+  /**
+   * The one-time old-root sweep, in flight. See {@link sweepOldRootsIfNeeded}.
+   */
+  private rootSweep?: Promise<void>
+  /**
+   * Where the completed old-root sweep is recorded. Engine plumbing under
+   * `_system/`, like every other marker there — never enumerated as data.
+   */
+  private static readonly ROOT_SWEEP_MARKER_PATH = '_system/vfs-root-sweep.json'
+  /**
+   * Below this wall, a sweep that removed nothing says nothing — see
+   * {@link sweepOldRootsIfNeeded}.
+   */
+  private static readonly ROOT_SWEEP_NARRATE_MS = 1_000
   private currentUser: string = 'system'  // Track current user for collaboration
 
   // Knowledge Layer features available via augmentation (brain.use('knowledge'))
@@ -143,8 +158,17 @@ export class VirtualFileSystem implements IVirtualFileSystem {
     // Create or find root entity
     this.rootEntityId = await this.initializeRoot()
 
-    // Clean up old UUID-based roots (one-time migration)
-    await this.cleanupOldRoots()
+    // Clean up old UUID-based roots — ONCE PER STORE, BEHIND THE DOORS.
+    // This is a migration sweep for roots created before the fixed root id
+    // existed. It ran on EVERY open, forever: a filtered find over the whole
+    // store hunting for duplicates that a store has either always had or
+    // never will. MEASURED on a 14,056-noun / 72,679-verb store: the phase it
+    // dominates cost 43-53 SECONDS of every open, warm reopens included.
+    // Now: a durable marker records that the sweep has run, and a store
+    // carrying it never sweeps again; a store without one sweeps in the
+    // BACKGROUND (the sweep only removes duplicate roots — nothing serves
+    // from them — and it was always declared non-critical).
+    this.rootSweep = this.sweepOldRootsIfNeeded()
 
     // Initialize projection registry with auto-discovery of built-in projections
     this.projectionRegistry = new ProjectionRegistry()
@@ -394,7 +418,100 @@ export class VirtualFileSystem implements IVirtualFileSystem {
    *
    * This is a one-time migration helper that can be removed in future versions.
    */
-  private async cleanupOldRoots(): Promise<void> {
+  /**
+   * @description Run the old-root sweep at most once per store, in the
+   * background, and record that it ran. See the call site in {@link init} for
+   * the measurement that made this necessary.
+   * @returns A promise that settles when the sweep has finished (or was
+   *   skipped); nothing in the read path awaits it.
+   */
+  private async sweepOldRootsIfNeeded(): Promise<void> {
+    const store = this.rawObjectStore()
+    if (store === null) {
+      // A storage adapter with no raw-object door cannot carry the marker.
+      // Sweep every open, as before — correctness over cost.
+      await this.cleanupOldRoots()
+      return
+    }
+    try {
+      const marker = await store.readRawObject(VirtualFileSystem.ROOT_SWEEP_MARKER_PATH)
+      if (marker !== null && marker !== undefined) return
+    } catch {
+      // Unreadable marker: sweep, and rewrite it below.
+    }
+    // NARRATION HAS A THRESHOLD, like every other line this engine emits on the
+    // always-visible channel. On a fresh or small store this sweep finds
+    // nothing and costs a millisecond, and announcing it — twice — on a
+    // channel a production log level deliberately CANNOT silence would train
+    // operators to ignore the one channel that exists to be impossible to
+    // ignore. It speaks when it has something to say: duplicates removed, or a
+    // wall long enough that somebody watching a slow first open deserves to
+    // know what is running. Otherwise it does its work and stays quiet.
+    const startedAt = Date.now()
+    const duplicatesRemoved = await this.cleanupOldRoots()
+    const elapsedMs = Date.now() - startedAt
+    try {
+      await store.writeRawObject(VirtualFileSystem.ROOT_SWEEP_MARKER_PATH, {
+        sweptAt: new Date().toISOString(),
+        durationMs: elapsedMs
+      })
+      if (duplicatesRemoved > 0 || elapsedMs >= VirtualFileSystem.ROOT_SWEEP_NARRATE_MS) {
+        prodLog.narrate(
+          `[VFS] one-time old-root sweep complete in ${elapsedMs}ms` +
+            (duplicatesRemoved > 0
+              ? `, ${duplicatesRemoved} pre-fixed-id root(s) removed`
+              : '') +
+            ' and recorded — no future open pays for it.'
+        )
+      }
+    } catch (error) {
+      // Unrecorded sweep = the next open sweeps again. Conservative, and said
+      // out loud rather than quietly repeated forever.
+      prodLog.narrate(
+        `[VFS] old-root sweep finished in ${Date.now() - startedAt}ms but could NOT be ` +
+          `recorded (${(error as Error).message}) — the next open will sweep again.`
+      )
+    }
+  }
+
+  /**
+   * @description Settle once the background old-root sweep has finished.
+   * Resolves immediately when the store already carried the marker. Exists so
+   * tests and operators can observe the sweep instead of racing it; no read
+   * path waits on it.
+   * @returns A promise that settles with the sweep.
+   */
+  public async whenRootSweepSettled(): Promise<void> {
+    await this.rootSweep
+  }
+
+  /**
+   * @description The brain's storage adapter, narrowed to the raw-object door
+   * this migration marker needs. Boundary: `Brainy.storage` is private, and
+   * this is the same reach-in the engine uses elsewhere for exactly this kind
+   * of engine-internal artifact. Returns null when the adapter has no
+   * raw-object door.
+   */
+  private rawObjectStore(): {
+    readRawObject: (key: string) => Promise<unknown>
+    writeRawObject: (key: string, value: unknown) => Promise<void>
+  } | null {
+    const storage = (this.brain as unknown as { storage?: Record<string, unknown> }).storage
+    if (
+      storage &&
+      typeof storage.readRawObject === 'function' &&
+      typeof storage.writeRawObject === 'function'
+    ) {
+      return storage as unknown as {
+        readRawObject: (key: string) => Promise<unknown>
+        writeRawObject: (key: string, value: unknown) => Promise<void>
+      }
+    }
+    return null
+  }
+
+  private async cleanupOldRoots(): Promise<number> {
+    let removed = 0
     try {
       // Find any old VFS roots with UUID-based IDs (not our fixed ID)
       const oldRoots = await this.brain.find({
@@ -416,6 +533,7 @@ export class VirtualFileSystem implements IVirtualFileSystem {
         for (const duplicate of duplicates) {
           try {
             await this.brain.remove(duplicate.id)
+            removed++
             console.log(`VFS: Deleted old root ${duplicate.id.substring(0, 8)}`)
           } catch (error) {
             console.warn(`VFS: Failed to delete old root ${duplicate.id}:`, error)
@@ -428,6 +546,7 @@ export class VirtualFileSystem implements IVirtualFileSystem {
       // Non-critical error - log and continue
       console.warn('VFS: Cleanup of old roots failed (non-critical):', error)
     }
+    return removed
   }
 
   /**

tests/integration/count-ledger-identity-record.test.ts

@@ -0,0 +1,251 @@
+/**
+ * @module tests/integration/count-ledger-identity-record
+ * @description THE COUNT LEDGER COUNTS RECORDS, NOT DIRECTORIES — and heals
+ * itself when it was derived the other way.
+ *
+ * Measured on a real store: the ALL-visibility ledger read 14,231 nouns
+ * against 14,056 identity records, and 72,729 verbs against 72,679 — exactly
+ * that store's 25 noun and 50 verb SCAR directories (empty `<id>/` containers
+ * left by a pre-8.3.1 partial delete). Two copies of the SAME archive derived
+ * different numbers, because each had been persisted at a different moment
+ * under the old container rule. A downstream index heal subtracted against
+ * those denominators and reported remaining work that did not exist.
+ *
+ * The membership predicate is the IDENTITY RECORD (the metadata content leg).
+ * The scan already applies it; what is pinned here is that a ledger persisted
+ * under the OLD rule does not go on lying — it is corrected in the background,
+ * without blocking the open, and two copies of one archive agree.
+ */
+
+import { describe, it, expect, afterEach } from 'vitest'
+import {
+  mkdtempSync,
+  mkdirSync,
+  rmSync,
+  writeFileSync,
+  readFileSync,
+  cpSync,
+  existsSync
+} from 'node:fs'
+import { tmpdir } from 'node:os'
+import { join } from 'node:path'
+import { Brainy } from '../../src/brainy.js'
+import { NounType } from '../../src/types/graphTypes.js'
+import { FileSystemStorage as FileSystemStorageClass } from '../../src/storage/adapters/fileSystemStorage.js'
+import type { FileSystemStorage } from '../../src/storage/adapters/fileSystemStorage.js'
+
+const NOUN_COUNT = 6
+const NOUN_SCARS = 3
+const VERB_SCARS = 2
+/** A REAL two-hex shard — the scan skips any directory that is not one. */
+const SCAR_SHARD = 'ab'
+
+function makeTempDir(): string {
+  return mkdtempSync(join(tmpdir(), 'brainy-count-ledger-'))
+}
+
+/** The FileSystemStorage behind a brain. */
+function storageOf(brain: Brainy): FileSystemStorage {
+  return (brain as unknown as { storage: FileSystemStorage }).storage
+}
+
+/**
+ * Add `count` empty `<id>/` container directories under
+ * `entities/<kind>/<shard>/` — scars, exactly as a partial delete leaves them.
+ */
+function addScarContainers(dir: string, kind: 'nouns' | 'verbs', count: number): void {
+  for (let i = 0; i < count; i++) {
+    const id = `${SCAR_SHARD}5ca4000-0000-0000-0000-00000000000${i}`
+    mkdirSync(join(dir, 'entities', kind, SCAR_SHARD, id), { recursive: true })
+  }
+}
+
+/** Add one GHOST container: a `vectors.json` leg with no identity record. */
+function addGhostContainer(dir: string): void {
+  const id = `${SCAR_SHARD}9405700-0000-0000-0000-000000000000`
+  const idDir = join(dir, 'entities', 'nouns', SCAR_SHARD, id)
+  mkdirSync(idDir, { recursive: true })
+  writeFileSync(join(idDir, 'vectors.json'), JSON.stringify({ id, vector: [0.1, 0.2] }))
+}
+
+/**
+ * Rewrite counts.json into the LEGACY shape: ALL scalars inflated by the
+ * containers, and no `allCountsDerivedBy` stamp — exactly what a store carried
+ * when it was last written by a build that counted directories.
+ */
+function writeLegacyCountsLedger(dir: string, inflateNouns: number, inflateVerbs: number): void {
+  const file = join(dir, '_system', 'counts.json')
+  const counts = JSON.parse(readFileSync(file, 'utf-8'))
+  counts.totalNounCountAll = (counts.totalNounCountAll ?? 0) + inflateNouns
+  counts.totalVerbCountAll = (counts.totalVerbCountAll ?? 0) + inflateVerbs
+  delete counts.allCountsDerivedBy
+  delete counts.allCountsSuspect
+  writeFileSync(file, JSON.stringify(counts, null, 2))
+}
+
+/**
+ * Seed a store and return the HONEST ledger it holds when freshly written —
+ * the baseline the correction must return to. Read from the engine rather than
+ * hardcoded: an open creates its own rows (the VFS root), and a pin that
+ * asserts a literal would be pinning that incidental fact instead of the rule.
+ */
+async function seedStore(dir: string): Promise<{ nouns: number; verbs: number }> {
+  const brain = new Brainy({ requireSubtype: false, storage: { type: 'filesystem', path: dir } })
+  await brain.init()
+  const ids: string[] = []
+  for (let i = 0; i < NOUN_COUNT; i++) {
+    ids.push(await brain.add({ data: `entity number ${i}`, type: NounType.Concept }))
+  }
+  await brain.relate({ from: ids[0], to: ids[1], type: 'relatedTo' } as never)
+  await brain.relate({ from: ids[1], to: ids[2], type: 'relatedTo' } as never)
+  await brain.flush()
+  const ledger = await storageOf(brain).getCanonicalCounts()
+  const baseline = { nouns: ledger.nouns.all, verbs: ledger.verbs.all }
+  await brain.close()
+  return baseline
+}
+
+/**
+ * Make the ledger walk take `ms` so a test can observe the open completing
+ * WITHOUT it. Patches the prototype before any brain is constructed; returns
+ * the restore function.
+ */
+function slowTheLedgerWalk(ms: number): () => void {
+  const proto = (
+    FileSystemStorageClass as unknown as {
+      prototype: Record<string, (...args: unknown[]) => Promise<unknown>>
+    }
+  ).prototype
+  const real = proto.scanCanonicalEntities
+  proto.scanCanonicalEntities = async function slow(this: unknown, ...args: unknown[]) {
+    await new Promise((r) => setTimeout(r, ms))
+    return real.apply(this, args)
+  }
+  return () => { proto.scanCanonicalEntities = real }
+}
+
+describe('the canonical count ledger', () => {
+  const dirs: string[] = []
+
+  afterEach(() => {
+    for (const d of dirs.splice(0)) {
+      try { rmSync(d, { recursive: true, force: true }) } catch { /* ignore */ }
+    }
+  })
+
+  function trackDir(): string {
+    const dir = makeTempDir()
+    dirs.push(dir)
+    return dir
+  }
+
+  it('corrects a legacy container-rule ledger in the background, counting identity records', async () => {
+    const dir = trackDir()
+    const baseline = await seedStore(dir)
+
+    // Scars and a ghost: containers with no identity record.
+    addScarContainers(dir, 'nouns', NOUN_SCARS)
+    addScarContainers(dir, 'verbs', VERB_SCARS)
+    addGhostContainer(dir)
+    // The ledger as the old rule left it: every container counted.
+    writeLegacyCountsLedger(dir, NOUN_SCARS + 1, VERB_SCARS)
+
+    const restore = slowTheLedgerWalk(1_500)
+    let brain: Brainy
+    try {
+      const openStarted = Date.now()
+      brain = new Brainy({ requireSubtype: false, storage: { type: 'filesystem', path: dir } })
+      await brain.init()
+      const openMs = Date.now() - openStarted
+      const storage = storageOf(brain)
+
+      // THE OPEN DID NOT WAIT. Two walks of 1.5s each would have added 3s.
+      expect(openMs).toBeLessThan(2_500)
+      // And while it runs, the scalars say so instead of being subtracted against.
+      const atOpen = await storage.getCanonicalCounts()
+      expect(atOpen.suspect).toBe(true)
+      expect(atOpen.nouns.all).toBe(baseline.nouns + NOUN_SCARS + 1)
+
+      await storage.whenCountLedgerSettled()
+    } finally {
+      restore()
+    }
+    const storage = storageOf(brain!)
+
+    const healed = await storage.getCanonicalCounts()
+    expect(healed.nouns.all).toBe(baseline.nouns)
+    expect(healed.verbs.all).toBe(baseline.verbs)
+    expect(healed.suspect).toBe(false)
+
+    // And it is PERSISTED with the honest stamp — the correction survives a
+    // reopen instead of being re-derived (or re-lost) every time.
+    await brain!.close()
+    const persisted = JSON.parse(readFileSync(join(dir, '_system', 'counts.json'), 'utf-8'))
+    expect(persisted.totalNounCountAll).toBe(baseline.nouns)
+    expect(persisted.totalVerbCountAll).toBe(baseline.verbs)
+    expect(persisted.allCountsDerivedBy).toBe('identity-record')
+
+    const reopened = new Brainy({ requireSubtype: false, storage: { type: 'filesystem', path: dir } })
+    await reopened.init()
+    const afterReopen = await storageOf(reopened).getCanonicalCounts()
+    expect(afterReopen.nouns.all).toBe(baseline.nouns)
+    expect(afterReopen.suspect).toBe(false)
+    await reopened.close()
+  }, 180_000)
+
+  it('derives the same number from two copies of one archive', async () => {
+    const source = trackDir()
+    const baseline = await seedStore(source)
+    addScarContainers(source, 'nouns', NOUN_SCARS)
+    addGhostContainer(source)
+
+    // Two copies of the SAME bytes, each carrying a DIFFERENT legacy ledger —
+    // the situation that made one archive report 14,231 and its twin 14,081.
+    const copyA = trackDir()
+    const copyB = trackDir()
+    cpSync(source, copyA, { recursive: true })
+    cpSync(source, copyB, { recursive: true })
+    writeLegacyCountsLedger(copyA, NOUN_SCARS + 1, 0)
+    writeLegacyCountsLedger(copyB, 1, 0)
+
+    const derived: number[] = []
+    for (const dir of [copyA, copyB]) {
+      const brain = new Brainy({ requireSubtype: false, storage: { type: 'filesystem', path: dir } })
+      await brain.init()
+      const storage = storageOf(brain)
+      await storage.whenCountLedgerSettled()
+      derived.push((await storage.getCanonicalCounts()).nouns.all)
+      await brain.close()
+    }
+    expect(derived[0]).toBe(derived[1])
+    expect(derived[0]).toBe(baseline.nouns)
+  }, 180_000)
+
+  it('writes counts.json atomically — no reader ever sees it empty', async () => {
+    const dir = trackDir()
+    await seedStore(dir)
+    const file = join(dir, '_system', 'counts.json')
+    expect(existsSync(file)).toBe(true)
+
+    const brain = new Brainy({ requireSubtype: false, storage: { type: 'filesystem', path: dir } })
+    await brain.init()
+    const storage = storageOf(brain)
+
+    // Watch the ledger across many persists. A truncating write leaves a
+    // window in which the file parses as nothing; a temp+rename never does.
+    let sawUnparseable = 0
+    const watcher = setInterval(() => {
+      try {
+        JSON.parse(readFileSync(file, 'utf-8'))
+      } catch {
+        sawUnparseable++
+      }
+    }, 1)
+    for (let i = 0; i < 40; i++) {
+      await (storage as unknown as { persistCounts: () => Promise<void> }).persistCounts()
+    }
+    clearInterval(watcher)
+    await brain.close()
+    expect(sawUnparseable).toBe(0)
+  }, 180_000)
+})

tests/integration/entity-tree-stamp.test.ts

@@ -57,7 +57,11 @@ describe('entity-tree family stamp', () => {
     const invariants = (stamp.members as any).invariants
     expect(invariants.nounCount).toBe(await brain.storage.getNounCount())
     expect(invariants.verbCount).toBe(await brain.storage.getVerbCount())
-    expect(stamp.sourceGeneration).toBe(brain.generation())
+    // THE SOURCE IS COMMITTED TRUTH, never the allocated counter. Stamping the
+    // counter labelled the stamp with a generation a write in flight had merely
+    // claimed, so every crash inside a write window produced a spurious verdict
+    // at the next open (see the torn-tail pins below).
+    expect(stamp.sourceGeneration).toBe(brain.generationStore.committedGeneration())
     expect(stamp.generation).toBeGreaterThanOrEqual(1)
   })
 
@@ -112,6 +116,96 @@ describe('entity-tree family stamp', () => {
     expect(stillIncoherent).toEqual([])
   })
 
+  /**
+   * Rewrite the on-disk stamp so its `sourceGeneration` sits ABOVE the store's
+   * committed watermark — the durable shape a torn generation-log tail leaves
+   * behind (the stamp's fsync outlived the tail's). Fabricated rather than
+   * crash-produced so the pin is deterministic; the seeded-SIGKILL lane
+   * (`scripts/crash-consistency.mjs` in the engine repo) produces the same
+   * shape from a real abrupt termination.
+   */
+  const fabricateTear = (ahead: number): FamilyStamp => {
+    const file = path.join(dir, `${ENTITY_TREE_STAMP_PATH}.gz`)
+    const zlib = require('node:zlib')
+    const raw = JSON.parse(zlib.gunzipSync(fs.readFileSync(file)).toString('utf-8')) as FamilyStamp
+    const torn: FamilyStamp = { ...raw, sourceGeneration: raw.sourceGeneration + ahead }
+    fs.writeFileSync(file, zlib.gzipSync(JSON.stringify(torn)))
+    return torn
+  }
+
+  it('a torn generation-log tail is a TERMINAL VERDICT at open: narrated, demoted, never a wait', async () => {
+    for (let i = 0; i < 3; i++)
+      await brain.add({ data: `torn${i}`, type: 'document', metadata: { i } })
+    await brain.close()
+    const torn = fabricateTear(5)
+
+    const warn = vi.spyOn(prodLog, 'warn')
+    const startedAt = Date.now()
+    brain = await open()
+    const openMs = Date.now() - startedAt
+
+    const tearLines = warn.mock.calls.filter((c) => String(c[0]).includes('TORN GENERATION-LOG TAIL'))
+    expect(tearLines.length).toBe(1)
+    const said = String(tearLines[0][0])
+    // Narrated PRECISELY: both generations, the file, and the named cure.
+    expect(said).toContain(`source generation ${torn.sourceGeneration}`)
+    expect(said).toContain(`committed generation ${brain.generationStore.committedGeneration()}`)
+    expect(said).toContain(ENTITY_TREE_STAMP_PATH)
+    expect(said).toContain('DEMOTED')
+    expect(said).toMatch(/repairIndex\(\)/)
+    // Terminal, not a wait: the demotion is O(1) straight-line work, so a tear
+    // cannot turn an open into the 8-minute spin this class was reported as.
+    expect(openMs).toBeLessThan(30_000)
+
+    // The store SERVES — a tear in a stamp never locks an owner out of the
+    // canonical tree the stamp merely describes.
+    expect((await brain.find({ type: 'document', limit: 100 })).length).toBe(3)
+
+    // The demotion CONVERGED: the stamp now names committed truth, and the
+    // next open is quiet. A verdict that re-narrates every open is a wait
+    // wearing a different hat.
+    const restamped = (await readFamilyStamp(brain.storage, ENTITY_TREE_STAMP_PATH)) as FamilyStamp
+    expect(restamped.sourceGeneration).toBe(brain.generationStore.committedGeneration())
+    await brain.close()
+    const warn2 = vi.spyOn(prodLog, 'warn')
+    brain = await open()
+    expect(warn2.mock.calls.filter((c) => String(c[0]).includes('TORN'))).toEqual([])
+  })
+
+  it('a READ-ONLY open on a torn tail refuses to guess: terminal verdict + named cure, no re-stamp', async () => {
+    await brain.add({ data: 'ro', type: 'document', metadata: {} })
+    await brain.close()
+    const torn = fabricateTear(3)
+
+    const warn = vi.spyOn(prodLog, 'warn')
+    const reader: any = await Brainy.openReadOnly({
+      requireSubtype: false,
+      storage: { type: 'filesystem', path: dir },
+      silent: true,
+      dimensions: 384
+    })
+    const tearLines = warn.mock.calls.filter((c) => String(c[0]).includes('TORN GENERATION-LOG TAIL'))
+    expect(tearLines.length).toBe(1)
+    const said = String(tearLines[0][0])
+    expect(said).toContain('READ-ONLY')
+    expect(said).toContain('UNVERIFIED')
+    expect(said).toMatch(/repairIndex\(\)/)
+    await reader.close()
+
+    // A reader never rewrites the store: read the bytes back off disk (not
+    // through a writer open, which would demote them) — the torn stamp is
+    // exactly as it was found.
+    const onDisk = JSON.parse(
+      require('node:zlib')
+        .gunzipSync(fs.readFileSync(path.join(dir, `${ENTITY_TREE_STAMP_PATH}.gz`)))
+        .toString('utf-8')
+    ) as FamilyStamp
+    expect(onDisk.sourceGeneration).toBe(torn.sourceGeneration)
+    expect(onDisk.generation).toBe(torn.generation)
+
+    brain = await open()
+  })
+
   it('the one verifier handles both member modes', () => {
     const rollup: FamilyStamp = {
       family: 'x',
@@ -127,7 +221,13 @@ describe('entity-tree family stamp', () => {
       stampSource: 5,
       head: 9
     })
-    expect(verifyFamilyStamp(rollup, 3, { nounCount: 10 }).state).toBe('incoherent') // ahead of head
+    // AHEAD is its own class — a torn generation-log tail, never folded in
+    // with `incoherent`: the two have opposite cures (recount vs demote).
+    expect(verifyFamilyStamp(rollup, 3, { nounCount: 10 })).toEqual({
+      state: 'torn',
+      stampSource: 5,
+      head: 3
+    })
     expect(verifyFamilyStamp(null, 5, {})).toEqual({ state: 'absent' })
 
     const enumerated: FamilyStamp = {

tests/integration/filter-operator-conformance.test.ts

@@ -0,0 +1,151 @@
+/**
+ * @module tests/integration/filter-operator-conformance
+ * @description THE OPERATOR SET, AND WHAT EACH TOKEN DOES ON THE INDEX PATH.
+ *
+ * The contract-1 manifest splits this engine's `where` operators three ways —
+ * served, served-beyond-baseline, refused-by-name — and two engines must agree
+ * token for token. This lane is the machine-checkable side of that agreement:
+ * it asserts the EXACT accepted set (so a manifest can be diffed against a run
+ * rather than against prose), and it pins each of the three classes.
+ *
+ * The defect it closes: the metadata index's operator switch had no default
+ * case, so an operator it does not implement — `hasAll`, `noneOf`, `excludes`,
+ * `startsWith`, `endsWith`, `matches`, `length` — left the field's match set at
+ * its initial `[]` and `find()` returned an empty page. A documented operator,
+ * implemented in the in-memory matcher, answering silently wrong. Three of the
+ * seven are now SERVED on the index path; the other four are REFUSED BY NAME,
+ * because an equality/range posting index cannot evaluate a substring, a
+ * pattern or an array length without reading every row.
+ */
+
+import { describe, it, expect, afterEach } from 'vitest'
+import { mkdtempSync, rmSync, readFileSync } from 'node:fs'
+import { tmpdir } from 'node:os'
+import { join } from 'node:path'
+import { Brainy } from '../../src/brainy.js'
+import { NounType } from '../../src/types/graphTypes.js'
+import { contractVersion, BRAINY_CONTRACT_VERSION } from '../../src/utils/version.js'
+
+/** The accepted `where` value-operator tokens, as a sorted list. */
+const ACCEPTED_OPERATORS = [
+  'between', 'contains', 'endsWith', 'eq', 'equals', 'excludes', 'exists',
+  'greaterThan', 'greaterThanOrEqual', 'gt', 'gte', 'hasAll', 'in', 'length',
+  'lessThan', 'lessThanOrEqual', 'lt', 'lte', 'matches', 'missing', 'ne',
+  'noneOf', 'notEquals', 'oneOf', 'startsWith'
+] as const
+
+/** Served on the index path with exact posting-set semantics. */
+const SERVED_ON_INDEX = [
+  'between', 'contains', 'eq', 'equals', 'exists', 'greaterThan',
+  'greaterThanOrEqual', 'gt', 'gte', 'in', 'lessThan', 'lessThanOrEqual',
+  'lt', 'lte', 'missing', 'ne', 'notEquals', 'oneOf',
+  'excludes', 'hasAll', 'noneOf'
+] as const
+
+/** Accepted by name, refused by the index path — never answered empty. */
+const REFUSED_BY_INDEX = ['endsWith', 'length', 'matches', 'startsWith'] as const
+
+describe('filter operator conformance', () => {
+  const dirs: string[] = []
+  const brains: Brainy[] = []
+
+  afterEach(async () => {
+    for (const b of brains.splice(0)) {
+      try { await b.close() } catch { /* already closed */ }
+    }
+    for (const d of dirs.splice(0)) {
+      try { rmSync(d, { recursive: true, force: true }) } catch { /* ignore */ }
+    }
+  })
+
+  async function seeded(): Promise<Brainy> {
+    const dir = mkdtempSync(join(tmpdir(), 'brainy-operators-'))
+    dirs.push(dir)
+    const brain = new Brainy({ requireSubtype: false, storage: { type: 'filesystem', path: dir } })
+    brains.push(brain)
+    await brain.init()
+    await brain.add({
+      data: 'a document about ferrets',
+      type: NounType.Document,
+      metadata: { tags: ['ferret', 'small', 'furry'], team: 'alpha' }
+    })
+    await brain.add({
+      data: 'a document about whales',
+      type: NounType.Document,
+      metadata: { tags: ['whale', 'large'], team: 'beta' }
+    })
+    await brain.flush()
+    return brain
+  }
+
+  it('the accepted operator set is exactly these 25 tokens', async () => {
+    const brain = await seeded()
+    // The engine names its own valid set in the refusal it raises for an
+    // unknown token — the honest place to read it from.
+    let message = ''
+    try {
+      await brain.find({ where: { team: { notIn: ['alpha'] } } } as never)
+    } catch (err) {
+      message = (err as Error).message
+    }
+    expect(message).toMatch(/Unknown filter operator "notIn"/)
+    const listed = (message.match(/Valid operators: ([^.]+)\./)?.[1] ?? '')
+      .split(',')
+      .map((t) => t.trim())
+      .filter(Boolean)
+      .sort()
+    expect(listed).toEqual([...ACCEPTED_OPERATORS].sort())
+    expect(listed.length).toBe(25)
+    // Four tokens a sibling manifest listed as served aliases are NOT in this
+    // engine's set and never have been — they raise INVALID_QUERY.
+    for (const absent of ['is', 'isNot', 'greaterEqual', 'lessEqual']) {
+      expect(listed).not.toContain(absent)
+      await expect(
+        brain.find({ where: { team: { [absent]: 'alpha' } } } as never)
+      ).rejects.toThrow(/Unknown filter operator/)
+    }
+  }, 120_000)
+
+  it('serves hasAll, noneOf and excludes on the index path — never an empty page', async () => {
+    const brain = await seeded()
+
+    const hasAll = await brain.find({ where: { tags: { hasAll: ['ferret', 'furry'] } } } as never)
+    expect(hasAll.length).toBe(1)
+    expect((hasAll[0] as { metadata?: Record<string, unknown> }).metadata?.team).toBe('alpha')
+
+    const noneOf = await brain.find({ where: { team: { noneOf: ['alpha'] } } } as never)
+    expect(noneOf.length).toBe(1)
+    expect((noneOf[0] as { metadata?: Record<string, unknown> }).metadata?.team).toBe('beta')
+
+    const excludes = await brain.find({ where: { tags: { excludes: 'whale' } } } as never)
+    expect(excludes.length).toBe(1)
+    expect((excludes[0] as { metadata?: Record<string, unknown> }).metadata?.team).toBe('alpha')
+
+    // hasAll with an operand nothing carries is EMPTY because it is empty —
+    // the honest zero, reached by evaluating the operator.
+    const none = await brain.find({ where: { tags: { hasAll: ['ferret', 'whale'] } } } as never)
+    expect(none.length).toBe(0)
+  }, 120_000)
+
+  it('refuses the four index-unserveable operators BY NAME', async () => {
+    const brain = await seeded()
+    for (const op of REFUSED_BY_INDEX) {
+      const operand = op === 'length' ? 3 : 'a'
+      await expect(
+        brain.find({ where: { team: { [op]: operand } } } as never),
+        `${op} must refuse, never answer an empty page`
+      ).rejects.toThrow(new RegExp(`Filter operator "${op}".*cannot be served by the metadata index`, 's'))
+    }
+  }, 120_000)
+
+  it('declares its contract version in code and in package.json', async () => {
+    expect(contractVersion()).toBe(1)
+    expect(BRAINY_CONTRACT_VERSION).toBe(1)
+    const pkg = JSON.parse(readFileSync(join(process.cwd(), 'package.json'), 'utf-8'))
+    expect(pkg.brainyContract).toBe(contractVersion())
+  })
+
+  it('the three classes partition the accepted set', () => {
+    expect([...SERVED_ON_INDEX, ...REFUSED_BY_INDEX].sort()).toEqual([...ACCEPTED_OPERATORS].sort())
+  })
+})

tests/integration/flush-watcher-event-driven.test.ts

@@ -0,0 +1,94 @@
+/**
+ * @module tests/integration/flush-watcher-event-driven
+ * @description THE FLUSH-REQUEST WATCH IS EVENT-DRIVEN.
+ *
+ * It used to `readdir` the request directory every 500 ms, per brain, for the
+ * life of every writer — armed on every non-reader brain whether or not any
+ * inspector process existed. MEASURED on a production process holding 21
+ * brains: 42 directory reads per second on a completely idle service, plus a
+ * stale-request GC pass on every one of them.
+ *
+ * The law: a request that has not been made is not a cause. The arrival itself
+ * wakes the watcher, so the request is seen SOONER than the poll saw it, and a
+ * slow safety sweep covers filesystems that drop watch events and the GC.
+ */
+
+import { describe, it, expect, afterEach, vi } from 'vitest'
+import { mkdtempSync, rmSync, writeFileSync, mkdirSync } from 'node:fs'
+import * as nodeFs from 'node:fs'
+import { tmpdir } from 'node:os'
+import { join } from 'node:path'
+import { Brainy } from '../../src/brainy.js'
+import { NounType } from '../../src/types/graphTypes.js'
+
+describe('the flush-request watcher', () => {
+  const dirs: string[] = []
+  const brains: Brainy[] = []
+
+  afterEach(async () => {
+    for (const b of brains.splice(0)) {
+      try { await b.close() } catch { /* already closed */ }
+    }
+    for (const d of dirs.splice(0)) {
+      try { rmSync(d, { recursive: true, force: true }) } catch { /* ignore */ }
+    }
+    vi.restoreAllMocks()
+  })
+
+  async function openWriter(): Promise<{ brain: Brainy; dir: string }> {
+    const dir = mkdtempSync(join(tmpdir(), 'brainy-flush-watch-'))
+    dirs.push(dir)
+    const brain = new Brainy({ requireSubtype: false, storage: { type: 'filesystem', path: dir } })
+    brains.push(brain)
+    await brain.init()
+    await brain.add({ data: 'a row', type: NounType.Concept })
+    await brain.flush()
+    return { brain, dir }
+  }
+
+  it('does not poll the request directory on an idle writer', async () => {
+    const { dir } = await openWriter()
+    const reqDir = join(dir, 'locks', '_flush_requests')
+
+    // Count real reads of the request directory over a window far longer than
+    // the old 500ms poll (which would have made ~16 of them).
+    const realReaddir = nodeFs.promises.readdir
+    let requestDirReads = 0
+    const spy = vi
+      .spyOn(nodeFs.promises, 'readdir')
+      .mockImplementation((async (p: unknown, ...rest: unknown[]) => {
+        if (String(p) === reqDir) requestDirReads++
+        return (realReaddir as unknown as (...a: unknown[]) => Promise<unknown>)(p, ...rest)
+      }) as typeof nodeFs.promises.readdir)
+
+    await new Promise((r) => setTimeout(r, 8_000))
+    spy.mockRestore()
+
+    // The old poll: 500ms → ~16 reads. The safety sweep is 30s → 0 in this window.
+    expect(requestDirReads).toBeLessThanOrEqual(1)
+  }, 120_000)
+
+  it('answers a request that arrives, without waiting for the sweep', async () => {
+    const { brain, dir } = await openWriter()
+    const reqDir = join(dir, 'locks', '_flush_requests')
+    const ackDir = join(dir, 'locks', '_flush_responses')
+    mkdirSync(reqDir, { recursive: true })
+
+    // Drop a request exactly as an out-of-process inspector does.
+    const id = 'test-request-0001'
+    writeFileSync(join(reqDir, `${id}.req`), JSON.stringify({ at: Date.now() }))
+
+    // The ack must land far sooner than the 30s safety sweep.
+    const deadline = Date.now() + 10_000
+    let acked = false
+    while (Date.now() < deadline) {
+      try {
+        const entries = await nodeFs.promises.readdir(ackDir)
+        if (entries.some((e) => e.startsWith(id))) { acked = true; break }
+      } catch { /* dir not created yet */ }
+      await new Promise((r) => setTimeout(r, 100))
+    }
+    expect(acked, 'the watcher must answer an arriving request').toBe(true)
+    void brain
+  }, 120_000)
+})

tests/integration/health-gate.test.ts

@@ -188,7 +188,7 @@ describe('health gate (b) — unledgered is unknown: never blocks a serving prov
 describe('health gate (c) — degraded-but-serving narrates once per generation', () => {
   // PER-FAMILY LAW (10.4.1): a metadata find() consults the METADATA leg only — the
   // degraded report lives on the family the read actually consults.
-  it('a heal:"repair" failure serves; narrates once per generation, twice across a generation bump', async () => {
+  it('a heal:"repair" failure serves; narrates once per DISTINCT VERDICT, not once per generation bump', async () => {
     const brain = new Brainy(createTestConfig({ silent: true }))
     await brain.init()
     brains.push(brain)
@@ -197,12 +197,13 @@ describe('health gate (c) — degraded-but-serving narrates once per generation'
 
     const internals = internalsOf(brain)
     let generation = 1
+    let detail = 'counter drift'
     internals.metadataIndex.healthReport = () =>
       healthReport({
         provider: 'vector',
         serving: true,
         healthy: false,
-        invariants: [invariant({ name: 'stale-vector-counter', holds: false, heal: 'repair', detail: 'counter drift' })],
+        invariants: [invariant({ name: 'stale-vector-counter', holds: false, heal: 'repair', detail })],
         generation
       })
 
@@ -212,11 +213,22 @@ describe('health gate (c) — degraded-but-serving narrates once per generation'
 
     await expect(brain.find({ where: { team: 'atlas' } })).resolves.toHaveLength(1)
     await expect(brain.find({ where: { team: 'atlas' } })).resolves.toHaveLength(1)
-    expect(countNarrations()).toBe(1) // same generation both times — one narration
+    expect(countNarrations()).toBe(1) // same verdict both times — one narration
 
+    // THE DEDUPE KEY IS THE VERDICT, NOT THE COUNTER. A provider's `generation`
+    // bumps on every ledger mutation and every rebuild boundary, so keying the
+    // narration on it re-printed an UNCHANGED health line on every read that
+    // consulted a busy provider — and, in the other direction, let a provider
+    // that never bumped suppress a line whose reasons had genuinely changed.
+    // An unchanged verdict is silent however the counter moves:
     generation = 2
     await expect(brain.find({ where: { team: 'atlas' } })).resolves.toHaveLength(1)
-    expect(countNarrations()).toBe(2) // generation bumped — a second narration
+    expect(countNarrations()).toBe(1) // generation bumped, verdict identical — still silent
+
+    // ...and a CHANGED verdict is always heard, bump or no bump:
+    detail = 'counter drift widened to 12 rows'
+    await expect(brain.find({ where: { team: 'atlas' } })).resolves.toHaveLength(1)
+    expect(countNarrations()).toBe(2) // the reasons changed — a new narration
 
     delete internals.metadataIndex.healthReport
   })

tests/integration/history-repacking.test.ts

@@ -16,6 +16,7 @@ import { describe, it, expect, afterEach } from 'vitest'
 import * as fs from 'node:fs'
 import * as path from 'node:path'
 import * as os from 'node:os'
+import * as zlib from 'node:zlib'
 import { Brainy } from '../../src/brainy.js'
 import { NounType } from '../../src/types/graphTypes.js'
 import { GenerationStore } from '../../src/db/generationStore.js'
@@ -57,6 +58,107 @@ describe('history repacking — the two-tier lifecycle', () => {
     }
   })
 
+  /**
+   * THE HOLE, END TO END — the shape a real store carries.
+   *
+   * A forensic fixture was measured with generation directories 1..2503
+   * present except for exactly one: 1416. Its fact-log segment already showed
+   * the tell — `seg-...1410.bfl` declaring firstGeneration 1410, lastGeneration
+   * 1940 (531 generations) while recording only 530 facts.
+   *
+   * Before the fix, repacking such a store folded ACROSS that hole: the batch
+   * skipped 1416 (no readable delta) and the sealed segment declared a range
+   * spanning it anyway. The next open merged that declared range back into
+   * committedRanges, re-admitting 1416 as committed history, and every
+   * subsequent auto-compaction pass then asked the packed tier for a frame
+   * that was never written — producing, on EVERY run, the non-fatal narration
+   *
+   *   Auto-compaction of generational history failed (non-fatal): generation
+   *   N is inside sealed segment seg-....bgs's declared range but has no frame
+   *   — packed history is damaged
+   *
+   * This pin removes a generation directory to make the same hole, then
+   * requires repack + reopen + compaction to complete cleanly.
+   */
+  it('a missing generation directory does not poison the packed tier', async () => {
+    const dir = tempDir()
+    // `retention: 'all'` throughout: close() otherwise auto-compacts the
+    // history away, and this pin needs the cold generations still on disk so
+    // there is something to punch a hole in. The live window stays at its
+    // production default for the build phase, so nothing folds yet.
+    const archival = async (): Promise<Brainy> => {
+      const b = new Brainy({
+        requireSubtype: false,
+        storage: { type: 'filesystem', path: dir },
+        embeddingFunction: stub,
+        retention: 'all'
+      })
+      await b.init()
+      return b
+    }
+    const brain = await archival()
+
+    const id = await brain.add({
+      data: 'holed-entity',
+      type: NounType.Document,
+      metadata: { v: 0 }
+    })
+    // One flush per update: single-op writes coalesce inside a flush window,
+    // so a history deep enough to have a middle needs the windows separated.
+    for (let v = 1; v <= 12; v++) {
+      await brain.update({ id, metadata: { v } })
+      await brain.flush()
+    }
+    await brain.close()
+
+    // Punch the hole: delete ONE generation directory in the middle of the
+    // cold range, exactly as the real store presents it.
+    const genRoot = path.join(dir, '_generations')
+    const numeric = fs
+      .readdirSync(genRoot, { withFileTypes: true })
+      .filter((e) => e.isDirectory() && /^\d+$/.test(e.name))
+      .map((e) => Number(e.name))
+      .sort((a, b) => a - b)
+    expect(numeric.length).toBeGreaterThan(6)
+    const victim = numeric[Math.floor(numeric.length / 2)]
+    fs.rmSync(path.join(genRoot, String(victim)), { recursive: true, force: true })
+
+    // Now shrink the live window and reopen. close() repacks automatically
+    // (brainy.ts phase 0b), so this is the production sequence exactly: a
+    // store with a hole in its history gets folded by ordinary housekeeping,
+    // with nobody asking for it.
+    ;(GenerationStore as any).REPACK_LIVE_WINDOW = 3
+    const reopened = await archival()
+    const result = await reopened.repackHistory()
+    expect(result.foldedGenerations).toBeGreaterThan(0)
+
+    const segDir = path.join(dir, SEGMENTS_PREFIX)
+    const manifestPath = ['manifest.json', 'manifest.json.gz']
+      .map((f) => path.join(segDir, f))
+      .find((p) => fs.existsSync(p))!
+    const raw = manifestPath.endsWith('.gz')
+      ? zlib.gunzipSync(fs.readFileSync(manifestPath)).toString('utf8')
+      : fs.readFileSync(manifestPath, 'utf8')
+    const manifest = JSON.parse(raw) as {
+      segments: Array<{ firstGeneration: number; lastGeneration: number; frames: number }>
+    }
+
+    // THE LAW: every sealed segment declares exactly as many generations as it
+    // holds frames, and none of them spans the victim.
+    for (const s of manifest.segments) {
+      expect(s.lastGeneration - s.firstGeneration + 1).toBe(s.frames)
+      expect(victim >= s.firstGeneration && victim <= s.lastGeneration).toBe(false)
+    }
+
+    await reopened.close()
+
+    // And the pass that used to fail on every run now completes: reopen (which
+    // re-seeds committedRanges from the packed tier) then compact history.
+    const third = await openBrain(dir)
+    await expect(third.compactHistory({ maxGenerations: 2 })).resolves.toBeDefined()
+    await third.close()
+  })
+
   it('repack preserves every historical read across cold reopen; folded dirs are gone', async () => {
     ;(GenerationStore as any).REPACK_LIVE_WINDOW = 3
     const dir = tempDir()