Excerpt 1: Boundary Discipline / RPR (from FPF-Spec.md, pattern A.6)
The RPR (Relational Precision Restoration) pattern addresses blurred boundary language in contracts, APIs, and SLAs:
"FPF does not let one contract/API/SLA/protocol sentence carry rules, gates, duties, evidence, quality words, and action permission as one undifferentiated bundle; A.6 and A.6.P restore the exact relation before stronger use."
The A.6 pattern family:
- A.6.B — routes boundary claims by type (obligation, permission, gate, evidence requirement)
- A.6.C — compliance/SLA boundary unpacking
- A.6.P — repairs overloaded quality/action language ("quality words" like "reliable," "fast," "secure" that hide comparison characteristics)
- A.6.T — temporal adequacy check on boundary language
- A.6.RSIG — identifies which description signals are present
Technique: Atomic claim decomposition — a single ambiguous sentence is unpacked into separate claims by type (obligation vs gate vs evidence requirement), each routed to the appropriate handling pattern.
Excerpt 2: Characteristic Spaces (from FPF-Spec.md)
"FPF treats comparison, measurement, search, and temporal change as work over declared characteristics and scales, not as loose talk about dimensions or scores."
A Characteristic Space is defined by:
- Declared characteristics (named dimensions)
- Scales for each characteristic (ordinal, cardinal, boolean, symbolic)
- Comparison operators (valid operations given scale type)
- Parity enforcement (all alternatives must be characterized on all dimensions before comparison is admissible)
Technique: Formal type system for comparison — prohibits comparison until all dimensions are declared and populated. Analogous to type-checking for decisions.
The framework defines R_eff (Effective Reliability):
R_eff = f(evidence verdicts, CL penalties, temporal decay)
Verdict vocabulary:
- supports (alias: accepted) → positive contribution to R_eff
- weakens (alias: partial) → attenuated contribution
- refutes (alias: failed) → negative/zero contribution
- superseded → excluded from R_eff computation
Technique: Evidence accounting — formal ledger of evidence verdicts with decay over time. This is analogous to a credit score for claims, where each piece of evidence has a typed verdict and an expiry.
Excerpt 4: Temporal Adequacy (from FPF-Spec.md, pattern C.27)
"C.27 handles claims whose usability depends on window, rhythm, inertia/resistance, freshness, effort, and intervention-sensitive change rather than treating time as background decoration."
Temporal adequacy check requires specifying:
- Live time window (how long is the claim valid?)
- Effort/resistance relation (how hard is it to act within the window?)
- Update rhythm (how often must the claim be refreshed?)
- What must be rechecked before use
Technique: Temporal claim typing — claims are not timeless but carry expiry metadata. A claim without temporal adequacy metadata cannot be used in engineering decisions.
Prompting Techniques Summary
- Atomic claim decomposition (A.6/RPR)
- Formal type system for comparison (Characteristic Spaces)
- Evidence accounting with decay (R_eff / B.3)
- Temporal claim typing (C.27)
- Pattern-as-entry-point (hierarchical navigation by problem type, not linear reading)