$ca-chore — non-behavioral change lane

The sanctioned path for work that has no behavioral surface to test-drive. Three types, each with the gates that fit it — and nothing it doesn't need. Everything still exits through commit-gate (classification docs / chore / revert) and lands via branch/PR.

Types

docs — README, comments, CHANGELOG, .codearbiter/ prose, typo fixes.

• Gates: secrets scan over the diff; diff review (no behavioral code change smuggled in); anti-slop copy pass on any user-facing doc in the change; commit-gate.
• Anti-slop copy pass — for any user-facing doc the change touches (repo-root community docs and docs/**; not codeArbiter's own framework bodies), load includes/anti-slop-design/INDEX.md, then core.md and the medium-documents leaf (§7.A.1), and run the §3.A em-dash ban and the §3.B copy self-audit over the authored prose before commit-gate. The H-13 PostToolUse reminder surfaces §3.A separator dashes as you write, so the pass is a confirmation, not a discovery.
• No tdd — prose has no failing test to write.

deps — bump an existing dependency's version (manifest + lockfile together, never one without the other).

• Gates: dispatch dependency-reviewer (same vetting as $ca-add-dep — license, provenance, supply chain, changelog of the bump); affected local tests green under includes/verification-boundary.md; exhaustive exact-head hosted CI before merge; commit-gate.
• A bump that requires code changes to adopt is not a chore — route the code change through $ca-feature or $ca-fix.

revert — back out a named commit.

• Gates: git revert <SHA> (never hand-edited backout); affected local tests green under the shared verification-boundary, exhaustive exact-head hosted CI before merge; the commit message references the reverted SHA and the reason; commit-gate.
• No new regression test demanded — the revert restores already-tested behavior. If the revert is fixing a defect the suite missed, open $ca-fix afterward to pin it.

Flow

1. Classify $ARGUMENTS into one of the three types. Anything with a behavioral code change beyond a mechanical revert is NOT a chore — redirect to $ca-feature or $ca-fix and stop.
2. Run the type's gates above.
3. Exit through commit-gate with the matching classification, then finishing-a-development-branch as usual.

Hard gate

MUST reject a change containing behavioral code (beyond the revert itself) — that is $ca-feature or $ca-fix territory. MUST keep manifest and lockfile changes in the same commit for deps. MUST run impact-bounded local verification for deps and revert and require exhaustive exact-head hosted CI before merge. MUST run the anti-slop copy pass on any user-facing doc a docs change authors or edits. Never skips commit-gate.

When NOT to use

• Any new or changed behavior → $ca-feature / $ca-fix.
• Adding a NEW dependency → $ca-add-dep.
• Restructuring code → $ca-refactor.