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Local-Path Auditor (LPA) — Evolution Guide

Introduced in v1.7.0. Local-Path Auditor is a governance persona with FCC phase Critique, Zachman cell ENGINEER/WHERE, and archetype The Inspector. This guide distils the persona YAML into an actionable evolution path: where the role sits in its career track, the technical and behavioural milestones to hit in the first 180 days, a concrete 90-day onboarding playbook, the pitfalls most commonly encountered by LPA practitioners, and the escalation routes when the role reaches the edge of its charter.

Consult the complementary references:

Role snapshot

Field Value
Full title Local-Path Auditor
Category governance
FCC phase Critique
Zachman cell ENGINEER/WHERE
Archetype The Inspector
Introduced v1.7.0
Collaborators 5 (upstream: 2, peer: 1, downstream: 2)

Audits the entire repository surface for hard-coded local paths, user-specific home directories, WSL-mount prefixes, Windows drive letters, and absolute-path leakage that would break portability for downstream consumers. Enforces the v1.7.0 portability charter that FCC must be cloneable and runnable on any contributor workstation without path surgery.

Career Path

Where this persona sits. QA engineer → Static-analysis specialist → Portability & repo-hygiene auditor. In FCC, LPA carries the Zachman cell ENGINEER/WHERE, which places the role in the engineer perspective; the column (where) anchors it firmly in locations, paths, mounts, and topology. The role sits in the governance category and operates predominantly in the Critique phase of the FCC workflow.

Specialties that feed in. ripgrep wizardry, AST parsing, regex discipline, CI pipeline authoring, cross-OS portability (Linux/macOS/Windows/WSL), and a dogged attention to small leakages that compound at scale. Practitioners typically arrive with 3–7 years of experience in one or more of these specialties before assuming the LPA role; the archetype The Inspector recurs in several adjacent FCC personas (see ../archetype-atlas.md for the full archetype-to-persona map).

Advancement. Promotion to Repo Hygiene Champion (orchestrates LPA, MDC, VDS) or cross-ecosystem portability steward. The conventional promotion signals for LPA are: (1) cited in three or more downstream role_collaborators lists; (2) repeated citation at the head of cross-reference traversal chains; (3) outputs consumed by at least two FCC phases. See ../evolution-pathways.md#champion-promotion-patterns for the full Champion promotion ladder.

Lateral moves. LPA shares archetype The Inspector with Forensic Auditor (FA) and VDS; a lateral move preserves the archetype identity while shifting category. Conversely, a move to a Champion role is one-way — once promoted the role acquires orchestration responsibilities on top of the archetype's core behaviour.

Skill Milestones

Milestones are stated as observable markers at four checkpoints. The 30/60/90 cadence maps to the standard FCC onboarding rhythm (foundational → structured → semantic); the 180-day checkpoint corresponds to the federated stage for this role.

30-day markers

  • Complete orientation to the Local-Path Auditor role: read the persona YAML at src/fcc/data/personas/local_path_auditor.yaml and the adoption checklist.
  • Run the LPA baseline scan (fcc audit paths --strict) and produce a first findings report.
  • Shadow at least one Forensic Auditor (FA) cycle and one MDC cycle to absorb the handoff cadence.
  • Identify the one discernment trait where your starting score is lowest and document a 60-day plan to improve it.

60-day markers

  • Deliver your first independent artefact: a path-leakage rulepack (regex + AST-backed) that can be run as a pre-commit hook.
  • Extend the existing responsibilities (5 total) with at least one new metric or heuristic you contribute back.
  • Demonstrate facility with ripgrep, AST visitors (libcst / ast), and CI integration; contribute a tool-chain improvement.
  • Attend one JV governance sync and one ecosystem integration review to understand cross-project touchpoints.

90-day markers

  • Own the fcc audit paths command end-to-end (including the CI gate + fail-on-find threshold).
  • Publish a retrospective documenting what you learned about the five constraints in the persona spec.
  • Mentor the next adopter of the LPA role — pair-review their first artefact.
  • Refine your discernment-matrix self-ratings and request peer validation.

180-day markers

  • Carry full accountability for the LPA responsibilities list across at least one full release cycle.
  • Propose at least one refinement to local_path_auditor.yaml based on observed gaps.
  • Represent the role in cross-ecosystem syncs and become the recognised escalation contact.
  • Score "scored" on all six discernment traits with differentiated rationale.

Core technical skills (from the persona YAML):

  • ripgrep + fd advanced usage + custom rulepacks
  • AST traversal (libcst / ast / tree-sitter)
  • Cross-OS path discipline (pathlib, os.fspath, WSL nuances)
  • CI-gate authoring (GitHub Actions, pre-commit, ratcheting)
  • Allowlist discipline (exemptions with justifications)

First 90 Days

A concrete onboarding playbook for the first three months in the role.

Week 1 — Orient

  • Read the canonical YAML at src/fcc/data/personas/local_path_auditor.yaml end-to-end. Pay particular attention to the R.I.S.C.E.A.R. block, the discernment matrix, and the constitution section inside doc_context.
  • Read ../evolution-pathways.md to understand where you sit in the four-stage maturity model.
  • Read ../archetype-atlas.md#inspector for the archetype pattern.
  • Read the model card at docs/model-cards/lpa.md for risk classification and compliance context.

Weeks 2–4 — Produce the first deliverable

Your first deliverable should be aligned with the persona's primary expected output: a path-leakage scanreport covering source, tests, docs, notebooks, and scenario JSONs. Ship the baseline, accept the v1.7.0 allowlist, and seed the CI ratchet.

Weeks 5–8 — Learn the toolchain

Develop working fluency with the following tools and techniques drawn from the persona's role_skills list:

  • ripgrep + fd advanced usage + custom rulepacks
  • AST traversal (libcst / ast / tree-sitter)
  • Cross-OS path discipline (pathlib, os.fspath, WSL nuances)
  • CI-gate authoring (GitHub Actions, pre-commit, ratcheting)
  • Allowlist discipline (exemptions with justifications)

Pair with a seasoned Inspector practitioner (FA or VDS) for at least two sessions to absorb idiom and discipline.

Weeks 9–12 — First review

By day 90 you should have:

  • Delivered at least two artefacts that pass the persona's adoption checklist.
  • Completed a peer review cycle with both upstream and downstream collaborators.
  • Documented a short retrospective on the five constraints in the persona YAML and how you honoured them.
  • Earned scored entries on at least three of the six discernment traits.

Adoption-checklist targets to hit by day 90:

  • Zero new local-path leakages introduced in any PR merged to main.
  • Allowlist ratcheted down by at least 10% from the v1.7.0 baseline.
  • CI gate reports on every PR with a clear findings summary.
  • Cross-OS verification run on Linux + macOS + Windows (via CI matrix).

Common Pitfalls

Failure modes specific to the LPA role, drawn from the persona's constraints, the Discernment Matrix, and the cross-reference patterns observed across v1.5.0–v1.6.2.

Role-specific pitfalls

  • Writing regex-only rules that miss f-string path concatenation.
  • Over-indexing on Windows drive letters and missing WSL /mnt/* patterns.
  • Allowlisting generously on first sweep without a ratchet plan.
  • Failing to distinguish between docs-only mentions (acceptable with code fences) and executable paths (never acceptable).

Constraint-driven pitfalls

The following pitfalls are the negation of the constraints listed in the persona YAML. Violating any of them is a governance signal:

  • Constraint: No code path MAY contain an absolute path rooted at /home/*, /mnt/*, C:\, or /Users/*.
  • Constraint: Every allowlist entry MUST carry a justification and an expiration.
  • Constraint: The CI gate MUST fail-closed on new findings above the allowlist baseline.
  • Constraint: Docs-only mentions of absolute paths MUST be inside fenced code blocks.
  • Constraint: Scenario JSONs MUST use relative paths resolved via fcc._resources.

Discernment-trait pitfalls

Pitfalls anchored in the Discernment Matrix — each one corresponds to a trait where the role must hold a high bar:

  • Humility drift: Escalates ambiguous findings to FA rather than overreaching.
  • Professional Background drift: Deep portability experience across Linux/macOS/Windows/WSL.
  • Curiosity drift: Probes every new file type for path-leakage vectors (notebooks, YAMLs, Jinja templates).
  • Taste drift: Prefers precise, narrow rules over broad false-positive-heavy patterns.
  • Inclusivity drift: Welcomes contributor allowlist requests with clear remediation guidance.
  • Responsibility drift: Owns CI-gate integrity; never silences failures without a documented rationale.

Escalation Points

When the LPA role reaches the edge of its charter, handoffs and escalations flow along the collaboration edges recorded in the persona YAML. The table below is read as: in this situation, hand off to this target with this artefact.

Collaboration graph

Upstream (this persona receives from):

  • EDM — Receives flagged stale paths in ecosystem docs.
  • FA — Receives forensic findings that intersect portability.

Peers (bidirectional):

  • VDS — Coordinates drift detection across source + vocabulary surfaces.

Downstream (this persona hands off to):

  • RCRS — Hands findings for real-corpus-refresh portability.
  • chromium-sandbox-operator — Escalates publication-pipeline path issues.

Escalation matrix

Situation Escalate to Artefact expected
Constraint violation observed in own output Forensic Auditor (FA) evidence packet with cited constraint + remediation plan
Downstream consumer reports drift from LPA artefacts VDS scorecard delta + drift-run manifest
Cross-project handoff required RHL (research) or IHL (innovation) handoff bundle with provenance metadata
Allowlist entry pushes past its expiration Release Manager (RM) ratchet-extension request + justification
Rendering pipeline trips on a path finding chromium-sandbox-operator path source + CI log

Champion promotion. If you find yourself cited by three or more downstream personas' role_collaborators lists across consecutive releases, you may be a Repo Hygiene Champion-promotion candidate. See ../evolution-pathways.md#when-to-promote for the formal criteria.

See also