the-daily-epub/docs/plans/2026-09-02-curation-v2-progress.md

Personalized Curation v2 — implementation progress and handoff

Updated: 2026-09-02 (end of session 1) Plan: docs/plans/2026-09-02-personalized-curation-v2.md (§21 is the step sequence) Branch: curation-v2 (branched from main at a599745; not merged, not pushed) Briefs: docs/plans/curation-v2-briefs/ — 00-preamble.md + one stepN.md per step. Each brief was handed to an implementation agent as cat 00-preamble.md stepN.md.

Where things stand

Step (§21)	Status	Commit
1. Feedback and profile	done, reviewed (codex review: no actionable issues)	3a9f4b9
2. Claude editor and editorial	done	57efbb4
3. Embeddings, signals, telemetry	done (branch curation-v2-step3, merged)	ea3b141 + merge commit
4. Triage replaces the gate	not started — brief ready: step4.md
5. Deep assessment, utility, diversity	not started — brief ready: step5.md
6. Paper telemetry, stats, lock	not started — brief ready: step6.md
7. Cleanup + implementation notes	not started — brief ready: step7.md

cargo fmt --check, cargo clippy --all-targets (only the three pre-existing src/world.rs needless_borrow warnings) and cargo test (294 lib tests + 6 integration suites) are green at HEAD.

Nothing has been run against the production database or the real providers. No local config.toml, database, or API keys exist on the dev box, so verification so far is tests only.

Decisions and deviations made while implementing (read before step 4)

• scores table not yet dropped. Migration 0002_curation_v2.sql created every new table, copied ratings → rating_events, and dropped ratings and feed_priors, but kept scores because the old Stage A scoring (src/curate/score.rs, db::upsert_score, recently_low_scored_ids) still uses it. Step 4 adds migrations/0003_drop_scores.sql and moves the churn rule to article_assessments (already in step4.md).
• Old prefilter still gates. Hygiene → embeddings → signals → preliminary blend now run for every article, and candidate_runs rows are written with the stage vocabulary mapped onto the old flow (admitted_by is ["prefilter"]/["auto"] for now), but prefilter::run + prefilter_keep still decide the deep set until step 4.
• Legacy up links. Vote::parse("up") → Loved, and auth::verify_token also accepts tokens signed over the literal up segment so already-published issues keep working.
• Same-date regeneration no longer excludes its own picks (published_before uses issue dates strictly before the run date), per plan §8.1.
• VoyageConfig.api_key exists as a field (figment maps DAILY_EPUB_VOYAGE__API_KEY into it; deny_unknown_fields would otherwise reject the env var). Never document it in TOML.
• anthropic.max_concurrent_requests is validated but not consumed yet; summary concurrency is the constant SUMMARY_CONCURRENCY = 4 in editorial.rs.
• UsageMeter::new(&DeepseekConfig, ..) survives as a compat constructor over with_prices.
• tests/fixtures/deepseek_front_page.json was replaced by tests/fixtures/claude_brief.json.
• RATINGS_LOOKBACK_DAYS in profile/mod.rs is effectively unbounded (36,500) for the prompt verdict block and the weekly rebuild; the knn/feed preference state uses curation.ranking.rating_lookback_days (180) as the plan says.
• Footer CSS: .rating has no white-space: nowrap (it would clip on narrow e-ink screens).

Operator to-dos before the first real run

1. Set DAILY_EPUB_ANTHROPIC__API_KEY and DAILY_EPUB_VOYAGE__API_KEY in the systemd env file.
2. Set hard spend limits in the DeepSeek, Anthropic and Voyage dashboards (the meters are runaway guards, not accounting).
3. Copy data/profile.md to wherever profile_path points on the server (default is relative to WorkingDirectory=/var/lib/daily-epub, like data/scour-interests.opml).
4. Run daily-epub db migrate (0002 drops ratings/feed_priors; back up the DB first).
5. daily-epub features backfill --rated-only then --days 30 to warm the embedding cache.
6. A generate --dry-run and read the paper; explain --near-misses once step 4 lands.

How the work was run (so the next session can repeat it)

• Orchestrator: Claude Code (this repo), one implementation agent per step, review + commit by the orchestrator after independent cargo fmt/clippy/test.
• Codex: codex exec -C <repo> --sandbox workspace-write --add-dir ~/.cargo -c sandbox_workspace_write.network_access=true -c model_reasoning_effort=high -o <last.md> - < <brief>, detached with setsid nohup, exit code written to a file and watched with a monitor. The openai-codex Claude Code plugin's task runs fail on this host (bubblewrap cannot create user namespaces: kernel.apparmor_restrict_unprivileged_userns = 1); the CLI works if the brief tells the agent to edit files via shell commands instead of the apply_patch tool (see the preamble). The plugin's read-only review --background --scope working-tree does work and was used on step 1. Fix for the sandbox: sudo sysctl -w kernel.apparmor_restrict_unprivileged_userns=0.
• Codex ran out of ChatGPT usage after ~560k tokens (step 1 complete, steps 2 and 3 cut off mid-way); Claude general-purpose sub-agents finished steps 2 and 3 from the partial trees and resolved the step 2/3 merge. Budget roughly one large step per Codex usage window.
• Steps 2 and 3 were run in parallel (step 3 in a git worktree); the merge cost ~19 conflict hunks in config/pipeline/report/main/README/config.example. Steps 4 → 5 → 6 → 7 are sequential.

Next session: exact starting instructions

1. git checkout curation-v2 && cargo test (expect green).
2. Read this file, then docs/plans/curation-v2-briefs/00-preamble.md and step4.md.
3. Launch the step 4 agent with cat 00-preamble.md step4.md as the prompt (Codex CLI as above, or a Claude general-purpose agent — tell it to ignore the "host quirk" paragraph in that case).
4. Review the diff against plan §10–§11, run the checks, commit as "Curation v2 step 4: …".
5. Repeat for steps 5, 6, 7. After step 7: git merge --no-ff curation-v2 into main, deploy, and do the operator to-dos above.