1.9 KiB
OE-0011: Evolution
Status: Draft Depends on: OE-0010 (Inheritance) Phase: The Bedrock Phase
Overview
Evolution is the process by which the Open Engineer standard and its constituent documents grow and change over time, always building on bedrock.
Definition
Evolution in the Open Engineer context is not arbitrary change. It is the disciplined, verified extension of the standard's body of knowledge. Every change must survive the four-question framework (OE-0008). Every change must be consistent with the dependency tree.
The Dependency Tree and Evolution
The specification documents form a strict dependency chain:
Charter -> Foundation -> Core Vocabulary -> Engineering Context -> Observation -> Survey -> Understanding -> Verification -> Decision -> Stewardship -> Inheritance -> Evolution
Nothing later may redefine an earlier layer. Only extend it. That is exactly like building on bedrock.
The Workflow
The canonical workflow for all changes:
Observe -> Draft -> Review -> Accept -> Freeze (RC) -> Reference
Once a document reaches RC status, it is not rewritten unless a later RFC explicitly supersedes it.
Spiral Re-evaluation as Evolution
Evolution is not linear. It is spiral. The standard will return to earlier concepts with deeper understanding, refining and extending them without contradicting the bedrock they rest on. This is spiral re-evaluation made concrete in the evolution process.
The Bedrock Phase
The current phase of the Open Engineer standard is The Bedrock Phase. Every sentence accepted during this phase is intended to support everything built above it. If this phase is executed carefully, the website, schemas, AI integrations, tooling, and future implementations will not require anything new to be invented. They will simply express what already exists in the specification.
That is the hallmark of a good standard: the specification leads, and everything else follows.