ADR 0038 — Requirements remain development metadata

Status: Accepted

Context

Language conformance already has a canonical specification and implementation-neutral cases. Cross-repository engineering must not move semantics into a private registry.

Decision

Add stable LREQ identifiers mapped to existing cases and SPEC.md. The registry is traceability metadata; SPEC.md and conformance remain authoritative. Use the engineering v1 schema and pinned distribution of its offline validator in development CI only. No runtime dependency, grammar, CLI, interpreter or conformance behavior changes.

Consequences

A public clone remains independent. Mapping coverage is distinct from oracle quality. New semantic cases require a new stable ID; existing IDs are never renumbered. A changed case updates its requirement and invalidates old evidence. High-risk language changes continue to need their own ADR and conformance case.