Build Log · October 9, 2026
Sterling, Scout Pioneer, and a Home for Alloy
A third team member for the business side, a bounded experiment that honestly found no opportunity, a landing page that puts every decision in one place, and a correction: Scout's dollar figures were never money.
- Alloy
- Scout
- Sterling
- Crowd Jam
- Team
- Pioneer cycles run to the cap (≈$8.09 API-equivalent, not billed)
- 4
- Pioneer opportunities that cleared the two-evidence bar (a valid result)
- 0
- KB: Scout's brief, trimmed after it outgrew what Scout could read
- 55→32.8
- commits (Sterling, Pioneer, Home, Crowd Jam analytics, brief fix x2)
- 6
Pioneer cycles run to the cap (≈$8.09 API-equivalent, not billed)
Pioneer opportunities that cleared the two-evidence bar (a valid result)
KB: Scout's brief, trimmed after it outgrew what Scout could read
commits (Sterling, Pioneer, Home, Crowd Jam analytics, brief fix x2)
Timeline
Charge 1
Sterling
Premise check found ForgeKit LLC already exists; Charge narrowed to regularizing it
Build
Sterling's record and page
Sourced establishment record, operating-agreement draft, Alloy /sterling checklist
Side
Lemon Squeezy reply
Checked bundled songs were original and the live site's state before drafting
Charge 2
Scout Pioneer
Crucible turned a standing 25% split into a capped 4-cycle experiment
Correction
Costs are not money
Zeb: 'if you are running on my claude code usage, you can't know the cost'
Charge 3
Home
One landing page: needs-you inbox, team cards, money, in motion
Run
Pioneer cycles 2-4
Corrections verified in the DB; brief: close this angle
Close
Commit, deploy Alloy, wrap
Found and fixed the truncated-brief bug the last cycle exposed
What shipped
docs/sterling/CHARTER.md — Sterling's identity, scope (business only), authority boundary (no credentials to any bank/payment/filing system), evidence vocabulary, promotion triggers
docs/sterling/operating-agreement-draft.md — single-member Ohio LLC draft including IP assignment to the LLC (draft, not legal advice)
products/alloy/lib/sterling/establishment.ts — sourced establishment record: facts with evidence levels, phased steps, owner questions and decisions, compliance calendar, bank comparison, risks, decision history, next-work queue
products/alloy/app/w/[slug]/sterling/page.tsx + products/alloy/app/sterling/page.tsx — owner-only guided checklist (Where are we / What's next / What do you need from me)
products/scout/lib/domain/operation.ts — Pioneer track caps in startCycle (maxPioneerCycles 4, maxPioneerCostUsd 12), owner-written track events, acquisitionMonthSpend() so Pioneer can't use the main track's monthly budget, compact brief
products/scout/scripts/run-cycle.ts — --track pioneer, Pioneer prompt, Witness-findings-first in every track, cost labeled API-equivalent
products/scout/scout/mcp-server.ts — write_pioneer_brief (Pioneer cycles only), honest cost questions, get_brief size warning
products/scout/scout/CHARTER.md — Pioneer track section (two-evidence-class bar, seven questions) and an Honesty rule that cost figures are not money
products/scout/lib/domain/witness.ts — Witness checks the Pioneer evidence bar
products/scout/tests/domain.test.ts — real-DB test: Pioneer caps, and acquisition refused at its own cap while Pioneer still runs
products/scout/scripts/peek-pioneer.ts, peek-pioneer-brief.ts, peek-brief-size.ts — read-only live checks
products/alloy/app/w/[slug]/scout/pioneer/page.tsx — Scout > Pioneer tab; API-equivalent labels on Scout overview and Activity
products/alloy/app/w/[slug]/home/page.tsx + products/alloy/app/home/page.tsx — Home landing page; root / now redirects there; Home and Sterling nav items
experiments/FretHero/frontend/src/main.jsx — Vercel Web Analytics (@vercel/analytics/react) for Crowd Jam; built, not deployed
Ran Scout Pioneer cycles #9-#12; final Pioneer Opportunity Brief recorded in Scout's DB
“can you prove these costs to me... if you are running on my claude code usage, you can't know the cost... and I don't use the API”