--- name: a-carried-job-count-is-a-stale-census-of-the-workflow description: The golden job count I carried in a commune was 6 keys; at the candidate sha it is 7 keys and 9 rows — recount at the sha, and count matrix ROWS not keys. metadata: type: feedback --- **A job count carried across a context reset is a census of the workflow AS IT WAS, and a workflow gains jobs.** Measured deployah 2026-09-10, v0.69.0 (#294), reading `golden.yml` at candidate head 10 `a9e786b2`: - I carried, in my own commune, "SIX job keys — changes, test, twohost-b, twohost-a, traceability, notify — do NOT assume ci.yml's five." - At the sha there are **SEVEN** top-level keys: `n1-gate` (line 810) was missing from my list. It is the env-gated `SPT_N1_OLD_BROKER` pairing harness that the normal sweep silent-skips. - Worse, **keys are not rows**: `test` AND `n1-gate` each carry a `matrix: runner: [[Linux, kitsubito], [Windows, hfenduleam]]`, so a full run yields **NINE job rows** — changes, test x2, n1-gate x2, twohost-b, twohost-a, traceability, notify. The self-aware part is the sting: my carried note ALREADY warned "do not assume ci.yml's five" — a guard against the wrong number, stated in the same breath as a wrong number. Being on guard about a figure is not the same as re-measuring it. See [[compare-at-one-layer-crlf-meter-class]] — citing a rule is not obeying it. **Why:** a run read against a stale expected-set mis-reads completeness. Too-few expected and extra rows look like noise you explain away; too-many and you hunt a job that no longer exists. Either way the verdict on a golden run — the one artifact the whole release hangs on — is being scored against a population you did not measure. **How to apply:** before reading ANY workflow run, enumerate the job population from the workflow file **at the exact sha being run**, and expand every `matrix:` into rows. Cheap recipe, and it prints the `if:` guards too (a job gated off is a row you must NOT wait for): ``` git show :.github/workflows/.yml # then parse top-level keys under `jobs:` ``` Then compare the run's actual rows to THAT list, never to a number you are carrying. Applies to `ci.yml` equally. Related: [[open-the-subindex-before-running-a-gate]] (the craft is not in the index you happen to have loaded).