Tests only. Proves the upgrade path the existing E2E does not cover, and
answers the three caveats.
## Why the existing coverage was not enough
The existing cases strand a card in a synthetic
`a-column-no-workflow-declares` on a **fixture** vocabulary. The real
upgrade leaves cards in **`triage`**, on the **real `builtin:coding`**
workflow.
That difference is the whole point: `triage` is still a legal `ColumnId`
and is still declared by legacy-coding, Ideas and every linear built-in
(R11), so nothing rejects it and **nothing throws**. The card simply
sits in a column its *own* workflow no longer declares — where it
carries no trait flags and is invisible to every trait-driven sweep.
## What is proven, on a temp PostgreSQL project
- A card left in the deleted `triage` column on a default-workflow board
is re-homed to `todo`, the merged Planning column.
- **Revert check in-suite:** without the sweep running, the card stays
in `triage`. Without this, the case above could pass because some
*other* sweep or a store-open reconcile moved the card — and would keep
passing if the sweep were deleted outright.
- **Progress and the plan artifact survive.** `preserveProgress: true`
is asserted end-to-end rather than trusted from the option name.
- A `userPaused` card is skipped and stays in the deleted column.
**Mutation-verified:** stubbing `reconcileUndeclaredTaskColumns` to
`return 0` turns **5 of 11** tests red, including all three positive
migration cases. The sweep is demonstrably the mover.
## The three caveats — answered
**1. `userPaused` cards are skipped → caveat, not a stall.**
An operator park is authoritative and the sweep must not override it, so
the card does stay in a column its workflow no longer declares. But it
is reachable two ways: unpausing makes the next sweep re-home it, and
**U11's undeclared-source escape hatch in `resolveAllowedColumns`
(merged with #2515) lets an operator move it by hand meanwhile** — that
path returns the workflow's rebound target instead of `Valid targets:
none`. Recorded as a test so the behaviour is a decision rather than an
accident.
My recommendation: **leave it skipped.** Re-homing a paused card
silently moves work an operator deliberately froze, and the escape hatch
already gives them a way out. Overriding a park to fix a column is the
wrong trade.
**2. Sweep only runs when self-healing is enabled → caveat, not a stall,
for the same reason.**
The escape hatch lives in the **move-validation** path, not in
self-healing, so it works with self-healing off entirely. A card
stranded that way is draggable out of the deleted column by hand. Worth
knowing: before #2515's escape hatch this *would* have been a hard stall
— `resolveAllowedColumns` returned `[]` for an undeclared source, so the
card could not be moved anywhere at all, by anyone.
**3. Re-home targets the HOLD column → correct, and progress survives.**
Under U11 the hold column **is** the Planning column, so "everything
lands in Planning" is the intended destination rather than a compromise.
Asserted with real step progress on the row.
**None of the three is worse than a caveat.** The reason all three are
survivable is the same single mechanism — the undeclared-source escape
hatch — which is worth knowing because removing it would silently
promote all three to hard stalls.
## Incidental
Fixed two fixture-level PostgreSQL column-name errors found while
writing this: `currentStep` → `current_step`, and `user_paused` is an
**integer** flag rather than a boolean. Both would have made a future
test here fail confusingly.
🤖 Generated with [Claude Code](https://claude.com/claude-code)
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Co-authored-by: Claude Opus 5 (1M context) <noreply@anthropic.com>
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