A Real Deployment Exposed Two Contract Defects Before I Froze the Contract

Description and use

During a real deployment, two contract defects were uncovered: an assumed preview environment that didn't exist and a circular dependency between manifest and bundle digests. Fixing these allowed verification that build artifacts matched deployed content and froze the contract, establishing a repeatable release chain.

Problem

CI/CD artifacts may not match what is actually deployed, leading to undetected contract defects and insecure releases.

Outcome

The updated contract and adapter ensured that build artifacts matched deployed content, prevented false positives from missing preview environments, and established a repeatable, verifiable release chain.

Workflow

• Review draft contract
• Run adapter against real deployment
• Identify and fix contract defects
• Verify live manifest against sealed bundle
• Freeze contract v0
• Run subsequent releases to confirm repeat‑run linkage

Evidence

The contract expected a preview that did not exist

Source

The bundle required the finished manifest. The manifest required the finished bundle.

Source

Only after that receipt existed did the contract replace its synthetic dashboard fixture with the real deployed bundle and freeze release-evidence/v0.

Source