manual_slop/conductor/directives/throwaway_scripts_isolated_subdir/v1.md

Tier 2 throw-away scripts live in scripts/tier2/artifacts/<track-name>/ — NEVER in the base scripts/tier2/ directory

What it says

When the Tier 2 autonomous agent writes throw-away scripts (audits, transforms, sanity checks, debugging helpers), it MUST put them under scripts/tier2/artifacts/<track-name>/. The base scripts/tier2/ directory is reserved for production code that ships with the sandbox (failcount.py, run_track.py, write_report.py, the .ps1 launchers).

Why

• Base directory hygiene. The base scripts/tier2/ is the durable sandbox layer. Throw-away scripts pollute the file list, confuse the user during review, and risk shipping with the next sandbox release.
• Archival isolation. Throw-away scripts are kept for archival but isolated in track-specific subdirectories so a reviewer of one track does not see another track's helpers.
• Track reproducibility. Each track's helpers are co-located under artifacts/<track-name>/ so the next agent that runs --resume on the track finds its working context.

Pattern

scripts/tier2/
├── failcount.py          # production: shipped with sandbox
├── run_track.py          # production: shipped with sandbox
├── write_report.py       # production: shipped with sandbox
├── run_tier2_sandboxed.ps1  # production: shipped with sandbox
└── artifacts/            # throw-away layer
    ├── tier2_autonomous_sandbox_20260616/   # archived helpers from that track
    ├── cruft_elimination_20260627/          # archived helpers from that track
    └── <new-track-name>/                    # current track's working helpers

Throw-away scripts are committed (not deleted) so the work is auditable, but they are quarantined in their own subdirectory.

Examples of throw-away helpers

• audit_<thing>.py one-shot scripts that compute a single metric and print the result
• transform_<format>_to_<format>.py one-time data migrators
• compare_<a>_to_<b>.py one-shot diff helpers
• seed_<database>.py one-time test data generators

None of these ship with the sandbox; none belong in the base directory.