| name | commit-trailers |
| description | Commit mesajlarina yapilandirilmis karar trailer'lari ekle. Constraint, Rejected, Confidence, Scope-risk, Not-tested trailer'lari ile karar baglamini koru. |
Commit Trailers -- Structured Decision Context
Supplement conventional commits with structured trailers that preserve the reasoning
behind a change. Future maintainers (and future agents) read commit history to
understand not just what changed, but why a specific approach was taken.
Standard Trailers
Add these after the commit body, separated by a blank line, when they add value:
Constraint: <external limitation that shaped this approach>
Rejected: <alternative considered and the reason it was rejected>
Confidence: high | medium | low <how certain we are this is correct>
Scope-risk: low | medium | high <blast radius — how much can this break>
Not-tested: <what was not tested and why>
When to Use Each Trailer
| Trailer | When to Include | When to Skip |
|---|
Constraint | External limitation forced a non-obvious decision | No external constraints applied |
Rejected | A reasonable alternative was considered and discarded | Only one approach was viable |
Confidence | Correctness is uncertain or untested in key areas | Straightforward well-tested change |
Scope-risk | Change touches shared infrastructure, middleware, auth, or core data paths | Isolated, single-purpose change |
Not-tested | A gap in test coverage is intentional and known | All paths are tested |
Not every commit needs trailers. A fix: typo in error message needs none.
A new auth middleware affecting every API call needs all five.
Trailer Reference
Constraint
An external limitation — browser API, hosting restriction, library limitation,
business rule, or environment constraint — that ruled out the obvious solution.
Constraint: Safari 15 does not support the CSS :has() selector
Constraint: Redis unavailable in staging — in-memory fallback only
Constraint: Must stay on Node 18, no upgrade path in scope
Constraint: Third-party payment API does not support idempotency keys
Rejected
An alternative that was seriously considered. Helps future maintainers understand
why the current approach exists instead of the simpler-looking one they are thinking of.
Rejected: Redux — too much boilerplate for this feature's scope
Rejected: JWT stored in localStorage — XSS exposure, using httpOnly cookie instead
Rejected: Direct DB query — bypasses cache layer, use repository instead
Rejected: Polling every 5s — too much server load, went with SSE instead
Confidence
Signal the quality of certainty around the correctness of the change.
low should trigger a code review comment or discussion before merge.
Confidence: high
Confidence: medium — edge case with concurrent writes not covered by tests
Confidence: low — reversing this migration is complex, needs review before merge
Scope-risk
Signal how much of the system this change can affect if it is wrong.
Helps reviewers and the team calibrate how carefully to review and test.
Scope-risk: low
Scope-risk: medium — touches payment processing, needs manual smoke test
Scope-risk: high — auth middleware change, every authenticated endpoint affected
Not-tested
Explicitly acknowledge a test gap. This is honest engineering, not an excuse.
A named gap is better than an invisible one.
Not-tested: email delivery — no SMTP server in test environment
Not-tested: concurrent request behavior — requires load testing setup
Not-tested: Safari-specific rendering — no CI browser suite yet
Not-tested: DB rollback on payment failure — requires Stripe test mode setup
Full Example
feat: add rate limiting to API endpoints
Implement token bucket algorithm for /api/* routes.
Limits: 100 requests/min for free tier, 1000 for paid tier.
Exceeding the limit returns 429 with Retry-After header.
Constraint: Redis required for distributed rate limiting — in-memory does not work across multiple instances
Rejected: express-rate-limit — lacks per-user tier support without significant custom logic
Confidence: high
Scope-risk: medium — affects all /api/* routes, auth and webhook routes excluded
Not-tested: sustained 10K+ req/min behavior — requires dedicated load test environment
Format Rules
- Trailers go AFTER the commit body, separated by a blank line
- One trailer per line, no line wrapping
Rejected may appear multiple times (one per rejected alternative)- Only include trailers that add genuine value — avoid mechanical inclusion
Confidence: low is a signal for the team, not a reason to skip the commit- This format supplements, not replaces, the conventional commit type prefix
Integration with Other Rules
safety-and-quality.md defines the base commit format (<type>: <description>)- This rule adds optional trailers on top of that format
full-autonomy.md requires commit approval — trailers give Batuhan the context to approve confidently- Trailers are the commit-level equivalent of Priority Notes in the notepad system
