scoped-fixes

name	scoped-fixes
description	When a user asks for a small change, do exactly that — never bundle unrelated pattern introductions
domain	change-management
confidence	low
source	earned — Bug 1 revert after D-126 over-scope (2026-05-21)

Context

When a user requests a specific, small change (e.g., "remove the Merge button"), the scope of the commit must match the scope of the ask. Introducing a new component family, refactoring unrelated surfaces, or applying a pattern broadly in the same commit creates regressions and triggers full reverts.

Patterns

• One ask → one change: If the ask is "remove button X from pages A, B, C, D", only edit those pages and only remove that button.
• Pre-commit baseline: Use git show <commit>^:<path> to recover the exact file state before an over-scoped commit for surgical reverts.
• Orphan check after revert: After reverting over-scoped work, grep for newly-introduced components/utilities that now have zero consumers — delete them.
• Bulk infrastructure is independent: Removing a per-row action (e.g., per-row Merge) does not affect toolbar-level bulk actions (e.g., "Merge Selected") because they use different entry points.

Examples

Bad commit (over-scoped):

feat: remove merge buttons from admin pages

- Removed per-row Merge from brands/categories/locations/networks ← actual ask
- Introduced ResponsiveListCard + ActionOverflowMenu ← NOT asked for
- Restyled all 6 admin pages to card layout ← NOT asked for
- Added lookup-actions.test.ts for card actions ← NOT asked for

Good commit (scoped):

fix: remove per-row Merge button from admin lookup pages

- Removed Merge button from brands/categories/locations/networks
- Removed openSingleMergeModal handler (no longer needed)
- Bulk "Merge Selected" toolbar remains functional

Anti-Patterns

• Bundling a new UI pattern introduction with a bug fix or small feature removal
• Touching pages that weren't mentioned in the user's request (e.g., restyling owners/tags when only brands/categories/locations/networks were asked about)
• Justifying scope expansion with "while I'm here" reasoning without explicit user approval