core/docs/decisions/ADR-0179-extraction-richness.md

ADR-0179 — Extraction Richness: feeding the comprehension composer real quantities

Status: Proposed Date: 2026-05-28 Author: Shay Anchor: thesis-decoding-not-generating Builds on / unblocks:

• ADR-0176 (MS-3 product search), ADR-0178 (GB-1/GB-2 composer) — built but starved by thin extraction.
• ADR-0177 — richer extraction produces the gold-matching chains that give cue-precision its signal.
• Reuses en_numerics_v1 (cardinal table) + WORD_NUMBERS + the existing currency/fraction/compound grounding in generate/math_roundtrip._value_grounds (ADR-0128 / 0131.G.3).

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Context — the wall every recent measurement hit

The structure machinery (MS-3 search, GB-1 clauses, GB-2 list-sum) is built, deterministic, and wrong=0-safe — and flips almost nothing on practice for one recurring reason: extraction is too thin to feed it. Concretely, with extract.py's current (\d+(?:\.\d+)?)\s+([a-z]+) (digit + single following word):

Case	Gap	Effect
0024	"36 on Tuesday" → unit "on"	non-uniform units → GB-2 list-sum never fires
0003	"$0.75" → bare 0.75; _value_grounds("0.75") fails (currency branch needs the $; digit-runs 0/75 not checked for a bare decimal)	correct product (864) refuses
0024/0033	"three times" → three not a digit	word-number quantity lost
0016/0024	"jumping jacks", "stop signs"	multi-word unit truncated
0033	"Rachel is 12." → no following unit word	sentence-final quantity lost

The capability is there; the inputs aren't. Extraction richness is the prerequisite the prior phases kept naming — and the place coverage should finally move (modulo cue precision for op-disambiguation, and scale).

Two layers — and their very different risk

• (A) The sealed derivation extractor (generate/derivation/extract.py). Enriching it is safe: it feeds only the (sealed, practice-only) derivation search; over-extraction is caught downstream (the gate's completeness + grounding
  • uniqueness; refuse-preferring). The bulk of this ADR lives here.
• (B) The shared grounding primitive (_value_grounds / _tokens in math_roundtrip). wrong=0-sensitive: the serving round-trip filter uses it. Exactly one change belongs here — bare-decimal grounding — and it must be proven to leave serving 3/47/0 byte-identical.

Decision

Enrich extraction, lexeme-level (ADR-0165 — orthographic shapes, never grammar), refuse-preferring, reusing existing numerics machinery:

1. Word-number quantities (extract.py) — three, a hundred, hyphenated compounds → values, via en_numerics_v1 / WORD_NUMBERS (already the grounding table; extraction just uses it). Unblocks comparative/word operands.
2. Currency + decimal extraction (extract.py) — $0.75 → (0.75, "dollars") preserving the money form; plus the one shared-primitive fix: _value_grounds grounds a bare decimal "N.M" when both digit-runs N and M appear as tokens — symmetric with the existing $N.NN and N/M logic. wrong=0-gated.
3. Multi-word units (extract.py) — jumping jacks, stop signs (a bounded unit-phrase: number + 1–2 following content words), so same-unit comparison works.
4. List-unit inheritance (extract.py) — in a list (20 jumping jacks on Monday, 36 on Tuesday, …), a quantity with no unit word of its own inherits the list's head unit. This is what makes 0024 a same-unit list → GB-2 list-sum fires.
5. Sentence-final / unit-less quantities (extract.py) — "Rachel is 12." → (12, <inherited/empty unit>), so the quantity isn't lost.

Each is independently bounded and refuse-preferring; (4) and (1) are the highest- leverage (they unblock 0024 and the comparatives).

wrong=0 obligations (must be proven, not asserted)

1. Shared-primitive change keeps serving byte-identical. After the bare-decimal grounding fix, serving stays 3/47/0 byte-identical (the verify pinned lane SHAs gate). If a decimal case now grounds and shifts a serving verdict, evaluate it explicitly; any wrong > 0 shift reverts the change. (Grounding a true token-run is a false-negative fix; the round-trip + disagreement + solver still gate any new admission.)
2. Over-extraction cannot break wrong=0. Spurious/mis-attributed quantities flow into the derivation gate, where completeness + grounding + uniqueness refuse them. A test: an over-extracted quantity yields refusal, never a wrong commit.
3. Determinism/replay; extraction is deterministic and lexeme-level (no grammar templates — ADR-0165).
4. List-unit inheritance must not invent units — a quantity only inherits a unit present in its list head; otherwise it stays unit-less (refuse-preferring on same-unit comparison).

Honest payoff

This is the prerequisite, not a coverage promise by itself — but it is the one that unblocks built capability: uniform units → GB-2 list-sum fires on 0024-class; decimal grounding → MS-3 product flips 0003-class; word-numbers → comparative operands resolve; and every newly-extracted gold-matching chain feeds cue-precision its signal (ADR-0177's bottleneck). Expect the practice flip-curve to finally move on the extraction-blocked cases — measured, not assumed; op-ambiguity (cue precision) and volume (scale) still gate the rest.

Sub-phases

• EX-1 — word-number quantities (extract.py; reuse en_numerics_v1/WORD_NUMBERS).
• EX-2 — currency/decimal extraction (extract.py) + bare-decimal grounding (shared primitive, wrong=0-gated: serving 3/47/0 byte-identical). The one shared-primitive touch; ship it alone with the lane-SHA proof.
• EX-3 — multi-word units (extract.py).
• EX-4 — list-unit inheritance (extract.py) — unblocks 0024 same-unit list.
• EX-5 — sentence-final / unit-less quantities (extract.py).
• EX-6 — measurement. Re-run MS-3 + GB-2 on the enriched extraction; report the flip-curve delta and the residual (cue-precision + scale) honestly.

Acceptance criteria (Proposed → Accepted)

1. EX-2's shared-primitive change proven to keep serving 3/47/0 byte-identical (lane-SHA gate); capability lanes G1–G5/S1 stay 100% wrong=0.
2. Over-extraction is refuse-preferring (proven: a mis-attributed quantity refuses, never wrong-commits).
3. The measurement shows the previously extraction-blocked cases (0003, 0024-class) reach a gold-matching chain (flip or honest hold under cue ambiguity), under ADR-0114a perturbation; determinism/seal invariants hold.

Cross-references

• Unblocks: ADR-0176, ADR-0178; feeds ADR-0177.
• Reuses: en_numerics_v1, WORD_NUMBERS, and the existing currency/fraction/ compound grounding in _value_grounds (ADR-0128, ADR-0131.G.3) — extends, never reinvents.
• Constraint: ADR-0165 — lexeme/orthographic extraction only, never grammar templates.
• Thesis: thesis-decoding-not-generating — read the quantities the text actually states; don't pattern-match a shape.