Quality Gates & Selftest

In traditional development, quality guidelines are often advisory. Under CDAL, every quality gate is mechanical, deterministic, and tested against its own mutations.

1. Traceability Matrix (cdal trace --enforce)

cdal trace verifies that requirements defined in contracts are backed by automated tests:

npx cdalkit trace --enforce

How to Tag Tests:

// test/booking.test.ts
import { describe, it, expect } from 'vitest';

describe('Booking Service', () => {
  // @REQ: BOOK-REQ-MIN-NOTICE
  it('enforces minimum 2-hour notice policy before booking start', () => {
    // assertions...
  });
});

If any requirement in contracts/ lacks a matching test tag, cdal trace --enforce fails the pipeline with an exit code of 1.

2. Gate Mutation Testing (cdal selftest)

"A quality gate that cannot be proven to fail red is merely a decoration."

cdal selftest verifies the integrity of the test pipeline itself:

1. It copies contracts into an isolated in-memory or temporary environment.
2. It injects deliberate mutations into the contracts (e.g. duplicate IDs, unreachable states, invalid policy bands).
3. It asserts that specifically the expected rule fires and fails red.
4. It injects forbidden code probes (e.g. @ts-ignore, as any, .skip()) into dummy production files to verify that the guardrails detect them.

If any invariant rule or forbidden pattern fails to detect its assigned mutation, cdal selftest fails immediately.