# ADR-0037: Execution-time mode side-channel (the three-way submission mode) ## Status Proposed (design agreed with the user 2026-05-27; pending `/runda` + implementation). Redeems the follow-up **deferred by ADR-0033 Amendment 3**, which named this very ADR and its motivating consumer. ## Context ADR-0033 Amendment 3 ("Execution-time mode is side-channel — deferred to its own ADR") recorded a requirement and deferred it: > every command should — at **execution time** — know which of three > modes it ran under: `simple`, `advanced`, or `advanced-one-shot` > (the `:` escape from Simple mode, ADR-0003), so execution can adjust > **output** without changing **identity** (e.g. a Simple-mode > `create table` echoing the generated SQL when run in Advanced mode, > while staying silent in Simple mode). That echo is the **DSL → SQL teaching bridge** (ADR-0030 §10), specified as its own Phase-5 ADR (ADR-0038). ADR-0038 is the motivating — and, at time of writing, only — consumer of this side-channel. This ADR establishes the channel; ADR-0038 consumes it. ### What exists today - The persistent input mode `Mode` (`src/mode.rs`) is **two-way**: `Simple` / `Advanced`. Its doc comment is explicit that the one-shot `:` escape "is handled at submission time in `app::App::submit`, **not as additional state here**." - The one-shot `:` is therefore a **transient, per-submission** property, collapsed to an effective mode at submit time. It is not persistent state and was deliberately kept out of `Mode`. - The only mode information that survives past submission is a **rendering** side-channel: `OutputLine.mode_at_submission: Mode` (the `[simple]`/`[advanced]` echo-line tag in `ui.rs`). It is two-way and exists purely to label the input-echo line. - Neither `Action::ExecuteDsl` nor the database worker (ADR-0010) carries any mode. Execution is mode-agnostic. ### Why the gap blocks the echo The teaching echo (ADR-0038) renders the equivalent SQL **beneath the `[ok]` summary**. That summary is built in the App's outcome handler (`App::update`, the `Dsl*Succeeded` arms) from the **worker's result event** — not at dispatch time. At that point: - The typed `Command` is available (the success events already carry it). - The submission mode is **not** available. `self.mode` is the *current* persistent mode, which is unreliable for this purpose: it can change between submission and outcome, and for a `:` one-shot it never reflected the effective mode of that single line at all. So the echo needs the **effective submission mode delivered to execution/outcome**. And several echo forms (ADR-0038 — auto-resolved index / relationship names, generated `shortid` values, lossy-conversion counts) are only knowable **after the worker has run**, so the echo's data is fundamentally worker-produced. The natural place to gate and build mode-dependent output is therefore the execution path, with the mode threaded to it — exactly the side-channel Amendment 3 anticipated. ## Decision Introduce a **three-way effective submission mode**, computed at submit time and threaded through the `Action` → worker interface, available at **execution time** to adjust **output only**. Command identity, dispatch, and execution semantics are **unchanged** (ADR-0033 Amendment 3: identity is intrinsic to the mode-rooted grammar path, not a flag). ### 1. A new per-submission enum, distinct from persistent `Mode` ```rust /// The effective mode of a single submitted line, resolved at submit /// time. Distinct from the persistent input `Mode` (which stays /// two-way) because the one-shot `:` escape is a transient per-line /// property, never persistent state (ADR-0003; `mode.rs`). pub enum SubmissionMode { Simple, Advanced, AdvancedOneShot, } ``` **This refines Amendment 3's framing.** Amendment 3 sketched "widening `Mode` to the three-way distinction." On implementation review, a **separate enum** is cleaner: `Mode` models *persistent input state*, and `mode.rs` deliberately keeps the one-shot out of it. Folding a transient `AdvancedOneShot` into the persistent `Mode` would contradict that design note and let a non-persistable value leak into persistent- mode call sites. `SubmissionMode` carries the three-way distinction on the per-submission channel where it belongs; `Mode` stays two-way and untouched. The *requirement* Amendment 3 recorded is met; only the **shape** is refined. (Flagged for `/runda`/user challenge — it is an internal architecture choice with no user-facing effect.) The effective mode is resolved at submit time from the persistent `Mode` plus whether the `:` sigil was used: - persistent `Simple`, no `:` → `Simple` - persistent `Simple`, `:` prefix → `AdvancedOneShot` - persistent `Advanced` → `Advanced` (the `:` is a no-op there) ### 2. Threaded through `Action::ExecuteDsl` to the worker `Action::ExecuteDsl` gains a `submission_mode: SubmissionMode` field; the worker request mirrors it. Execution thus knows, per command, the effective mode it ran under. The value is **output-only**: no executor branches its *effect* on it (that would be a behavioural mode dependency, which ADR-0033 Amendment 3 forbids — identity and effect are intrinsic). ### 3. The worker produces mode-dependent output; the App renders it For the first consumer (ADR-0038): when the command is a **DSL-form** command (`Command::CreateTable`/`Insert`/… — *not* the `Sql*` variants) and `submission_mode` is `Advanced` or `AdvancedOneShot`, the worker builds the teaching echo (equivalent SQL + any category-3 expansion data — ADR-0038) and returns it on the result event. In `Simple` mode, or for a command typed as SQL, no echo is produced. The App renders the returned echo as de-emphasised `OutputLine`(s) beneath `[ok]`. Co-locating echo construction with execution is deliberate: the echo's harder forms (resolved auto-names, generated `shortid`s, conversion counts) are facts the worker already computes. Gating on the threaded mode means the work happens **only when an echo will be shown**. **Non-interactive re-execution does not echo.** `replay` (ADR-0034) re-runs recorded commands through the dispatch pipeline in advanced mode (ADR-0033 Amendment 3) — but a per-line teaching echo there would bury the replay summary in noise. So replayed lines (and any future programmatic re-execution) dispatch with a `SubmissionMode` that **suppresses** mode-dependent output: command *identity* still parses in advanced mode (Amendment 3, unchanged), but no echo fires. The mechanism — a fourth non-echoing context, or an `interactive: bool` alongside the mode — is a build choice; the contract fixed here is *replay is silent*. ### 4. Scope of this ADR This ADR establishes the channel and the resolution rule **only**. The echo renderer, its catalogue, and the `Value → SQL-literal` machinery are ADR-0038. The advanced-mode `ALTER COLUMN` gap-fill the echo relies on is the ADR-0035 amendment. No echo behaviour is specified here beyond the gating contract in §3. ## Alternatives considered - **Widen `Mode` to three-way (Amendment 3's literal sketch).** Avoids a new type but conflates transient per-submission state with persistent input state, against `mode.rs`'s explicit design note. Rejected for §1's separate enum. - **App-side gating, worker always returns echo data.** Keep the worker mode-agnostic; have it return echo data on *every* result, and let the App decide whether to render from `mode_at_submission` + command shape. Rejected: it computes the echo unconditionally (including in Simple mode, where it is never shown), does not generalise to other mode- dependent output, and re-opens exactly the "the echo is purely render- side" framing the user has twice ruled against — the settled direction is execution-time mode awareness, per Amendment 3. ## Consequences - Additive and small: a new enum, one field on `Action::ExecuteDsl` and the worker request, and the submit-time resolution rule. No change to parsing, dispatch, command identity, or any executor's effect. - The persistent `Mode` enum and `OutputLine.mode_at_submission` are unchanged. (ADR-0038 may enrich the render tag separately; not required here.) - Future mode-dependent **output** has a home. Anything touching command *identity* or *effect* does not belong here (Amendment 3). - Tests: submit-time resolution for all three cases (incl. `:` one-shot and the Advanced-mode `:`-is-a-no-op case); the field survives the `Action` → worker round-trip; a Simple-mode DSL command yields no echo request while an Advanced / one-shot one does (the gating contract). ## See also - ADR-0033 Amendment 3 — deferred this side-channel; defines the intrinsic command-identity model this ADR must not disturb. - ADR-0030 §10 — the DSL → SQL teaching bridge (the motivating consumer). - ADR-0038 — the teaching echo; the consumer built on this channel. - ADR-0003 — input modes and the one-shot `:` escape. - ADR-0010 — the database worker thread this mode is threaded to.