Found P31 S72; COULD have been found 2026-06-15 (Phase 7, commit:0025), which wrote the
island's contents by hand and named loadDestPtrTable as the divider. The signal needs no
matching progress — it is a property of the retail image.
The number that matters is the cost curve: at Phase 6 src/800.c had 13 externs and 0
typedefs and the split was a yaml edit; at S72 it had 2,378 externs and 175 typedefs and
cost 57 crossing declarations, a shared header and 4 stale consumers. Plus a session of
wrong conclusions (11 'PROVEN gate-rejects', 10 of which banked once the carve existed).
PREREQ recorded honestly: the binding constraint came from the OVERLAY work two phases
later, so this is knowledge that never got carried back to main — not carelessness.
General principle: segmentation is the exception to probe-before-investing. When a
decision is evidenced at t=0, cheap now, and strictly more expensive later, make it early
even though its payoff is unproven.
Drew T
94ca16e007