ADR 0002: Uncertainty as a First-Class Output

• Status: Accepted
• Date: 2025-12-18

Context

Log interpretation has unavoidable ambiguity:

• parentheses in filenames
• wrapped paths
• missing close parens
• package outputs that mimic tokens

Traditional tools often guess silently, producing confidently wrong diagnostics.

Decision

Represent uncertainty explicitly via:

• confidence scores on events and diagnostics
• the ability to emit diagnostics without a file/range mapping

The UI should surface low confidence distinctly.

Alternatives Considered

• Always guess the “most likely” mapping
  • rejected: harms trust and makes debugging harder
• Refuse to emit any diagnostic when uncertain
  • rejected: loses useful information; better to report with uncertainty

Consequences

• Downstream consumers must display confidence appropriately.
• Evaluation includes calibration of confidence vs correctness.