v0.122.0: three ways the signals lied about themselves (R-189, R-188, R-186)

All three are the reporting and release path misreporting its own work. No
customer machine, no backup, no restore, no data. The restore-test itself and
when it runs are unchanged.

R-189 — a passing restore-test no longer vanishes on a restart. restore_tests[]
came only from the in-memory store, whose comment ("lost on restart; the cadence
re-populates") was true under a timer and stopped being true when R-86 made the
agent refuse to re-test a proven archive: the proof is then not repeated for a
whole archive generation. Observed live — a 14.5 GB offsite PASS reached no
host-report because the agent was restarted 2m43s later. RestoreTestState now
carries tier + verified beside the archive and renders reportable entries; the
collector merges them, one per tier, newest by TestedAt. It refuses to lie: a
record missing archive-or-tier produces no entry, and run mechanics are not
re-invented. Only successes are persisted, and the asymmetry is now written where
it will be read.

R-188 — a correct release stops emailing a failure. Only the tag PUSH moved
(build -> tag locally -> publish -> push tag): the push wakes CI, and a tag
visible before its package made the gate correctly fail a correct release about
half the time. The old order's invariant is asserted directly instead — the gate
now refuses a published version with no tag, as a bounded probe that prints its
own coverage, because the package listing api is still 401 without a token.

R-186 — a released binary can be verified by rebuilding it. -trimpath
-buildvcs=false: same source, same bytes, tag or no tag. Measured. publish-agent's
fallback also forced CGO_ENABLED=0 and produced a 74 KB different binary for the
same version; both paths now build identically. CLAUDE.md records the command.

CONTEXT.md

@@ -5,6 +5,31 @@
 
 ## Current
 
+- **2026-08-03 — v0.122.0 (R-189 · R-188 · R-186): three signals that lied about their own work.**
+  None touches data; all three cost attention, which every other signal depends on.
+  - **R-189 — a passing restore-test no longer vanishes on a restart.** `restore_tests[]` came only
+    from the in-memory `backup.Store` (*"lost on restart; the cadence re-populates"* — true under a
+    timer, FALSE since R-86, because the agent will not re-test a proven archive). **Observed live:**
+    a 14.5 GB offsite PASS at 15:25:14, agent restarted 2 m 43 s later, hub logged `0 restore-tests`
+    twice. `RestoreTestState` now stores `tier` + `verified` beside the archive (v3 shape; v1/v2
+    still read, and a record missing archive-or-tier is NOT reported), exposes
+    `ProvenRestoreTests`, and `Collector.SetProvenRestoreTests` merges it — **one entry per tier,
+    newest by `TestedAt` wins**, so a fresh failure beats a stored success and a tier never appears
+    twice. Wiring pinned by an AST test: the method this replaces (`Snapshot`) claimed a
+    "host-report gauge" in its doc comment and had **no caller** for weeks.
+  - **ONLY SUCCESSES ARE PERSISTED, and the reason is now in the code:** a success *suppresses*
+    future work (a proven archive is never re-tested, so a lost proof leaves the box quietly less
+    tested than it believes); a failure *causes* future work and heals itself at the next evaluation.
+  - **R-188 — the release stopped emailing false failures.** Only the tag PUSH moved (build → tag
+    locally → publish → push tag): the push is what wakes CI, and a tag visible before its package
+    made the gate correctly fail a correct release ~half the time. The old order's invariant is now
+    asserted directly — `check-published-versions.py` refuses a **published version with no tag**, as
+    a bounded, printed probe (the package listing api is still 401 without a token, re-measured).
+  - **R-186 — a released binary is verifiable.** `-trimpath -buildvcs=false`: same source → same
+    bytes whether or not the tag exists. Measured. `publish-agent.sh`'s fallback also forced
+    `CGO_ENABLED=0` and built a **74 KB different** binary for the same version — both paths now
+    identical. The verification command is in `CLAUDE.md`.
+
 - **2026-08-03 — v0.121.0 (R-86): the restore-test follows the BACKUP, not the clock.** The ticker is
   now only the **evaluation interval**; a tier is **DUE** when its newest archive that has settled for
   `settle` (default 24 h) **has not been proven**. Daily tier → proved daily on yesterday's archive;