Systematic Debugging

Overview

Find root cause before applying fixes. Avoid guess-fix cycles.

Process

1. •Reproduce issue reliably.
2. •Narrow the failing boundary.
3. •Identify root cause with evidence.
4. •Apply smallest safe fix.
5. •Verify behavior manually or with requested checks.

Evidence standard

• •Capture the failing symptom before changing code.
• •Tie each hypothesis to an observable signal.
• •Keep a short log: symptom -> hypothesis -> check -> result.

Common failure patterns

• •Hidden precondition mismatch
• •Incorrect state transition ordering
• •Integration contract drift
• •External dependency version mismatch

Output format

Return:

• •Root cause statement
• •Fix summary
• •Residual risk
• •Verification performed

Project Defaults

• •No automatic git operations.
• •No mandatory test requirement unless requested.