GloriousFlywheel Dogfood First Patch Playbook 2026-04-16

GloriousFlywheel Dogfood First Patch Playbook 2026-04-16

Snapshot date: 2026-04-16

Purpose

Define the first concrete self-dogfood patch target for GloriousFlywheel under #210.

GitHub owner: #210

Why GloriousFlywheel Goes Fifth

GloriousFlywheel is not just another downstream repo:

  • it is the source-of-truth repo for the documented runner contract
  • its composite actions and dogfood workflows must match what downstream repos are told to use
  • if its own examples are wrong, tranche-1 canaries will keep relearning drift

Observed Workflow Reality

From direct workflow inspection on 2026-04-16:

  • test-arc-runners.yml
    • previously probed cache endpoints directly
    • did not dogfood setup-flywheel
  • .github/actions/nix-job/action.yml
    • referenced ./github/actions/setup-flywheel
    • the path was missing the leading dot
  • .github/actions/docker-job/action.yml
    • had the same broken local action path
  • image/release workflows are mostly GitHub-hosted and not the first place where the shared runtime contract is proven

First Patch Goal

Make the documented contract executable inside the source-of-truth repo:

  1. fix the local composite-action paths
  2. make the ARC test workflow use the same setup action downstream repos use
  3. stop validating the contract via ad hoc direct endpoint checks alone

Current Execution Status

Current execution state on 2026-04-16:

  • .github/actions/nix-job/action.yml now uses ./.github/actions/setup-flywheel
  • .github/actions/docker-job/action.yml now uses ./.github/actions/setup-flywheel
  • .github/workflows/test-arc-runners.yml now dogsfoods ./.github/actions/setup-flywheel on both tinyland-nix and tinyland-docker
  • the test workflow now asserts injected ATTIC_SERVER, ATTIC_CACHE, and BAZEL_REMOTE_CACHE instead of hard-coding the whole validation story around raw endpoint curls
  • the Nix dogfood surface now also bootstraps Nix explicitly: .github/actions/nix-job/action.yml uses DeterminateSystems/determinate-nix-action@v3, and .github/workflows/test-arc-runners.yml verifies nix --version on tinyland-nix
  • git diff --check passes in the repo
  • all touched YAML files parse cleanly

What Not To Do First

  • do not start by rewriting GitHub-hosted image/release workflows
  • do not treat the source-of-truth fix as only a docs update
  • do not leave broken local composite-action paths in place while telling downstream repos to adopt those actions

Acceptance Criteria

  • the repo’s composite actions point at the correct local setup action path
  • the ARC dogfood workflow validates the documented cache/runtime contract
  • the Nix dogfood workflow validates bootstrap before runtime acceleration
  • GloriousFlywheel stops being a source of runner-contract drift in tranche 1

GloriousFlywheel