Normalization Reference

Purpose

Single live reference for the current normalization posture.

Current Read

• keep the default-vs-explicit normalization contract closed
• do not reopen broad default live coercion casually
• the current contract is intentionally narrower than old Slate
• promoting explicit-only cleanup into ordinary commit behavior is a real public contract change

Contract Summary

Default live behavior keeps only the invariants needed for correctness.

Heavier cleanup stays on explicit or app-owned seams:

• Editor.normalize()
• load / replace / reset
• import / paste ingestion
• app-owned custom normalizeNode(...)

Phase Boundary Read

The engine still has one normalization phase before publish.

That means:

• publish is not a second normalization tier
• commit canonicalization does not exist yet
• promoting explicit-only cleanup would change committed snapshots

Promotion Read

If normalization work reopens later, the first credible promotion candidate is:

• explicit adjacent-text cleanup / merge

Not first:

• broad inline-container flattening
• broad always-on live coercion