Stop promising a review box that nothing unchecks - #214
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August 26, 2026 11:11
The Review progress comment said that pushing a commit unchecks the affected box. Nothing here does that: the workflows are actionlint, codeql, examples, issue-labeler, maven, pullrequest-labeler and pullrequest-template, and none of them touches the description. The sentence came from Artemis, where a bot does it, and a reviewer who believed it would take a ticked box as evidence that the tick survived the commits under it. The opening comment now also asks for British English, which the template otherwise left to chance.
AGENTS.md requires Javadoc on every method and field, under 500 characters, in simple words. The checklist never mentioned it, so the one convention a reviewer most often has to raise by hand was the one the template stayed silent about.
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Summary
The Review progress comment promised that pushing a commit unchecks the affected review
box. Nothing in this repository does that, so a ticked box said less than a reviewer
believed. It no longer claims it. The opening comment now asks for British English, and
the checklist asks for the Javadoc rule AGENTS.md already requires.
Linked issues
No linked issues.
1. Problem
Three things in the pull request template, all in the instructions it gives rather than in
code.
The Review progress comment stated that pushing a commit unchecks the affected box. No
workflow here touches a description: the seven are actionlint, codeql, examples,
issue-labeler, maven, pullrequest-labeler and pullrequest-template. The sentence was
inherited from Artemis, where a bot does it. A reviewer who believed it would read a
ticked box as evidence that the tick had survived the commits under it.
The template never said which variety of English to write in, so it was left to chance.
AGENTS.md requires Javadoc on every method and every field, each under 500 characters and
in simple words. The checklist never mentioned it, so the one convention a reviewer most
often has to raise by hand was the one the template stayed silent about.
2. Improvement from the user's perspective
No Improvement from the user's perspective.
3. Improvement from the maintainer's perspective
A tick in Review progress now means only what somebody actually ticked, rather than
carrying a promise about later commits that nothing keeps.
Contributors are told which variety of English to write in before a reviewer asks, and are
reminded of the Javadoc rule where the rest of the checklist is read rather than in a
review comment afterwards.
4. Testing manual
Prerequisites
and 3 need nothing but a browser.
Steps
PR_BODY="$(cat .github/PULL_REQUEST_TEMPLATE.md)" java .github/scripts/CheckPullRequestTemplate.javaand read every line it prints.
grep -ril uncheck .github/..github/PULL_REQUEST_TEMPLATE.mdon this branch in the browser and read thechecklist and the opening comment.
Expected result
naming a missing, a duplicated or an undefined heading. This pull request does not
touch
.github/scripts/CheckPullRequestTemplate.java, and that output is what says thetemplate still matches it.
.githubunchecks a review box, which is why the sentencepromising it is gone. This is evidence about this repository only: an organisation-level
GitHub App cannot be ruled out from a checkout, and that is exactly why the template
should not have stated it as a fact.
linking to the "Documenting Java" section of AGENTS.md. The opening comment asks for
British English on the line after the one about tick boxes. The Review progress comment
is two lines shorter and says only that both boxes should be ticked before merge.
Negative case (what must still be rejected)
The check must not have become more permissive. Confirm that
PR_BODY="" java .github/scripts/CheckPullRequestTemplate.javastill reports that the body is empty andexits 1, and that deleting any one heading from a copy of the filled template still fails
with a missing section. This description was written against the changed template, so the
pr-templatecheck on this pull request is the change exercising itself.Modes exercised
No mode-specific behaviour changed.
5. Test case coverage regarding this PR
No production Java code changed.
Breaking changes and migration
No breaking changes or migration.
Checklist
docs/,README.adoc, Javadoc) was updated where the change is user-facing.Review progress