Document bounty preflight quality gate

[chrisx9z]

Summary

• Add a concise preflight section to CONTRIBUTING.md for bounty PR authors.
• Document the current scripts/submission_quality_gate.py --text-file ... --repo ... workflow and what the gate checks.

Refs #426

Evidence

• Compared against scripts/submission_quality_gate.py, which checks bounty references, summary/evidence signals, payability, active attempts, similar open PRs, and maintainer activity when available.
• docs/agent-guide.md already documents this gate for agents; this PR adds the same contributor-facing preflight guidance to the main contributor entrypoint.
• Intended files or surfaces: CONTRIBUTING.md only.
• Expected PR size: small docs-only update.
• Out of scope: API/MCP examples, behavior changes, broad docs rewrite, or payout/price claims.

Test Evidence

• python scripts/docs_smoke.py (docs, template, example, or onboarding changes)

C:\Users\ADMIN\.cache\codex-runtimes\codex-primary-runtime\dependencies\python\python.exe scripts\docs_smoke.py

Result: docs smoke ok

MRWK

Related bounty or issue (Bounty #N or Refs #N for multi-award bounties): Refs #426

Summary by CodeRabbit

• Documentation
  • Added pre-submission validation guidelines for contributors, including a checklist for verifying bounty references, summaries, validation evidence, capacity/attempts, similar submissions, and recent maintainer activity before submitting contributions.

[coderabbitai]

No actionable comments were generated in the recent review. 🎉

ℹ️ Recent review info

⚙️ Run configuration

Configuration used: Path: .coderabbit.yaml

Review profile: ASSERTIVE

Plan: Pro Plus

Run ID: 06e7a9b9-0294-4a55-a42e-6cd4cc71a70b

📥 Commits

Reviewing files that changed from the base of the PR and between 764e9ed and b6de214.

📒 Files selected for processing (1)

• CONTRIBUTING.md

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📝 Walkthrough

Walkthrough

CONTRIBUTING.md now includes a "Preflight Checks" section instructing contributors to run a local submission quality gate script before opening bounty PRs. The section documents the script command and the validations it performs.

Changes

Submission Preflight Guidance

Layer / File(s)	Summary
Submission quality gate preflight guidance CONTRIBUTING.md	New "Preflight Checks" subsection instructs contributors to run python scripts/submission_quality_gate.py locally and describes the validations performed: bounty reference, summary, validation evidence, capacity/attempts, similar open PRs, and recent maintainer activity.

Possibly related PRs

• ramimbo/mergework#387: Introduces documented pre-bounty preflight checks guidance using the same pre-submission validation workflow concept.

🚥 Pre-merge checks | ✅ 5 | ❌ 1

❌ Failed checks (1 warning)

Check name	Status	Explanation	Resolution
Bounty Pr Focus	⚠️ Warning	PR modifies 128 files including entire app codebase, not CONTRIBUTING.md only as stated. Claimed +15/-0 contradicts actual changes. No test evidence provided.	Align PR scope to stated intent or update description to reflect all changes. Provide docs_smoke.py test output if full initialization intended.

✅ Passed checks (5 passed)

Check name	Status	Explanation
Title check	✅ Passed	The title clearly names the changed surface (CONTRIBUTING.md documentation) and describes the main change (documenting the bounty preflight quality gate).
Description check	✅ Passed	The description includes all required sections: Summary, Evidence (with all subsections), Test Evidence (with docs smoke test passing), and MRWK reference.
Linked Issues check	✅ Passed	Check skipped because no linked issues were found for this pull request.
Out of Scope Changes check	✅ Passed	Check skipped because no linked issues were found for this pull request.
Mergework Public Artifact Hygiene	✅ Passed	Preflight Checks section contains no investment, price, cash-out, off-ramp, or payout claims; appropriately describes MRWK minimally; avoids private security details.

_{✏️ Tip: You can configure your own custom pre-merge checks in the settings.}

---

_{Comment @coderabbitai help to get the list of available commands and usage tips.}

[prettyboyvic]

Reviewed PR #429 at head b6de214 against origin/main for Bounty #426.

No blockers found. The diff is limited to CONTRIBUTING.md and adds a contributor-facing preflight section that matches the existing scripts/submission_quality_gate.py workflow: bounty reference, summary/evidence signals, payability/capacity, attempts, similar PRs, and maintainer activity when public context is available. The copy also avoids payout, price, off-ramp, or acceptance claims.

Validation performed:

• git show --stat origin/main..origin/pr/429 -> 1 file changed, 15 insertions in CONTRIBUTING.md
• ./.venv/Scripts/python.exe scripts/docs_smoke.py -> docs smoke ok
• git diff --check origin/main...HEAD -> clean

[aiautotool]

Reviewed PR #429 against current origin/main after fetching the latest base. The PR is now a focused docs-only change: 15 lines added to CONTRIBUTING.md for the advisory submission quality gate.

I checked that the new contributor-facing instructions match the existing tool and docs model: the command points to scripts/submission_quality_gate.py --text-file ... --repo ..., and the text accurately describes advisory checks for bounty reference, summary/evidence, award capacity, active attempts, similar PRs, and maintainer activity when public context is available. It does not claim the gate reserves work, guarantees acceptance, or creates payment.

Local verification on head b6de214f4b229e4caf224efcbd2dfd63435bdafc:

• git diff origin/main...HEAD -- CONTRIBUTING.md -> only the preflight section changed
• python scripts/docs_smoke.py -> docs smoke ok
• git diff --check origin/main...HEAD -> passed

No blocking issues found from my review.

[ramimbo]

Holding this out of the accepted batch. The PR is still not mergeable in the queue because the required project CI is not present/green on the current head. Review claims that did not catch that process blocker are not accepted for payment.

[Chris79OG]

I opened a rebased replacement at #450 because this PR head is not writable from the currently available automation account, and the maintainer noted this head is missing the required project CI signal.

The replacement keeps the same focused CONTRIBUTING.md scope, is based on current main, and includes full local CI evidence including pytest, ruff, mypy, deploy readiness, docs smoke, Docker build, and diff check.