Build Log
Start With a Decision Record
The first artifact was not code. It was a small control record that allowed the idea to remain dormant without becoming ambiguous or disappearing.
Dormant is a valid state
The project began inside a broader Utility Sites container. It had a mission, ownership, standards pointers, and a place in the portfolio, but no claim that implementation had started. That distinction prevented speculative ideas from being mistaken for shipped work.
On 27 June, a concrete brief and three consultant proposals were available. The project graduated into AussieLeaveCalculator.com, received its own versioned plan, and moved from dormant to active with a defined first release. The earlier record supplied continuity without pretending the implementation had existed all along.
Continuity before velocity
The plan recorded the product boundary: an Australia-only, static annual-leave optimiser using verified holiday data. It also recorded architecture, risks, source hierarchy, phase gates, and the files a new session must read before changing anything.
This made later decisions traceable. When the site added content pages, automated deployment, structured accountability, or new typography, each change could be compared with the original mission instead of relying on chat memory.
What became standard
A project starts with a recoverable state, not a burst of output. The live plan says what is true now; the history records what changed; versioned artifacts preserve what shipped; the Knowledge Manager carries lessons across projects.
The product that grew from that record is now visible in the calculator, its planning guide, and this technical history.