gitea-axi/.claude/tasks/0021-body-field-truncation-ruling.md

spec

spec
gitea-axi

What to build

A single ruling on whether --fields body truncates, applied uniformly everywhere the body extra field is offered.

The spec contradicts itself today. Principle 3 says body text is truncated at 500 characters "in all contexts (list and detail alike)", while the Command Surface describes the body extra field as "body (raw)" for both issue list --fields and issue create --fields. issue view follows Principle 3 (it routes the body through truncateBody, which also applies cleanBody), but the two --fields paths follow the Command Surface and emit the body raw and untruncated — ISSUE_CREATE_EXTRA_FIELDS in task 0004, then ISSUE_LIST_EXTRA_FIELDS in task 0002, which copied the precedent rather than diverge from it.

The cost is real on the list path: issue list --limit 30 --fields body can emit 30 full issue bodies into an agent's context, which is the exact expense Principle 3 exists to prevent. The plausible reading of "raw" is uncleaned markdown (no cleanBody) rather than unbounded, but that is a guess and the two passages need reconciling in the spec text, not in an extractor.

Decide, then make the spec and the code agree:

• If bodies truncate in --fields too, route the body extractor through truncateBody (a truncatedBody() FieldDef alongside pluck/joined/relativeTimeField in fields.ts), and amend the Command Surface's "(raw)" wording.
• If --fields body is genuinely exempt, amend Principle 3 to carve out the exemption explicitly and say why, so the next slice offering a body field does not have to re-derive it.

Whichever way it goes, issue list, issue create, and any later command exposing body via --fields must behave the same.

Acceptance criteria

• The spec no longer contradicts itself: Principle 3 and the Command Surface's body field agree, with the reasoning recorded
• issue list --fields body and issue create --fields body behave identically under the ruling
• If truncation wins, the truncation hint and --full affordance match how issue view already presents a truncated body (see ADR 0003)
• Tests cover the ruled behaviour on both commands