Branching and Release Channels

Branching Baseline

• Canonical branches track main state.
• Feature, analysis, and QA work happens in PROJECT-wtrees/<topic>.
• PR prep and merges stay in stacks from worktree branches.

Channel Rules

• alpha: early code, guarded by flags and unit tests.
• beta: feature-complete slice; integration smoke + migration checks.
• rc: release-candidate validation; requires rollback path.
• canary: selective, pre-prod exposure; strict rollback monitor.
• release: full gating and release checklist complete.

Do not merge alpha work into release paths.