§ Concepts

Projects.

What a project owns and how it moves through the pipeline.

A project is the unit of work in SpecGraph. One project produces one specification document. Everything else — phases, wishes, amendments, exports — is scoped to a project.

What a project owns #

FieldWhere it livesWho edits it
NameProject headerAnyone with editor access
DescriptionProject headerAnyone with editor access
Phase contentEach phase form / chatThe phase owner (or any editor)
WishesThe wish panelAny team member
AmendmentsThe amendments panelAny team member, approved by owner
AssetsThe assets panelAny team member
Audit logProject audit pageRead-only — written by the system

Wishes are cross-department feature requests or constraints. Amendments are proposed changes to a locked phase. Both are queues the owner triages — neither modifies the spec until it's accepted.

Lifecycle #

A project moves through three macro-states:

  • Drafting — phases are open, content is being authored, downstream sections may be empty.
  • Locked & ready — all nine phases are locked, the spec compiles cleanly, the export bundle is up to date.
  • Archived — read-only. The project is preserved but no longer appears in the active portfolio.

Archiving is reversible. Deletion is not — only workspace admins can delete a project, and the action requires typing the project name to confirm.

What a project is not #

  • Not a ticket tracker. SpecGraph isn't where bugs or sprint work live. The output is a one-shot spec, not an ongoing backlog.
  • Not a wiki. General team knowledge belongs in the Knowledge Base (which can be reused across many projects), not pinned inside one project's phases.
  • Not auto-saved AI slop. Every AI-drafted section requires explicit owner approval before it counts as "complete."

Permissions, briefly #

  • Viewer — can read everything, can't change anything.
  • Editor — can edit any phase, file wishes, propose amendments.
  • Owner — everything an editor can do, plus lock/unlock phases and approve amendments.
  • Workspace admin — everything an owner can do across every project, plus team management.

Roles are configured in Team for the workspace. They can also be overridden per-project for sensitive engagements — see Team & invites.