Sources & Decisions
Where every claim on this site comes from.
Everything on this website derives from a repository of records at their recorded statuses. This page explains, in plain language, what those records are — without asking a general reader to browse raw files.
The order of authority
When records could conflict, authority descends in a fixed order: approved decision records first, then canonical source files at their declared status, then schemas, then governance and editorial policy, then drafts and notes, and only then website content — which is never authoritative on its own. Historical and superseded records are authoritative only about history.
Kinds of record
- Decision records — numbered, dated choices about identity, doctrine, structure, or presentation. They are never renumbered or quietly edited.
- Open questions — genuine uncertainties, closed only by a recorded decision.
- Canonical-status documents — developing material carrying an explicit status; nothing here is currently canonical.
- Reviews and corrections — editorial and (welcomed, ongoing) external review, and a record of corrections.
- Superseded and historical records — kept, dated, and linked, never deleted.
How to go deeper
Every substantive page on this site lists its own sources, with each source’s recorded status, in a panel at the foot of the page. That panel is the honest route from public prose back to the underlying record. The full working repository is public, but this site does not require anyone to read raw files to understand what ORIA is claiming and how firmly.