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Demos

# What AI misses, Roam catches

Eight concrete scenarios — each starts with a plausible patch from an AI coding agent and ends with the Roam command that catches the problem before merge.

AI coding agents are good at writing code. They are not yet good at the engineering judgment around code: which callers will break, which tests cover the change, whether the new loop is quadratic, whether the function the agent just edited has two near-identical siblings that didn't get the patch.

Each demo below is a real failure pattern we see in agent PRs. Roam ships a deterministic local tool for each.

## 1. The clone the AI didn't notice

Scenario. The agent fixes a bug in `UserService.normalize_email()`. It looks correct. Tests pass. Reviewers approve. Two weeks later the same bug fires from `AdminService.normalize_email()` and `SignupFlow._normalize_email()` — copy-pasted siblings the agent never saw.

What Roam does. `roam clones --persist` populates a clone-class table; `git diff | roam critique` flags clones-not-edited at `BLOCK` severity when a patch touches one member of a clone class without touching the others.

    $ roam clones --persist
    clone classes: 47  (3 high-similarity, 21 medium, 23 low)
    class C-12 [3 members, 0.91 similarity]:
      src/users/service.py:142  normalize_email
      src/admin/service.py:89   normalize_email
      src/signup/flow.py:201    _normalize_email

    $ git diff | roam critique
    VERDICT: BLOCK
    [1] clones-not-edited (HIGH)
        Edited: src/users/service.py:142 normalize_email
        Unedited siblings in class C-12:
          src/admin/service.py:89   normalize_email
          src/signup/flow.py:201    _normalize_email
        Hint: copy-paste fix or extract a shared helper.

## 2. The deletion that breaks production

Scenario. The agent is "cleaning up dead code" and deletes `resolve_legacy_token()`. Tests pass — there are no direct callers in source. The function is reached at runtime through a string lookup in a dispatcher map. Production breaks the next morning.

What Roam does. `roam impact` follows static + bridge edges (REST, template, config, ORM, dispatcher tables). `roam safe-delete` returns a binary verdict.

    $ roam safe-delete resolve_legacy_token
    VERDICT: UNSAFE
    reachable_from: 3 entry points (login_handler, sso_callback, mobile_v1)
    indirect callers: 1 (dispatcher_map['legacy_token'] in src/auth/dispatch.py:67)
    runtime hits: 1,247 in last 7 days
    recommendation: do not delete. Add deprecation warning instead.

## 3. The accidental O(n²) the linter approved

Scenario. The agent rewrites a list-deduplication loop. It's clean, idiomatic, and uses `list.append` + `if x not in seen`. Linters love it. At 100 records it runs in 2 ms; at 50,000 records it takes 18 seconds and the request times out.

What Roam does. `roam math` (alias `roam algo`) detects nested-loop lookups, regex-in-loop, N+1 I/O in loops, quadratic string concatenation, serial awaits, pandas row loops, and dozens of other algorithmic anti-patterns the AI agent's training distribution doesn't penalise.

    $ roam math --confidence high
    VERDICT: 3 high-confidence findings
    [1] LIST-MEMBERSHIP-IN-LOOP (O(n²))
        src/etl/dedupe.py:34  in dedupe_records
        Hint: use a set for O(1) membership; switch list[] to set() at line 32.
    [2] REGEX-COMPILE-IN-LOOP
        src/parsers/log.py:88  in parse_log_lines
        Hint: hoist re.compile() outside the loop. ~40× speedup at 10k lines.
    [3] JSON-PARSE-IN-LOOP
        src/sync/users.py:212  in sync_user_batch
        Hint: parse once outside the loop, iterate the parsed object.

## 4. The N+1 query no one noticed

Scenario. The agent adds an `order.customer.name` reference to the order-list template. Each rendered row issues a fresh SELECT against the customers table. Page load goes from 80 ms to 4.2 seconds at 200 orders. Tests pass — the test fixture has 3 orders.

What Roam does. `roam n1` walks the call graph and matches DB-call patterns inside loops; `roam missing-index` matches WHERE-clause shapes against the schema's index list.

    $ roam n1
    VERDICT: 2 N+1 hotspots
    [1] OrderList.render_rows -> Customer.find_by_id  (loop in render_rows:42)
        Hint: prefetch with .includes(:customer) in the query at line 30.
    [2] InvoiceExport.export -> LineItem.tax_for_country  (loop in export:88)
        Hint: batch-load tax rates for the unique country set.

## 5. The layer violation that quietly couples your domain to your HTTP stack

Scenario. The agent is asked to "use the existing HTTP retry helper" and imports `http.retry` directly inside `domain/billing.py`. The change passes review — it's a small import. Six months later you can't change HTTP libraries without touching the entire domain layer.

What Roam does. `roam layers` infers architectural layers; `roam fitness` + `.roam-gates.yml` declare layer constraints; `roam critique` blocks PRs that violate them.

    $ git diff | roam critique
    VERDICT: BLOCK
    [1] layer-violation (HIGH)
        Edge added: domain/billing.py -> http/retry.py
        Rule: domain/* MUST NOT import from http/* (.roam-gates.yml:18)
        Suggestion: route through application/retry_policy or pass an injected client.

## 6. The change with no tests touching it

Scenario. The agent edits `PricingEngine.discount_for_segment()`. The full test suite is green. But the only test that actually exercises that branch was deleted six months ago when its fixture broke. Coverage looks fine because other tests pass through the function without entering the changed branch.

What Roam does. `roam affected-tests` walks the call graph in reverse and lists tests reachable from changed lines, not files. `roam test-gaps` highlights changed code with no reaching test.

    $ roam affected-tests
    changed: PricingEngine.discount_for_segment (lines 88-104)
    tests reaching this branch: 0
    nearest tests:
      test_pricing_engine.py::test_basic_discount (covers lines 60-79, not 88-104)
      test_pricing_engine.py::test_segment_lookup (covers segment_for_user, not the discount branch)

    $ roam test-gaps --changed
    VERDICT: 1 high-risk gap
    src/pricing/engine.py:88-104 discount_for_segment
      reach-from-tests: 0
      hint: add a test that exercises segment="enterprise" + amount > 10_000.

## 7. The refactor that takes the codebase down for an afternoon

Scenario. The agent says "I'll move `EmailQueue` to `infrastructure/messaging/` — it's a clean rename." It updates the imports it can see. CI passes. Production stops sending emails because three runtime registries reference the old import path through `importlib.import_module`.

What Roam does. `roam simulate move` clones the graph, applies the move, reports what breaks before any source file changes.

    $ roam simulate move EmailQueue infrastructure/messaging/email_queue.py
    VERDICT: BLOCK (3 unresolved references)
    direct callers updatable: 14
    indirect references requiring manual fix:
      config/celery.py:12          'app.queues.email.EmailQueue' (string ref in CELERY_BEAT_SCHEDULE)
      scripts/seed_demo.py:88      importlib.import_module('app.queues.email')
      src/admin/registry.py:204    QUEUE_REGISTRY['email'] = 'app.queues.email:EmailQueue'

    run: roam plan-refactor EmailQueue --target-file infrastructure/messaging/email_queue.py
    to get a step-by-step plan with caller-update ordering.

## 8. The PR that ships unsigned

Scenario. Quarterly review arrives. Compliance asks "what was checked on this PR before it merged?" You point at green checkmarks. They want a signed, tamper-evident artifact — not a screenshot of CI. EU AI Act / SOC 2 CC8.1 / ISO 42001 evidence.

What Roam does. `roam attest` emits an in-toto v1 attestation (`https://roam-code.com/spec/CodeGraph/v1`) covering the inputs, the gates that ran, and the verdicts. Optional `cosign` signing produces an offline-verifiable artifact you can store with the PR.

    $ roam attest --sign --output cga.intoto.jsonl
    attestation: https://roam-code.com/spec/CodeGraph/v1
    inputs:
      graph_merkle: sha256:e2b0...c4f
      diff_merkle:  sha256:9a17...8d2
    gates:
      critique:    PASS (severity max=LOW)
      fitness:     PASS
      math:        PASS (0 high-confidence findings)
      test-gaps:   PASS (0 high-risk gaps)
    signed by: keyless OIDC (github-actions)
    written: cga.intoto.jsonl

    $ roam cga verify cga.intoto.jsonl
    VERDICT: VERIFIED
    signature: valid
    graph_merkle: matches HEAD
    gates: PASS

## The pattern

Each demo follows the same shape: an AI agent ships a plausible patch, conventional CI passes, and a structural problem slips through. Roam runs alongside CI as a deterministic graph-aware gate that catches the problem before merge.

None of these checks require a network call, an API key, or access to your source code outside the repo. The graph is local, the analysis is local, and the verdict is reproducible.

Try them yourself — install the free CLI · or read the agent contract for the discipline that strings them together.

See it run: The 5-minute canonical demo — install → health → preflight → critique → signed `ChangeEvidence` packet, end to end.