ADR-0007 — No source writes in the recovery core

Status: accepted · Date: 2026-09

Context

Any write to the source can destroy the data being recovered. Users under stress make mistakes; software must not amplify them.

Decision

No crate in the recovery core exposes a source write. Devices are opened with read-only access and, on Windows, without GENERIC_WRITE. The recovery writer targets a destination path and refuses, by default, destinations that resolve to the same physical device as the source.

Consequences

• Automatic partition-table repair is out of scope for the core; a future capability would be a separately privileged, explicitly invoked component.
• Tests assert that fixture images are byte-identical before and after every scan and recovery.