# Evidence Standard: what counts as proof for each kind of agent work, who checks it, and what is refused

> Agents report done from the plan as often as from the result. Five plain files write down, for each class of work, the proof that counts, who checks it (never the producer), what is refused and how long proof is kept. Agents log each claim with its evidence, seal it by sha256 and report in the words evidence.py say allows: done, partly done with the gap named, waiting on the owner, or reported, not verified. The agent's own summary is never proof. Fifteen read-only checks run on the standard and the claims ledger.

- URL: https://paperchasewebb.ai/bots/marketplace/items/evidence-standard-what-counts-as-proof-for-agent-work/
- Type: Prompt pack
- Category: Solo business
- By: PaperChaseWebb
- Works with: Claude Code, Codex, Grok Bot, Hermes (named in the listing); A skill file for Claude Code, Codex and Hermes, an AGENTS.md snippet and a Grok Bot rules block; the scripts were tested on Linux with Python 3.13, the agent files were not loaded inside each harness
- Price: $24 USD
- Difficulty: Intermediate
- Setup time: 30 min
- Time to result: A ratified standard for five to eight classes of work in an afternoon
- Format: Markdown (.md) file, evidence-standard-what-counts-as-proof-for-agent-work.md
- Version: 1.0, updated 2026-10-29
- License: Use on your own work and on standards you set up for clients and teams. Do not resell or republish the pack itself.

## What you end up with

A written rule for what your agents may call done, checked before they report: every claim tied to evidence someone else can open, checked by someone other than the agent that did the work, with people, money, records and releases going to a person and your yes.

## What you get

- 19 sections in one .md file
- The standard folder: standard.json, classes, proof kinds, refusals and a claims ledger, with blank templates
- Eight proof kinds with the agent's own narration listed and refused, three checker roles, two gates and a three-level claim ladder with the words for each
- evidence.py: seal evidence by sha256, say (exit codes 0, 10, 11, 12), period reports, owner approval tied to a sha256, verify, and one use per yes
- evidence_check.py: fifteen read-only checks, with a seeded test standard (15 findings, then 0)
- A skill file for Claude Code, Codex and Hermes, an AGENTS.md snippet and a Grok Bot rules block
- Ten prompts, a failure table and a worked example
- A look at completion receipt packs, verification skills and transcript auditors, with sources

## Who it is for

Anyone who lets agents do real work (code, research, copy, outreach drafts, record edits, releases) and wants every done in their reports backed by evidence a second party can open.

## Tools needed

- Grok Bot, Claude Code, Codex or Hermes: the agent that does the work; it reads the skill file, AGENTS.md snippet or rules block, logs each claim with its evidence, seals it with evidence.py seal and reports in the words evidence.py say gives
- Python 3: runs evidence.py (init, hash, seal, say, report, owner approval, verify, done) and the fifteen-check checker; standard library only, no network
- The owner of the standard: ratifies the standard, says yes to claims in owner-gated classes and approves period reports at their own terminal; approvals are refused inside agents and on piped input
- You need: Any of Grok Bot, Claude Code, Codex or Hermes
- You need: Python 3.9 or newer
- You need: One owner who ratifies the standard and approves gated claims and reports at their own terminal

Cost to run: The pack is the only purchase. The scripts use no model tokens.

## How it works

1. **Run the tests.** Copy the evidence-standard folder and run sh test_all.sh. Expected: 15 findings on the seeded standard and 0 on the fixed one, 15 of 15 single faults caught alone, checker tests 38 passed, evidence.py tests 52 passed, exit 2 on a missing folder.
2. **Write your standard.** Run evidence.py init, use prompts 1 to 3 to find the classes of work your agents already do, and write the proof, checker, gate and refusals for each. Run evidence_check.py until only E15 remains. Expected: Every class names what counts as proof, a checker who is not the producer, what is refused and where proof is kept.
3. **Ratify and connect.** The owner runs evidence.py approve DIR --standard at their own terminal. Install the skill file, paste the AGENTS.md snippet, or paste the rules block into Grok Bot. Expected: Each agent logs and seals a claim before reporting and uses the words evidence.py say gives.
4. **Live with it.** A fresh session or a named person checks each claim. The owner says yes to gated claims and approves the period report by hash. Review the standard monthly with prompt 9. Expected: verify passes only for an unchanged report under the current standard and an unchanged claims ledger, within approval_hours, once.

## Sample prompt: Log before you report (Grok Bot, Claude Code, Codex, Hermes)

```
Before you tell me anything is done, add the claim to claims.csv with the evidence and kinds, run evidence.py seal, leave checked_by empty, and run evidence.py say. Report using its words.
```

Prompt 4 of 10.

## Sample prompt: Check in a fresh session (A second agent or fresh session)

```
You did not do this work. Open each piece of evidence listed for claim <ID>. Say whether it shows what the claim says, after the last change, and quote the line or output that does. If it does not, say what is missing. Do not fix anything.
```

Prompt 5 of 10.

## Free preview of evidence-standard-what-counts-as-proof-for-agent-work.md

````markdown
# Evidence Standard: what counts as proof for each kind of agent work, who checks it, and what is refused

Version 1.0, 2026-10-29. By PaperChaseWebb. A written evidence standard as five plain files, a script your agents use to seal evidence and to get the words their evidence allows, a read-only checker with fifteen checks, templates, a seeded test standard, ten prompts and the tests, all Python 3 standard library. Works with Claude Code, Codex and Hermes through a skill file and an AGENTS.md snippet, and with Grok Bot through a rules block. Tested as described in section 11: everything ran on Linux with Python 3.13, including owner approvals typed at a pseudo-terminal. The skill file, snippet and rules block were not loaded inside the harnesses for this release, and the pack has not been used on a real team's work. Each is marked where it matters.

Agents report work in confident sentences. "Fixed the rounding bug, all tests pass." "Merged the duplicate supplier rows." "Version 2.4 is live." Some of those are true. Some come from the plan rather than the result: the test was a stub, the run happened before the last edit, the tool returned a 200 and the record is still wrong, the page built and nobody loaded it. The person reading the summary cannot tell which is which without redoing the work, and that is the job they handed off.

The fix is a standard written before the work, not a better prompt after it. For each class of work you name what counts as proof, who checks it,
````

## Test record

- Date: Oct 29, 2026
- What was run: evidence_check.py on a seeded standard and a fixed copy, each planted fault alone, a missing input, and the unit tests. Linux, Python 3.13.
- Result: 15 findings on the seeded standard, 0 on the fixed one; 15 of 15 planted faults caught alone; exit 2 on missing input; nothing written. 38 checker and 52 evidence.py tests passed, 0 failed.
- Not run: The agent files inside Claude Code, Codex, Hermes or Grok Bot. A real team's work. Windows.

Copied from this item's dated test notes. What was not run stays in.

## Worth knowing

- evidence.py answers questions; it cannot stop an agent that never asks, or one that writes a false file and seals it. That is why a separate checker opens the evidence. This is not a sandbox.
- The skill file, AGENTS.md snippet and Grok Bot rules block were not loaded inside Claude Code, Codex, Hermes or Grok Bot for this release, so how reliably each harness logs claims before reporting was not measured. The pack has not been used on a real team's work, and there is no claim about how many false done reports it prevents. The test standard is made up. Linux only; Windows was not tested.
- It checks that a claim is backed by evidence a second party can open, not whether the work is good. Not a compliance certification (SOC 2, ISO 42001, EU AI Act).
- The approval step refuses piped input and the environment variables Claude Code, Codex, Hermes and Grok Bot set. That stops an agent approving by mistake; it is not a lock against someone with the same account.
- On 2026-10-29, on Linux with Python 3.13: evidence_check.py gave 15 findings on the seeded standard (each check once) and 0 on the fixed one, caught 15 of 15 single faults with only its own check, wrote nothing, and exited 2 on a missing folder, missing claims.csv or broken standard.json; checker tests 38 passed, 0 failed; evidence.py tests at a pseudo-terminal 52 passed, 0 failed.

## Questions

**How is this different from a verification-before-completion skill?** Those skills tell the agent to check before it says done, and they are a good rule. Here the rule covers every class of work, not just code, names a checker who is never the producer, lists what is refused, and the standard itself is checked fifteen ways.

**What does the agent say if the evidence is missing?** evidence.py say answers reported, not verified (exit 12). If some evidence is there and the gap is written down, it answers partly done with the gap named (exit 10).

**Can a second agent check outreach or a release?** No. Classes that touch people, clients, money, records or a release are checked by a person or the owner and need the owner's yes, tied to that claim's sha256.

**What if someone edits the evidence after the claim?** The sealed sha256 stops matching, the checker flags it and say drops the claim to reported, not verified until it is sealed and checked again.

## How to buy

$24 one time at https://paperchasewebb.ai/bots/marketplace/items/evidence-standard-what-counts-as-proof-for-agent-work/. Stripe checkout, then an instant download page; the download link is also in your emailed receipt.

Seller: PaperChaseWebb Inc., mgmt@paperchasewebb.com