#344 cli: one message-severity vocabulary (error:/warning:/note:) instead of four

[Anonymous]

Originally created by: fu351
Originally owned by: floze-the-genius

What

src/doberman/cli/main.py speaks four different message-severity dialects for "something didn't happen":

• bare messages (lines 347, 406, 457, 877, 956, 982)
• warning: (629, 888)
• note: (1537)
• error: (29 occurrences)

A user can't tell from the prefix whether a line is fatal, advisory, or informational. (Line numbers current on main as of 2026-08-11 - re-grep before you start.)

The fix

1. Pick one scheme - the natural one already dominates: error: for failures (non-zero exit), warning: for something skipped or degraded (exit 0), note: for purely informational asides. Bare messages become one of those three.
2. Sweep cli/main.py's echo call sites to match. Keep exit codes exactly as they are - this is prefix-only, no behavior change.
3. Extend a test to lock the convention where it is load-bearing (e.g. the bad-mode-choice path asserts its error: prefix in tests/unit/test_setup_wizard.py - follow that pattern for one or two of the re-prefixed sites).

Flagged in the 2026-08-05 UX audit and carried through the 2026-08-11 re-score; everything else at its severity is fixed, so this is the last P2 in the CLI surface.

[Anonymous]

Originally posted by: floze-the-genius

I’d like to claim this. I’ll re-audit the src/doberman/cli/main.py echo sites against the issue’s error: / warning: / note: definitions, make prefix-only changes while preserving every exit code and stdout/stderr behavior, add focused coverage for one or two representative re-prefixed paths, keep the required docs in sync, and run the full contributor checks before opening the PR.

[Anonymous]

• assigned_to: floze-the-genius

[Anonymous]

Ticket changed by: fu351

• status: open --> closed