Mirrored verbatim from utopia-models/knowledge _rules/commit-as-the-author-the-deploy-accepts.md by the allowlisted publish pipeline. Edit it there, not here.

name: commit-as-the-author-the-deploy-accepts
cases: [2026-07-01-agent-vercel-git-author, 2026-07-01-dmv-merge-as-authorized-author, 2026-07-01-win-vercel-seat-author-no-override]
status: active
mechanism: pretooluse: git commit in a Vercel-wired repo with an author outside the allowed set
audience: all
last-recurrence: 2026-07-01

Commit as the author the deploy accepts — never override it, never merge as the wrong identity.

Fires when

Committing or merging in any repo wired to a Vercel project, or setting a git author for a run.

The rule

Use the repo's CONFIGURED git author; never override with -c user.email. The seat/owner check blocks a non-seat author and the deploy simply never runs. Set it per repo once, then read it rather than assuming it.

Cost when it fired

The same block found three separate times by three different agents — agent, dmv and win — each diagnosing it from scratch.