group chat: a Bot's "@Name" is dropped on two paths — a mid-round post builds no call, and a late "quiet" line returns before the @ is read #932

Report

The owner, in the group chat at 11:11 today: a Bot posts a line that names another Bot with @, and the named Bot never answers. Earlier the same shape with @Reviewer. This is Bot-to-Bot naming inside one room.

Not reproduced — recorded so nobody re-opens it

Two Bots in participants, admin-mode room, A (the admin) replies @B your call on current main dfa25a2a: B gets exactly one turn — assert.equal(writerTurns.length, 1) is green, no duplicate, no gap. Evidence from that run:

• The round report can see such a member: groups.js:1005-1019 has three buckets — addressed (the poster's own @, mine at :1009-1010), Called, but no answer (:1019), and Stayed silent (:1017).
• hop = 1 (a person's line 0, a Bot's reply +1), nowhere near MAX_HOPS = 6 (core/src/host/constants.js:23).
• B's Session was created, ran, answered [PASS] → status: 'passed', and room.log holds no line by B (a pass writes none). The call was built and the turn ran.

So the callMembers path (groups.js:585) is correct and must not gain a rule. This test stays as the negative control.

The two paths that actually drop the @ (all line numbers on main dfa25a2a)

(a) A Bot posts into the group while the round is running

postToRoom:929 → the group agent is running and heldWhileRunning is true → holdPost:915 → a this-home Bot's ordinary line goes through showInRound:891, which does logPost and round.replies.push and nothing else: no mentionsIn, no callMembers. The held post is only re-delivered after agent.whenIdle() (:918-925), i.e. after the round has ended — and the round's report has already said Stayed silent (:1017) about the member it named.

This is most likely what the owner saw: a Bot speaks during a round, names a member, and that member is not called until the round is over (and reads as silent in the report).

(b) A late line past ROOM_LATE_ROUNDS is marked quiet and the @ is never read

lateRoomReply:947 sets quiet at :961 once room.lateRounds >= ROOM_LATE_ROUNDS, and passes { late: true, quiet: true } down. Two early returns follow: showInRound drops it (:904), and when it finally opens a round, openingSpeakers returns at :837 — if (opener.quiet) return [] — before mentionsIn is consulted. Measured: feeding {late:true, quiet:true} with @Writer ... yields zero calls for Writer, and the admin answers instead.

quiet exists so late posts cannot keep a group talking; that goal is right. An explicit @ is not "keeping it talking", it names exactly one member.

Dev measured these on a nearby ref, so its numbers drift by a few lines (:939, :895, :812). Anchor on dfa25a2a.

What to change

• (a) resolve the mentions once in showInRound for a this-home Bot's ordinary line and build the calls there, still inside ROOM_TURNS_EACH / ROOM_ADMIN_TURNS_EACH (groups.js:40-41, enforced in callMembers:347) and the round limit — no second, uncapped call path that skips the caps.
• (b) make quiet stop only the spread that nobody asked for: either move the mention parse above the :837 early return, or let the early return apply only when nothing is named. Whichever, the comment must say why an explicit @ is exempt and what quiet still prevents.

Acceptance

Red tests first, then the code:

1. Mid-round post: while a round runs, a this-home Bot posts a line @Writer → Writer gets exactly one call (assert.equal, not "at least one"), and the round's report does not file Writer under Stayed silent.
2. Late quiet line: {late:true, quiet:true} with @Writer → exactly one call for Writer.
3. The spread guard still holds: a late quiet line naming nobody → zero calls (that is what quiet is for).
4. Dev's green case stays, unchanged, as a negative control: two Bots, A replies @B, exactly one turn — proof the callMembers path was not touched.
5. Negative controls: naming a Bot that is not in participants builds no call; a speaker naming itself builds no call and no loop.

Why the report is not the observation point for this

On both paths the named member is never called, so #913's report files it under Stayed silent (:1017) — not under Called, but no answer. Anyone looking for evidence here should read the code paths above, not the round report.