Executor
The scheduled task, hook or build step that actually invokes a rule. A rule without one is a proposal.
An executor is whatever actually calls a rule — a scheduled task, a git hook, a build step. Rules with no named executor do not run and produce no error when they do not, which is why they decay silently.
Definition
The concrete mechanism that invokes a rule: a scheduled task, a git hook, a build step, a session-start script. Not the rule itself and not the person who wrote it.
In practice
Every repeated rule in this system names its executor on the same line as the rule. If none can be named, the item is labelled proposal, not rule.
The test is blunt: if everyone forgets this exists, what still runs it? One documented failure ran 84 days on the answer "nothing".
executor: weekly scheduled task, Friday 07:00 — fails loudly
See also
a-rule-without-an-executor · standing-mandate
$ head -12 term-executor.md
$ cite term-executor
Citation id SV-1057 is stable. It resolves at
https://stillvalid.dev/c/SV-1057 even if this artifact moves to another section,
which a bare URL does not survive. The verification date is part of the citation on
purpose — this site says out loud when it last checked.
[Executor](https://stillvalid.dev/start/term-executor) — stillvalid, SV-1057 (glossary-entry, verified 2026-08-14)