docs: refocus repository documentation on public value and navigation

[ndrorchestration]

Purpose

Rework the root README as a public-facing project entry point rather than an internal governance ledger.

Changes

• lead with what DGAF is and why it exists;
• explain the practical value of authority, governance, evidence, provenance, and epistemic controls;
• separate the governed control-plane engineering track from the PDMAL experimental track;
• retain the critical PRE-FREEZE / FAIL-CLOSED / NOT AUTHORIZED / N=0 boundary without making it the dominant narrative;
• replace the 28-item documentation spine with a task-oriented documentation map;
• move detailed historical, predicate, gate, and audit state to canonical documents;
• add a concise architecture overview and getting-started path;
• preserve human/societal, open-source, commercialization, and mathematical-notation boundaries at appropriate public-surface depth;
• correct stale PR fix: fail closed on incomplete TGL governance wiring #132/fix(tgl): restore governance contract semantics after PR #132 regression #133 presentation by referring to the current PR feat: finalize DGAF v1 governed control plane with TGL hardening #139 engineering lane and canonical state documents.

Public-surface rationale

GitHub's README guidance emphasizes helping visitors understand what the project does, why it is useful, how to get started, where to get help, and who maintains it. The previous README was accurate in intent but functioned primarily as a detailed internal evidence/control record. This revision keeps the important transparency while improving hierarchy, audience fit, scanability, and next-step clarity.

No implementation or experimental state is changed by this PR.

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Project	Deployment	Actions	Updated (UTC)
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[ndrorchestration]

Repository-wide editorial pass

The scope has been extended beyond README.md to the surrounding public/documentation surface.

Updated on this branch:

• README.md — public project entry point, value proposition, architecture, task-oriented navigation, and separation of engineering vs. experiment state.
• CONTRIBUTING.md — contribution guidance rewritten for clarity, evidence boundaries, documentation quality, and actionable PRs.
• docs/CURRENT_STATE.md — current engineering narrative refreshed; PR feat: finalize DGAF v1 governed control plane with TGL hardening #139 is the active engineering lane and fix: fail closed on incomplete TGL governance wiring #132/fix(tgl): restore governance contract semantics after PR #132 regression #133 are historical remediation records.
• docs/PROJECT_STATUS.md — condensed into a living status document rather than an exhaustive audit ledger.
• CROSS_REF.md — cross-reference role clarified and current documentation controls added.
• docs/governance/DOCUMENTATION_STYLE_GUIDE.md — new repository-wide editorial standard covering audience, hierarchy, claim presentation, temporal scope, navigation, and public social quality.
• docs/governance/PUBLIC_SURFACE_QA_STANDARD.md — publication control strengthened with surface tiers and explicit anti-patterns.
• docs/governance/PUBLIC_SURFACE_REFACTOR_2026-08-29.md — audit/reconciliation record for this pass.

The governing principle is not less transparency; better placement of transparency. Landing pages orient, project documents summarize, technical/research documents explain, evidence records prove what they can prove, and historical records preserve provenance.

No implementation, experimental apparatus, freeze, authorization, or empirical state has been changed by this editorial work.

[ndrorchestration]

Continued the repo-wide public-surface pass. I identified README.governance.md as the next high-impact surface: its prior version mixed governance design with direct NIST/EU AI Act compliance language, certification implications, historical metrics, and strong implementation guarantees. It has now been refactored into a governance reference that preserves the substance while explicitly separating DGAF design correspondence from legal/regulatory compliance claims, and routes detailed evidence to authoritative records.

The pass also confirms remaining follow-up areas: legacy 1.7747 formalism references require classification/supersession rather than deletion; broad historical/current-state language should continue to be separated; and high-level documents should avoid repeating forensic caveats that belong in evidence records. This remains documentation-only and does not alter experimental authorization, candidate identity, freeze state, or empirical N.