Canonical personal standard

Make the
work legible.

A durable system for turning thought, evidence, and action into one coherent artifact—on screen, on paper, and in motion.

Status
Current · v2.0.0
Scope
Clark’s personal work
Signal
#00C38B · semantic only
Identity
Clark Valberg · BS"D

00 / Governing principles

Structure does the expressive work.

The system is severe about hierarchy and generous about space. Typography carries importance; rules reveal relationships; green identifies the one thing whose state matters.

  1. 01

    Answer first

    Lead with the governing sentence. Context follows only when it sharpens the decision.

  2. 02

    Contrast has meaning

    Paper supports reading. Carbon contains systems, thresholds, media, and decisive conclusions.

  3. 03

    Show the operating model

    Use diagrams, ledgers, and sequences when they teach a relationship.

  4. 04

    The still must work

    Every first viewport, video frame, and component state must make sense before motion begins.

  5. 05

    One signal at a time

    Green means current, active, terminal, verified, live, or unlocked. It is never decoration.

Canonical authority

One system, one source, one release.

Ontology 2.0 is the default for Clark’s personal products and artifacts. Historical systems remain in Git; the literary profile is the only named exception.

Default

Ontology 2.0

Inter, IBM Plex Mono, paper, carbon, semantic green, square geometry.

Exception

Literary profile

Reserved for books, Torah, and genuine long-form reading—not ordinary web or product work.

Studio boundary

Transformative remains separate

The operating grammar is credited; Transformative’s identity and wordmark do not transfer.

Enforcement

Machine-readable canon

Tokens, schema, CLI, skill, CI, and MCP resolve to the same versioned contract.

One artifact, end to end

Canonical production sequence

The same model governs what is said, shown, shipped, and remembered.

A design system is the chain of decisions that keeps an artifact coherent from first claim through release.

Frame
Name the answer

State the governing idea before selecting a format.

Structure
Build the argument

Separate observation, implication, proof, and next move.

Render
Choose the field

Use text, diagram, ledger, paper, or motion according to the job.

Verify
Inspect the artifact

Test the first view, smallest view, still frame, and interaction path.

Release
Preserve the proof

Ship the exact reviewed artifact with its source and status intact.

System map

Four layers, thirteen pages.

Foundations establish constraints. Components and patterns encode behavior. Applications prove the system under real pressure. Reference surfaces make the standard executable.

01

Foundations

Color, themes, type, grid, spacing, rules, and geometry.

02

Components

The reusable vocabulary and its required states.

03

Patterns

Compositions for arguments, systems, records, and decisions.

04

Voice

The editorial logic that shapes every artifact.

05

Web & Product

Responsive product surfaces and application states.

06

Briefings & Publications

Answer-first editorial artifacts and protected thresholds.

07

Documents & Print

Paginated documents, field cards, and the literary exception.

08

Motion & Media

Poster-first film grammar and semantic media.

09

Tokens

The versioned DTCG source and generated adapters.

10

Standards

Accessibility, privacy, responsive, and release gates.

11

Agents & Adoption

Install, validate, and give agents the exact canon.

12

Changelog

The durable record of decisions and releases.

Provenance: Ontology 2.0 extends the operating grammar of Transformative Ontology and refinements proven in Transformative briefings and films. Ontology is Clark Valberg’s personal standard; the two identities remain separate.