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+# UI/UX design session brief
+
+You are running a design session for spreadlab's milestone 3 dashboard. The
+deliverable is a written spec, `docs/ui-spec.md`, that an implementation
+session can execute without re-deciding anything. Do NOT write application
+code in this session.
+
+## How to run this session
+
+- Walk through the UX with the user top-down: audience and core message
+  first, then page layout, then each interaction, then states and edge
+  cases. One topic at a time.
+- Use AskUserQuestion aggressively for every meaningful choice, with a
+  recommended option first. Use ASCII mockups in option previews when
+  comparing layouts.
+- The user is a developer (Vue/TS background), not a designer; explain
+  design trade-offs the way you would explain code trade-offs.
+- No em dashes in anything you write.
+
+## What spreadlab is
+
+A self-hosted dashboard running an agent-based model live: a non-consensual
+deepfake spreads through a simulated school year group (120 students), and
+an education program changes who forwards it. The headline result: the same
+education budget reaches 82% / 58% / 6% of the school depending on who gets
+educated (no program / random 30% / best-connected 30%). The product goal
+is making that lever visceral. Always framed "illustrative, not validated".
+
+Audience, in order: grant-pitch audience and course graders (first contact,
+must land in seconds), curious public on the hosted demo, the author.
+
+## What already exists (look at it)
+
+- Run `./dev.sh` from the repo root and open http://localhost:5173 to see
+  the current parity page (a static table of the three scenarios).
+- The Python prototype's rendered output defines the inherited visual
+  language: ../pitch/figure/out/spread.png and spread.gif (relative to the
+  repo root's parent: grant-proposal/pitch/figure/out/). Teal donut ring =
+  educated, rose = forwarded the fake, haloed node = origin, slate =
+  unreached; colourblind-safe via shape, not colour alone. Modern-dashboard
+  look, Tailwind-ish palette (see constants in
+  ../pitch/figure/spread_figure.py).
+- API: GET /api/config/default, POST /api/comparison (full Config in, all
+  three strategies' Results out). Result.reachedAtRound gives per-node
+  activation rounds, exactly what an animation needs. Types in
+  web/src/types/ are generated from Go structs.
+- KNOWN GAP: the API does not yet expose graph topology (edges), which any
+  network view needs. The spec should state what the frontend needs from a
+  new/extended endpoint; the implementation session will add it.
+
+## Locked decisions the spec must respect (from ../tool-handoff.md)
+
+- Layout is computed in the frontend with a force simulation (d3-force or
+  equivalent) seeded from the config: a shared URL must render the same
+  picture.
+- Config is the whole truth and goes in the URL: shareable, reproducible.
+- Vue 3 + TypeScript, lean and conventional; Pinia/Router only when the
+  design actually requires them (note it in the spec if so).
+- No shape redefinition in the frontend: all data types come generated
+  from Go.
+- Quality bar includes accessibility, and the concrete criteria are
+  UNDEFINED so far. Defining them is part of this design session (keyboard
+  operation, reduced-motion behaviour for the animation, contrast,
+  screen-reader treatment of results at minimum).
+
+## Questions the spec must answer
+
+1. Page composition: prototype-style three panels side by side, or one
+   network view with a strategy switcher, or something better? What is
+   above the fold at first contact?
+2. Which config levers get visible controls first, which live in an
+   "advanced" area (seeds?), and what control types (sliders, steppers)?
+3. Animation: autoplay or user-initiated? Play/pause/scrub/speed? What does
+   round-by-round progression look like; what happens at reduced motion?
+4. Metrics: what numbers/curves accompany the picture, and how do they
+   update while animating?
+5. Sharing UX: how does config-in-URL surface to the user (copy button,
+   live-updating address bar)?
+6. States: loading, API unreachable, invalid config (the API returns 400
+   with an error string), tiny screens.
+7. How is "illustrative, not validated" communicated without undermining
+   the demo?
+8. Accessibility acceptance criteria (the concrete, testable list).
+
+## Output format for docs/ui-spec.md
+
+Page layout (with a final ASCII wireframe), component tree with
+responsibilities, every interaction specced (trigger, behaviour, states),
+data requirements from the API (including the topology gap), visual tokens
+(palette, shape encodings), accessibility criteria as a checklist, and an
+ordered implementation slice list for milestone 3. Decisions only, no
+options left open; record rejected alternatives in one line each at the end.