Bundled Documents skill: absolute heading punctuation rule conflicts with template preservation

What version of the Codex App are you using?

Desktop app 26.908.40834 (8881), bundled CLI 0.154.0-alpha.6.2. Documents plugin 26.909.12148 from the primary runtime package.

What subscription do you have?

Not included: this report concerns a static conflict in installed workflow instructions, not plan-dependent access.

What platform is your computer?

macOS 26.6.2, Apple silicon.

What issue are you seeing?

The bundled Documents skill imposes an absolute title-punctuation rule that conflicts with its template-preservation workflow. This is an instruction-level finding, not a claim that a real document has already been corrupted.

skills/documents/SKILL.md says:

Title clarity is an absolute requirement.
Apply this to document titles, subtitles, and section titles, using only words, numbers, and spaces.

Its Template Following section also says:

the retained reference is the design authority

skills/documents/template-create.md requires:

Preserve untouched sections, styles, numbering, relationships, headers, footers, images, tables, and page furniture.

For a controlled template heading such as 1. Scope: Owner’s responsibilities, applying the absolute punctuation rule would change required numbering and heading text even when the requested edit is confined to a body slot.

What steps can reproduce the bug?

1. Inspect the title-clarity paragraph, Template Following section, and template-create preservation requirements in the installed Documents 26.909.12148 package.
2. Consider a synthetic retained template with the heading 1. Scope: Owner’s responsibilities and an editable body placeholder.
3. Request replacement of only the body placeholder while preserving the template. The instructions currently conflict about whether the untouched heading may retain punctuation.

These steps describe a minimal instruction conflict and a proposed regression case. No model-backed document-generation reproduction or real-user document modification is claimed.

What is the expected behavior?

Make heading style a default for newly authored, unconstrained headings. Preserve required template wording, punctuation, numbering, and styles.

Suggested replacement for the punctuation requirement:

For newly authored headings without controlling template text, prefer plain descriptive language and avoid decorative punctuation. Preserve required wording, punctuation, numbering, and styles in supplied templates and controlled headings.

Keep the render/fidelity gates and separate Google Docs title-border sanitizer contract unchanged. A regression should verify unchanged controlled headings and untouched package parts, then use the existing render/fidelity checks.

Additional information

The installed manifest names OpenAI as the author but points its repository field to https://github.com/openai/openai, which returned 404 during this review. Filing here because this tracker accepts Codex app bugs; please route to the maintained Documents skill owner if a different tracker is appropriate.

No private documents, credentials, machine-specific paths, session transcripts, or screenshots are included. The versioned plugin cache was not edited.

Read skills/documents/SKILL.md and skills/documents/template-create.md, focusing on the title-clarity, Template Following, and preservation requirements. Use the synthetic heading 1. Scope: Owner’s responsibilities with a body-only edit, then run the existing render/fidelity checks. Done means controlled heading text, punctuation, numbering, styles, and untouched package parts remain unchanged.