AI Disclosure Statement
Overview
This project uses AI-assisted development tools as part of its engineering workflow. This document describes how AI is used, what safeguards are in place, and what downstream users and contributors should know.
AI Tools Used
AI tools used during development have included, but are not limited to, Claude AI, Copilot and Gemini. This list may not be comprehensive as tools and workflows evolve over time.
Nature of AI Use
AI assistance has been or may be used for the following activities:
- Code generation - writing new code for the module and the executable, including subroutines, data structures, and logic.
- Documentation - drafting and refining POD documentation, README content, and inline comments.
- Architectural design - exploring design alternatives, evaluating trade-offs, and structuring the module interface.
- Test generation - creating test cases and test scaffolding.
- Debugging and troubleshooting - diagnosing issues, analysing error output, and suggesting fixes.
- Refactoring - restructuring existing code for clarity, performance, or maintainability.
Human Review and Oversight
All AI-generated or AI-assisted output has been reviewed, understood, tested, and where necessary modified by a human developer before being committed to the repository. No code or documentation has been committed as raw, unreviewed AI output.
This project does not engage in so-called "vibe coding", where AI output is accepted without understanding or verification.
Intellectual Property and Licensing
The copyright status of AI-generated code is legally unsettled in most jurisdictions as of this writing. Users and distributors should be aware of this uncertainty and assess their own risk accordingly.
The author(s) have made a good-faith effort to ensure that AI tools were not used in a way that knowingly infringes on third-party intellectual property. However, no guarantee can be made that AI-generated output is free from similarity to existing copyrighted code.
Ethical Considerations
This project favours AI tools whose developers have made reasonable efforts toward responsible and transparent data practices. This includes, but is not limited to, consideration of how training data was acquired, whether creators and rights holders were respected in that process, and whether the tool provider is transparent about their data sourcing and labour practices.
We acknowledge that full visibility into the training data and practices of any AI provider is not currently possible from the outside. This is a good-faith commitment to prefer tools that align with ethical principles, not a guarantee that every tool used meets any particular standard. As industry norms, transparency, and available information evolve, so will our assessment of which tools are appropriate.
Scope
AI assistance has been used throughout the development process rather than being confined to specific files or modules. It is not practical to annotate individual lines or sections as "AI-generated" versus "human-written", because most code has been iteratively developed with a mix of both.
Contributor Expectations
Contributors to this project are expected to:
- Disclose if they have used AI tools in preparing their contribution.
- Ensure all submitted code has been reviewed, understood, and tested by the contributor.
- Not submit raw, unreviewed AI output.
- Consider the ethical implications of their choice of AI tools, particularly regarding how the tool's model was trained and whether its data sourcing practices are consistent with respect for creators and rights holders.
- Be prepared to identify which AI tools were used if asked.
Contact
If you have questions about AI usage in this project, please open an issue or contact the maintainer at Mikko Koivunalho mikkoi@cpan.org.
This disclosure is provided voluntarily in the interest of transparency. It will be updated as the project evolves and as norms around AI-assisted development continue to develop.