This directory contains Requests for Comments (RFCs) — design documents for substantial changes to DiskANN.

An RFC is recommended for changes that are cross-cutting, architecturally significant, or affect widely-used APIs — especially when the design has multiple viable approaches that benefit from broader input. Examples include:

• Adding a new crate to the workspace
• Introducing or modifying cross-crate traits or abstractions
• New distance functions, storage layouts, or index formats
• Changes with backward-compatibility implications for downstream consumers

An RFC is not required for routine API additions scoped to a single crate (e.g., adding a variant to an internal enum), bug fixes, internal refactors, or documentation improvements.

The pull request is the RFC. Merging an RFC PR is acceptance.

• Open PR — the RFC is under discussion. Authors iterate on feedback.
• Merged PR — the RFC is accepted. Only accepted RFCs appear in this directory.
• Closed PR — the RFC is rejected or withdrawn. The full text and discussion remain available in the closed PR.

Tag every RFC pull request with the RFC label so they are easy to find.

1. Copy 00000-template.md to 00000-short-title.md.
2. Fill in all sections. Remove instructional comments.
3. Open a pull request with the RFC file and apply the RFC label. The PR description should summarize the proposal.
4. Once the PR is created, rename the file from 00000-short-title.md to NNNNN-short-title.md, where NNNNN is the pull request number zero-padded to 5 digits.
5. Discuss in the PR. Update the RFC based on feedback.
6. A maintainer merges the PR to accept the RFC, or closes it to reject/withdraw.