file.mkdir ignores --conflict: anything that is not a directory at its path fails the deploy under every policy, while file.link and file.copy replace it #822

Feature: #836 — file provider. (Moved from #463: every line of the fix is in pkg/op/provider/file.)

The contract

--conflict=<policy> answers one question: what does writ do when something already exists at a target it is
about to write?

What the occupant is — a file, a directory, a live link, a dangling link — does not enter into it. "It exists" is the
whole test. That is what any developer, operator, or administrator reads into the flag, and it is how two of writ's
three writers behave.

The defect

file.mkdir: C:\Users\david-noble\.config\git exists, but is not a directory

• file.link reads the policy (provider.go:234) and under replace archives the occupant and writes the link.
• file.copy does the same (provider.go:2112).
• file.mkdir never reads the policy (provider.go:363, :380). Anything at its path that is not a directory is
  an error, under stop, skip, and replace alike.

On the machine the occupant was a stale symlink from the previous dotfile manager. It could have been anything.
The run, invoked with --conflict=replace, stopped on a target the user had told it to replace.

The fix

file.mkdir applies the conflict policy exactly as file.link does:

• stop: the target is reported by pre-flight with the others (see Pre-flight under --conflict=stop lists only file targets: a directory target that is occupied is missed, so the refusal is incomplete and the run fails later #831) and the deploy refuses before running
• skip: the directory is not created; the units beneath it are skipped, as a skipped link's would be
• replace: the occupant is archived to the recovery site, the directory is created, and the receipt records the
  archive so compensation can restore it

Acceptance

• file.mkdir over a regular file, a live symlink, and a dangling symlink: each policy produces the outcome in
  the table, with a unit test per cell
• the receipt of a replacing mkdir carries the archive id; compensation restores the occupant
• writ deploy noblefactor --conflict=replace on DANOBLE-WD11-3 gets past file.mkdir-6

Related

#831 — the stop refusal list omits directory targets for the same reason. #813, #814, #818, #819, #820, #821 —
the same machine, the same day.

Ticked 2026-09-21, all three. The third at 06:02 on DANOBLE-WD11-3, build ad2219ef with #900: writ deploy common noblefactor-ops --conflict=replace deployed 56 links, exit 0; C:\Users\david-noble\.config\git, the 2022 symlink, is archived in recovery (01a0c1e9-f911-…) and the path is a directory holding five links. Log: build/e2e/2026-09-21-windows-danoble-wd11-3-lane14-deploy-2.log in the worktree. In
pkg/op/provider/file/provider.go: Mkdir observes the leaf and lets the policy govern a non-directory occupant;
archiveMkdirOccupant discovers, archives, and marks the occupant gone before the claim; the receipt is create_dir
with the recovery id and digest; compensateMakeDir restores through restoreDisplacedOccupant. Tests in
provider_test.go: TestMkdir_Stop_RefusesAnOccupant, TestMkdir_Skip_LeavesAnOccupant,
TestMkdir_Replace_ArchivesAnOccupantAndCreates (a file, a live symlink, a dangling symlink each),
TestMkdir_Replace_CompensationRestoresTheOccupant, TestMkdir_ADirectoryIsNeverAConflict. On
danoble-ud24-1.local, writ deploy common noblefactor-ops --conflict=replace deployed 127 links where 2026-09-18's
run stopped at file.mkdir. Plan: docs/plans/fix/822-mkdir-obeys-conflict.md.