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13. Sony's help text stays private

  • Date: 2026-11-01; changed 2026-11-03
  • Status: accepted
  • Rule: The camera's own help text is Sony's: kept for private use and never published; the proof viewer, which shows it, stays local.

Context

The kit reads the camera's In-Camera Guide text per item and option off the camera, for private use; it is Sony's.

Decision

It is kept in one's own private/help/, never in a definition, a data file or the docs. A definition's help fields hold the project's own words (data/<model>_fw<fw>/help_<model>_fw<fw>.json), and the editor and the proof viewer show the private text in their place where they find it. The proof viewer, which shows it, stays local.

Before 2026-11-03 the schema carried that text itself, stripped before anything was published.

Consequences

The published definitions and the .ksy carry no help text of Sony's, and kit/tools/check_public.py refuses a commit whose help text stays too close to the camera's own, as far as the clone's private/help/ lets it compare.

See also: decision 18 (the private overlay) and RELEASING (what the project publishes under the SDK's terms).