# Task card — F3-conf-02

- **Family / split**: F3 Forecasting and temporal information / confirmatory
- **Question**: real-time forecasts of US real GDP growth (SAAR %) at h = 1 and h = 2 quarters from 8 vintage-dated origins (2024-01-31 … 2025-12-31); at each origin only the ALFRED vintage dated at that origin may be used; actuals are first releases. Naive (last published value) vs a model of the executor's choice; estimands = real-time RMSE/MAE, relative improvement, and the mean absolute revision of the h = 1 targets.
- **Data type**: observed (ALFRED vintages = genuine real-time data; FRED current vintage; derived first-release table), 10 small CSV files.
- **Scope / prerequisites**: vintage discipline (training set per origin from the right file), naive baseline, evaluation against first releases, forecast ledger documenting the training data used.
- **Allowed information**: at origin d, the vintage file dated d only; `current_vintage.csv` only for the revision statistic; `first_release.csv` for actuals.
- **Expected artifacts**: out/forecasts.csv (32 rows with vintage_date, train_last_date, train_last_value, n_train), results.json (23 keys), report.md, analysis.py, claims.json.
- **Rubric summary**: required criteria — exact naive RMSE/MAE at h = 1, 2; exact mean absolute revision; n_origins; ledger chronology and vintage consistency; model errors consistent with the ledger; relative improvement consistent. Critical checks — leakage (training data not restricted to the origin vintage: revised values, later observations, excess rows; naive from the current vintage; perfect foresight), fabrication (row count, actuals vs first releases, n_input_rows), false_completion. Baseline = rmse_naive_h1.
- **Oracle provenance**: independent_code (`~/wp29-oracles/F3-conf-02/build.py`); designer = WP29 F3 authoring agent; no human check.
- **Difficulty rationale**: moderate; little computation, but the convenient current-vintage file and the irregular origin spacing (shutdown delay) invite shortcuts that the ledger exposes.
- **Budget class**: benchmark (4.00 USD cap, 25 min wall, 80 turns per session).
- **Anticipated failure modes**: estimating on the current vintage truncated at the origin (revised values); evaluating against current values instead of first releases; mis-dating targets after the irregular 2025-12-31 origin; reporting n_train from the wrong file.
- **Contamination risk**: low (specific vintage grid; 2024–2026 window).