Xerg surfaces seven named finding kinds today. Two are confirmed waste, three are workflow opportunities, and two are Cursor-specific usage opportunities. For the conceptual view of how these categories are meant to be interpreted, see waste taxonomy.Documentation Index
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Finding taxonomy
| Kind | Terminal label | Classification | Confidence | Meaning |
|---|---|---|---|---|
retry-waste | Retry waste | waste | high | Failed calls were followed by more work, so that spend is pure retry overhead. |
loop-waste | Loop waste | waste | high | A run reached at least 7 iterations, and spend after iteration 5 is treated as likely loop waste. |
context-outlier | Context bloat | opportunity | medium | A workflow with at least 3 runs had one or more runs whose input token volume was far above its own baseline. |
idle-spend | Idle waste | opportunity | medium | A workflow name looks like a recurring heartbeat, cron, monitor, or poll loop. |
candidate-downgrade | Downgrade candidates | opportunity | low | An expensive model appears to be used on a simple operational workflow. Treat this as an A/B test candidate. |
cache-carryover | Cache carryover | waste | medium | A long Cursor session is carrying too much stale cached context forward. |
max-mode-concentration | Max mode concentration | opportunity | medium | Cursor is leaning too heavily on max mode rather than escalating selectively. |
What counts as confirmed waste
Onlyretry-waste and loop-waste count toward:
wasteSpendUsdstructuralWasteRate--fail-above-waste-rate--fail-above-waste-usd
opportunitySpendUsd and are shown as directional savings opportunities.
Recommendation objects
When you runxerg audit --json, Xerg includes a ranked recommendations array derived from the findings. The same recommendation objects are now part of the v2 push payload as well.
| Field | Meaning |
|---|---|
id | Stable recommendation id |
findingId | The finding this recommendation came from |
kind | The source finding kind |
title | Human-readable next step |
summary | Why this recommendation exists |
priorityBucket | fix_now, test_next, or watch |
recommendedOrder | Rank within this audit after bucket and savings sorting |
implementationSurface | Where the fix lives, such as retry_policy, model_routing, or user_behavior |
category | structural_efficiency, model_fit, context_hygiene, cadence_activity, or other |
severity | high, medium, or low |
estimatedSavingsUsd | Expected dollar impact |
estimatedSavingsPct | Expected impact as a share of total spend |
confidence | high, medium, or low |
effort | low, medium, or high |
scope | workspace, source, or workflow |
scopeId | Stable scope identifier used for recommendation identity |
scopeLabel | Display-ready label for the scope |
whereToChange | Operator-facing guidance on where the change belongs |
validationPlan | Compare-aware instructions for proving the result |
actions | 2–3 concrete action bullets |
Current recommendation patterns
| Finding kind | Bucket | Typical action | | --- | --- | |retry-waste | fix_now | add retry backoff or lower retry count |
| loop-waste | fix_now | cap iteration depth or add an early exit |
| context-outlier | test_next | trim prompt or context size |
| idle-spend | test_next | reduce cadence or switch to event-driven work |
| candidate-downgrade | test_next | A/B test a cheaper model |
| cache-carryover | test_next | reset or summarize long Cursor chats |
| max-mode-concentration | test_next | reserve max mode for the hardest Cursor turns |
What not to overread
- Opportunity findings are directional recommendations, not proven waste.
- A
candidate-downgradefinding is intentionally low-confidence and should be treated as an experiment, not an automatic downgrade order. - Cost per outcome is intentionally unavailable in v0.