methodology

What SIGNALWATCH treats as real,
derived, simulated, or conceptual.

The system is designed to feel useful without pretending to know more than it does. This page explains the difference between real source data, summaries built from sources, app health readings, and educational examples.

plain glossary
real AI source data
from sources

Research papers, product releases, policy updates, safety posts, and forum discussions are collected with links and timestamps before they appear in the interface.

trace / arXiv
trace / Anthropic / OpenAI releases
trace / Alignment Forum / LessWrong
trace / safety registry with sources
summaries from real sources
computed from sources

Higher-level context is built from source activity, repeated topics, overlapping sources, time windows, and source links. It is not invented headline generation.

trace / source overlap
trace / tag frequency
trace / observation windows
trace / source traceability
system health readings
runtime state

System health readings describe whether SIGNALWATCH itself is connected and responding. Latency, collector health, reconnects, and heartbeats describe the app, not facts about the AI industry.

trace / collector latency
trace / websocket heartbeat
trace / retry counters
trace / system pressure
conceptual demos
labeled education

Alignment and oversight demos are clearly marked as conceptual. They explain mechanisms such as proxy objectives or oversight gaps without making claims about specific deployed systems.

trace / alignment sandbox
trace / oversight gap
trace / reward hacking toy model
browser-side perception
real model outputs

Computer vision confidence, detection boxes, frame history, replay, and missing detections come from browser-side COCO-SSD outputs. Missing detections remain missing.

trace / webcam inference
trace / upload inference
trace / evidence packet
trace / confidence history
case-study records
reproducible protocols

Robustness case studies define setup, degradation, observation, operational implication, and evidence requirements. They do not ship with prefilled conclusions.

trace / low-light protocol
trace / occlusion protocol
trace / compression protocol
trace / motion protocol
claim boundary
credibility rule

SIGNALWATCH separates real data, derived context, conceptual explanation, and infrastructure telemetry so the interface can stay alive without fabricating intelligence.

trace / source registry
trace / source labels
trace / evidence trail
trace / unavailable states
methodology visual legend
context stays separate from evidence
source photo
context only

A real attributed image used to show operating conditions.

generated context
not telemetry

A project image created to explain infrastructure or system concepts.

diagram
not measurement

A conceptual map that explains relationships or method boundaries.

model output
evidence only when run

Detections, confidence, empty frames, or traces emitted by a real model run.

method boundary image gallery
illustrative photos / not model evidence

The methodology separates visual context from evidence. These images make the boundary concrete: a scene can explain why an evaluation matters, but detections, confidence, continuity, and operational claims still have to come from actual source data or model outputs.

visual role
operational context
source status
externally attributed
evidence boundary
not inference output
operational rule
real data stays traceable / missing data stays visible
Claims about AI

Must come from a real source or from activity collected from real sources.

Model confidence

Must come from actual browser-side inference outputs.

Case studies

Must be reproducible from protocols and evidence packets, not prewritten analytics.

Observation windows

Must describe timestamped collection, source overlap, recurrence, or model-output history.

methodology unavailable states
absence is observable / absence is not guessed
model unavailable
perception lab

If browser-side inference cannot load, detections remain unavailable instead of simulated.

no detections emitted
model output

Empty frames are recorded as empty frames; no bounding boxes or confidence values are fabricated.

collector offline
source ingestion

Source health reports offline or delayed states directly through collector telemetry.

insufficient window
evaluation

Temporal claims wait until a real observation window has enough frames or source events.

packet not exported
evidence packet

The interface can show the export schema without pretending an evidence packet exists.

source missing
provenance

A claim without a usable source trace should stay unresolved, not become narrative filler.

Evidence loop diagram showing real-world input, model behavior, observed facts, and monitoring action.
plain-language guide

How LLM training fits this system

SIGNALWATCH monitors what happens after models are trained: real sources, outputs, failures, and source trails. The LLM guide explains the training path in simple terms.

open LLM guide