A seatbelt for database writes.
WriteLeash is a database-safety research project exploring how dangerous data mutations can be reviewed, bounded and recovered instead of giving automation effectively unlimited write authority. Its commercial products apply these principles to real workflows.
The core research thesis is simple:
Writes consume authority.
WriteLeash for WooCommerce is the first commercial product built from these principles.
Database write permission is usually binary: a credential that may change one row may also change every row. WriteLeash research asks:
If an actor has database WRITE permission, how much mutation authority should it be allowed to consume?
The research explores making dangerous database mutation authority finite, measurable, reviewable, bounded, and resistant to accidental or automated blast radius. Motivation includes dangerous writes caused by automation, repair scripts, operators, workflow engines, AI agents, and other semi-trusted database writers.
The strategic principle remains:
Invariant > Correctness > Bypass Resistance > Features.
This track covers mutation budgets, bounded mutation authority, PostgreSQL/native experiments, database safety research, state-transition and numeric-delta research, and advanced Guard mechanisms.
Status: RESEARCH — NOT A PRODUCTION-READY DATABASE SECURITY CONTROL AND NOT A RELEASED POSTGRESQL SECURITY PRODUCT. The PostgreSQL/native work remains research: its evidence is limited to demonstrated and tested environments. See the support matrix for the exact tested envelope and open limitations.
Research locations:
- docs/spec.md — intended PostgreSQL research semantics
- docs/product.md — the PostgreSQL research thesis
- docs/postgresql-research.md — research overview and local demos
- docs/support-matrix.md — tested envelope, limitations and status
- docs/mutation-budget.md — mutation-budget design notes
- experiments/ — experiment record, including the native transaction-state work
- sql/ — research SQL
- ./writeleash — local research CLI (
doctor,demo,protect-update)
Bulk price changes without blindly overwriting newer edits.
WriteLeash for WooCommerce is the first commercial product derived from the WriteLeash research program. It is a merchant product for store owners, Shop Managers, catalog operators and agencies/freelancers:
WriteLeash helps store owners, Shop Managers, catalog operators and agencies update Regular Price or Sale Price across simple products and variable-product variations. Select by product name, SKU or category, then Preview the exact before/after prices for up to 1,000 products in one job.
Apply the Preview you reviewed. Work runs in the background; if a relevant price or checked product setting changed after Preview, WriteLeash preserves the newer edit and marks that item as a conflict. Items with invalid prices or unsupported settings show a reason and are skipped while clean work continues where safe. Resume interrupted work, review results in History, and Undo eligible changes when the current product state still allows restoration.
The product applies principles shared with the research — reviewed intent before mutation, a bounded target population, re-checking before mutation, preserving newer state, conflict instead of blind overwrite, and recoverability — but it does not implement the PostgreSQL/native mutation-budget mechanism. It is not a database security control.
- Install and activate WooCommerce within the supported versions.
- Install and activate the WriteLeash plugin ZIP.
- Open Products → Bulk Prices.
- Select products, choose Regular Price or Sale Price, and Preview the change.
- Review exact prices and warnings, then approve and Apply. Use Resume if work is interrupted; review History and eligible Undo afterward.
For installation requirements, supported price operations and limitations, see
the plugin listing. This repository is
preparing the public plugin submission; it does not announce a WordPress.org
listing or a published download. Plugin source is in
wordpress/writeleash/.
WriteLeash changes prices, not stock, orders or sale dates. Selecting a variable parent targets its variations; you can also select individual variations. Undo is conditional: a later relevant edit is preserved rather than overwritten. Multisite is unsupported. Managed and shared hosting have not been tested.
These static screenshots show real product screens with sample products.
Preview exact before/after prices before approving.
Preserve a newer edit and see why that item was skipped.
Review History and which changes are eligible for Undo.
These examples show Regular Price and Sale Price changes. Sale Price changes and variations are supported as described in the plugin listing.
For source changes and existing checks, read CONTRIBUTING.md. Report suspected vulnerabilities privately as described in SECURITY.md. Use GitHub issues for non-sensitive questions and bug reports, without customer data or secrets.
The WordPress plugin is GPL-2.0-or-later; see its license. The rest of the repository has no selected repository-wide open-source license; see repository license status.