The ledger in verification_evidence.db exists only to feed the verify-on-stop
guard, but the recorder kept running on every foreground terminal command and
every file edit after #53552 turned the guard off by default. Users who never
opted in still accumulated a multi-MB database (7 MB / 4.6k rows on one install).
Every ledger entry point (record_terminal_result, record_verify_run,
mark_workspace_edited, verification_status) now checks verify_on_stop_enabled()
first and returns without opening or creating the database when the guard is
off. verification_status reports {"status": "disabled"} in that case; no client
consumes the verification.status RPC yet, so nothing downstream changes.
Existing ledger tests pin HERMES_VERIFY_ON_STOP=1 since they exercise the ledger
itself; the new test proves the off path never creates the file (red on base).
Teknium
06dc51d62d