Concepts
Policy and observability
The two pieces that make role-model more than a model picker: explicit routing policy and inspectable runtime evidence.
Role-model is not only about choosing a model-serving endpoint. It is also about making that choice constrained and inspectable.
Policy
Routing policy gives the router explicit knobs for:
- strategy
- locality preferences
- capability and modality requirements
- tool requirements
- endpoint or provider allow and deny lists
- budget and privacy constraints
That lets operators express hard limits and optimization intent instead of burying them in ad hoc code.
Observability
The runtime can emit artifacts such as:
RouterDecision- trace spans and events
- usage events
- observed performance profiles
Together these make routing reviewable after the fact.
Why these two belong together
Policy without observability becomes opaque configuration.
Observability without policy becomes a post-hoc explanation of behavior you never constrained properly.
Role-model treats both as first-class parts of the routing contract.