Acceptance Criteria for an Evidence-based Map of AI Vendor Lock-in and Exit Paths: What Must Be Proven

The direct answer

Write a test for “dependencies are mapped to interfaces and owned artifacts” before execution and keep “inventorying vendor names but not proprietary behaviors” as a release-blocking counterexample.

For an evidence-based map of AI vendor lock-in and exit paths, the relevant audience is teams that need to know which models, APIs, data formats, tools, and operating procedures they can move. The decision should cover dependency inventory, contract boundary mapping, data and artifact ownership, interface portability, replacement tests, and exit sequencing. The supplied boundary starts with current stack documentation, vendor contracts, interfaces, data flows, and representative workloads and ends with a portability report describing what the buyer owns, rents, and can replace, presented in reviewable form.

An exit report cannot make an incompatible replacement equivalent or predict every future price, deprecation, legal, or operational change.

Turn each requirement into a proof obligation

The expected deliverable is a portability report describing what the buyer owns, rents, and can replace.

Use current stack documentation, vendor contracts, interfaces, data flows, and representative workloads as the controlled starting material.

The qualified contract reviewer adjudicates every pass, hold, or fail verdict against these registered statements.

Cover more than the happy path

The normal flow should establish whether “dependencies are mapped to interfaces and owned artifacts” holds. An alternate flow should vary a permitted input while testing whether “exported data is test-imported” holds. The failure flow should use a fixture demonstrating “data export tested without import and replay” and verify containment.

Add a recovery flow for “exit costs omitted from prioritization”.

Judge evidence quality and freshness

For an evidence-based map of AI vendor lock-in and exit paths, a result from another environment cannot prove that “representative workloads have replacement fixtures” holds in the buyer's environment.

Define pass, hold, and fail before execution

Keep sign-off independent

The implementer may produce artifacts, but the qualified contract reviewer should judge whether “the exit sequence has rollback points” holds against criteria written before the result was seen.

Record the business decision of the system owner, the technical evidence reviewed by the data owner, the acceptance verdict recorded by the qualified contract reviewer, and residual risk accepted by the system owner.

A screenshot or self-score cannot prove that “the exit sequence has rollback points” holds under the failure condition “contracts summarized without qualified legal review”.

Reopen criteria when the system changes

Changes to dependency inventory, contract boundary mapping, data and artifact ownership, interface portability, replacement tests, and exit sequencing can invalidate a test even when the requirement text stays the same.

How the sources bound the acceptance criteria decision

For an evidence-based map of AI vendor lock-in and exit paths, the live catalog limits the offer to two elements. The supplied boundary is current stack documentation, vendor contracts, interfaces, data flows, and representative workloads. The catalog names the deliverable as a portability report describing what the buyer owns, rents, and can replace. It cannot establish whether “dependencies are mapped to interfaces and owned artifacts” holds in the buyer's environment.

Connect those narrow roles to a local fixture for “assuming an API-shaped interface is semantically portable” rather than treating citation status as a pass.

For an evidence-based map of AI vendor lock-in and exit paths, limit the conclusion to the documented workflow and let the procurement owner retain the current source-to-claim map. The qualified contract reviewer should revisit the acceptance statement “exported data is test-imported” when supporting evidence expires.

Product-specific acceptance criteria review drills

These drills connect an evidence-based map of AI vendor lock-in and exit paths to concrete inputs, failures, acceptance statements, and owners. For an evidence-based map of AI vendor lock-in and exit paths, the drills map each criterion to a reviewable verdict.

Acceptance for an evidence-based map of AI vendor lock-in and exit paths is judged against a boundary record covering current stack documentation, vendor contracts, interfaces, data flows, and representative workloads, never live protected material. The system owner requires synthetic, non-secret cases; messages, writes, state changes, and all other external effects stay inside the fixture throughout and after each case.

Requirement trace

Begin with the adverse condition “inventorying vendor names but not proprietary behaviors”. During the acceptance criteria review, the system owner locates its first observable effect inside dependency inventory, contract boundary mapping, data and artifact ownership, interface portability, replacement tests, and exit sequencing.

Ask the procurement owner to reproduce evidence for “representative workloads have replacement fixtures” within the documented boundary covering current stack documentation, vendor contracts, interfaces, data flows, and representative workloads. An unrepeatable result remains an open condition.

The qualified contract reviewer compares the result with “representative workloads have replacement fixtures” and records one bounded outcome. Unresolved scope cannot be converted into a pass. In the requirement trace review, evidence for “representative workloads have replacement fixtures” maps support to pass, contradiction to fail, and unresolved to hold.

The system owner repeats the drill after a material change to the fixture, workflow, or evidence used to judge whether “representative workloads have replacement fixtures” holds.

Normal-flow result

Exercise the normal-flow result review against the known risk “assuming an API-shaped interface is semantically portable”. Ask the procurement owner to mark the earliest point where the expected handoff diverges.

Create a versioned boundary record covering current stack documentation, vendor contracts, interfaces, data flows, and representative workloads, then test whether “the exit sequence has rollback points” holds; keep the case result with its exact input identity.

The qualified contract reviewer records whether the criterion “the exit sequence has rollback points” is supported, contradicted, or unresolved. It grants no broader status to a portability report describing what the buyer owns, rents, and can replace. In the normal-flow result review, evidence for “the exit sequence has rollback points” maps support to pass, contradiction to fail, and unresolved to hold.

Do not reuse the disposition when the failure case “assuming an API-shaped interface is semantically portable” occurs under conditions outside the recorded input and authority boundary.

Alternate-flow result

During the alternate-flow result review, reproduce a safe case involving “data export tested without import and replay”. The data owner records what remains observable before the next role acts.

Anchor the drill in a current scope record covering current stack documentation, vendor contracts, interfaces, data flows, and representative workloads and ask for evidence that “exported data is test-imported” holds. A missing artifact leaves the alternate-flow result review on hold.

The qualified contract reviewer limits acceptance to “exported data is test-imported” and nothing beyond it, leaving a named hold for any unsupported part of a portability report describing what the buyer owns, rents, and can replace. In the alternate-flow result review, evidence for “exported data is test-imported” maps support to pass, contradiction to fail, and unresolved to hold.

Retest this decision when the team changes dependency inventory, contract boundary mapping, data and artifact ownership, interface portability, replacement tests, and exit sequencing or can no longer reproduce the record for “exported data is test-imported”.

Failure-flow result

Represent the failure case “exit costs omitted from prioritization” explicitly in the failure-flow result review. The platform engineer captures the relevant input, action, and residual condition.

Use an authorized test case within the boundary covering current stack documentation, vendor contracts, interfaces, data flows, and representative workloads to establish whether “gaps and switching costs are explicit” holds. Record configuration and reviewer identity beside the result.

The qualified contract reviewer advances the record only when it can demonstrate “gaps and switching costs are explicit”. If evidence conflicts, the qualified contract reviewer records fail and preserves the prior state. In the failure-flow result review, evidence for “gaps and switching costs are explicit” maps support to pass, contradiction to fail, and unresolved to hold.

Do not carry this verdict into a changed workflow, input class, or response to “exit costs omitted from prioritization”; create a new bounded record.

Independent verdict

Test the boundary of the independent verdict review with an authorized fixture showing “contracts summarized without qualified legal review”. The system owner marks where evidence ends and escalation begins.

The system owner checks a versioned boundary record covering current stack documentation, vendor contracts, interfaces, data flows, and representative workloads for “dependencies are mapped to interfaces and owned artifacts”. A result from different conditions cannot close this drill.

The qualified contract reviewer bases the outcome for the independent verdict review on “dependencies are mapped to interfaces and owned artifacts” and keeps a portability report describing what the buyer owns, rents, and can replace bounded to that finding. In the independent verdict review, evidence for “dependencies are mapped to interfaces and owned artifacts” maps support to pass, contradiction to fail, and unresolved to hold.

Repeat the judgment when the workflow boundary for dependency inventory, contract boundary mapping, data and artifact ownership, interface portability, replacement tests, and exit sequencing adds a new handoff or removes the rollback state used in the test.

Evidence expiry

Make the observed condition “inventorying vendor names but not proprietary behaviors” the opening evidence for the evidence expiry review. The system owner observes the current handoff and preserves its authority boundary.

Review the scope record covering current stack documentation, vendor contracts, interfaces, data flows, and representative workloads under its recorded authority and evaluate whether “representative workloads have replacement fixtures” holds. The procurement owner owns the evidence gap.

The qualified contract reviewer makes the disposition answer whether “representative workloads have replacement fixtures” holds. A missing answer makes the qualified contract reviewer keep a portability report describing what the buyer owns, rents, and can replace outside the accepted state. In the evidence expiry review, evidence for “representative workloads have replacement fixtures” maps support to pass, contradiction to fail, and unresolved to hold.

An altered input source, acceptance owner, or response to “inventorying vendor names but not proprietary behaviors” invalidates only this drill and its dependent decisions.

Frequently asked question

What acceptance criteria should I use for Vendor Exit Audit?

Require observable evidence that dependencies are mapped to interfaces and owned artifacts and include “inventorying vendor names but not proprietary behaviors” as a negative case. The qualified contract reviewer should record pass, hold, or fail before expansion.

A product bridge, with a boundary

The Vendor Exit Audit is the relevant sincLLM offer for this narrow problem. The frozen live catalog describes its required boundary as current stack documentation, vendor contracts, interfaces, data flows, and representative workloads and its deliverable as a portability report describing what the buyer owns, rents, and can replace. That catalog statement defines the offer and does not establish buyer-specific fit, technical sufficiency, legal compliance, safety, or business results.