generator: emitted JSON output HTML-escapes & < > (SetEscapeHTML not disabled)

[rvdlaar]

Filed by /printing-press-retro from a run of GitHub Contents (scorecard 89/100, 94% verify pass, full live dogfood 99/99, printed with cli-printing-press v4.28.0).

Summary

Emitted JSON output helpers use Go's default encoder HTML-escaping, so &, <, > render as \u0026 etc. Valid JSON, but URL-bearing payloads (e.g. download_url fields with query params) become confusing for humans and break naive string-matching by agents. Output goes to a terminal or pipe, never an HTML context.

Where to look

• Component: generator
• Likely area: output-helper templates (the emitted JSON writers behind --json/printJSONFiltered)
• Triggered when: any payload containing &/</> — most APIs with URLs

What we observed

• plan/endpoint outputs on this print render & in GitHub URLs as \u0026 (flagged by the run's agentic output review; classified generator-side because the helpers are emitted DO NOT EDIT).
• Same helpers present in huggingface, plaud, openrouter prints.

Suggested direction

enc.SetEscapeHTML(false) on the emitted JSON encoders (terminal/file writers only — there is no HTML embedding context in a printed CLI).

Acceptance criteria

• positive: a value a&b<c> round-trips verbatim in --json output
• negative: none identified (no HTML sink exists)

Frequency

every API

Complexity

small

Related issues

None.

Artifacts

Upload to catbox.moe failed ("Invalid uploader"). Scrubbed zips preserved locally in the printer's run proofs: manuscripts/github-contents/20260710-125244-1a986992/proofs/github-contents-{manuscripts,cli-source}.zip. Retro doc: same directory, 20260711-021500-retro-github-contents-pp-cli.md.

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Generated by /printing-press-retro · CLI Printing Press