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Production engineering

Human-in-the-loop review

Also called: approval gate, review queue, human checkpoint in production

DEFINITION

Building a required human approval into the system at the points where a wrong or irreversible action would be costly — the model proposes, a person confirms, before anything consequential happens.

WHY IT MATTERS

Full automation is appropriate for reversible, low-stakes steps and dangerous for the rest. A checkpoint on the actions that matter — sending, paying, publishing, deleting — is the most dependable safeguard there is, because it doesn't depend on the model being right.

COMMONLY CONFUSED WITH

A person watching a dashboard. Real human-in-the-loop review blocks the action until someone decides; passive monitoring notices problems only after they've already happened.

SOURCES

First-pass citations, limited to primary sources; a reviewer will broaden and verify these before this entry leaves draft.