Block refcounting (atomic refs + condemned flag) lets live queries
survive concurrent compaction and retention. Levelled compactor merges
2h->8h->32h blocks via raw chunk passthrough. Retention drops blocks
older than the configured window. Background goroutine drives
flush/compact/retain cycles; exported RunCompaction/ApplyRetention allow
deterministic test control via injectable clock.
Soak test: 10k series x 48h simulated at 15s intervals (115M samples).
Validates flat memory (158 MiB peak), bounded disk (13 blocks), and zero
query errors during compaction.
All existing tests refactored to table-driven with uniform assertions.
Label matchers (equal, not-equal, regexp, not-regexp) in labels/,
postings intersection/union/difference in internal/postings/,
LabelValues and AllPostings on index, block, and head readers.
ingot.go wired to real DB backed by head + block readers. Querier
snapshots overlapping blocks, Select resolves matchers to postings,
merged iterator chains blocks then head with block-wins dedup.
Oracle tests compare every query against a naive []sample reference
across head-only, block-only, head+block merge seam, multiple blocks,
all four matcher types, and time range filtering.
david