Phase 2 of the Wine/Proton stage (decisions 3, 4, 16, 17, 19 in docs/testing/wine-proton.md): replace the Wine manager's startup snapshot with a live settings source read once per poll, so accepted global settings take effect with no reader restart. The source publishes only the active/global profile's Wine values; per-application profile switching never changes the governing list. A newly listed running program restarts its helper once in the same mode; removals and clearing the global switch never downgrade a running helper.
Phase 1 of the Wine/Proton stage (decisions 2, 5, 16, 17, 18, 24 in docs/testing/wine-proton.md): classify the helper exclusion-count line as info, parse the ready hook_exclusions count, mirror programs=[...] extra=[...] in the helper-start record, and stop passing prefix-wide --no-dialog-reader merely because a listed program is present, so ordinary programs in a mixed prefix keep dialog reading. Wholesale mode remains for the global controller-only switch, the environment override, and helpers whose ready record does not confirm the exclusions sent; unconfirmed binaries are remembered. A newly listed running program restarts its helper once in the same mode; removals never downgrade.