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Follow-up to #11691 — item 2 from #11687, plus a related shortcut. ## What When the `minimumReleaseAge` lockfile verification gate needs to know when a version was published, it used to fetch a multi-MB full metadata document per package just to read one timestamp. This PR replaces that single-step path with a four-layer lookup that pays the cheapest viable source first: 1. **Abbreviated metadata's `modified` field** — the resolver already fetches this for resolution. If the package as a whole hasn't been modified within the policy cutoff, every version it contains is at least that old; return `modified` as a conservative upper-bound and skip the rest of the chain. 2. **Local `FULL_META_DIR` mirror** — exact per-version times if a previous verification populated it. 3. **npm attestation endpoint** (`/-/npm/v1/attestations/<name>@<version>`) — a tens-of-KB Sigstore bundle whose Rekor inclusion time stands in for publish time. Wins on cold cache when the package was published with provenance. 4. **Full metadata fetch** — last resort. ## Why The verification cache from #11691 made repeat installs against an unchanged lockfile effectively free. The remaining cost is the *first* verification on a fresh CI runner with no restored cache — particularly `pnpm install --frozen-lockfile`, where every locked package's publish timestamp has to be confirmed. Fetching the full metadata document for each package is wasteful when: - The resolver has usually already cached abbreviated metadata, whose `modified` field alone is enough to clear stable packages (the common case). - For recently-modified packages, the per-version attestation endpoint is orders of magnitude smaller than full metadata. ## How ### Abbreviated `modified` shortcut `fetchFullMetadataCached` is refactored to share an internal helper with a new `fetchAbbreviatedMetadataCached`. Both do conditional GETs against their respective on-disk mirrors. On a non-frozen install the abbreviated mirror is already populated by the resolver, so the shortcut hits the local cache at headers-only cost. On `--frozen-lockfile` the fetch is still cheaper than full metadata. If `Date.parse(modified) < cutoff`, return `modified` — it's an upper bound on every version's publish time in this package, and the verifier's `published < cutoff` check passes trivially. ### Attestation endpoint `fetchAttestationPublishedAt` (new module) hits `/-/npm/v1/attestations/<name>@<version>`, parses the response, and reads the earliest `bundle.verificationMaterial.tlogEntries[].integratedTime` across the attestation bundles. That's the Rekor inclusion time — a couple of seconds after publish, well within tolerance for a policy that operates in minutes/hours/days. Returns `undefined` on 404 / network error / malformed body so the caller falls back. ### Per-install dedup The lookup carries a `PublishedAtLookupContext` with four memo maps: abbreviated meta per (registry, name), local full meta per (registry, name), full meta network fetch per (registry, name), final published-at per (registry, name, version). Verifying many versions of the same package only pays the disk/network costs once. ## Trust model **No Sigstore signature verification on the attestation path.** The trust model is identical to reading the registry's `time` field on the full metadata document — we already trust the registry to serve correct publish timestamps for the gate's purpose. The win is purely bandwidth. Full Sigstore verification (Fulcio cert chain + Rekor inclusion proof) would harden the timestamp against a compromised registry. It pulls in the `sigstore` npm package and the TUF root — a separate dependency-surface discussion, parked as future work. ## Tests - **13 unit tests** in `resolving/npm-resolver/test/fetchAttestationPublishedAt.test.ts`: ISO timestamp extraction, URL construction (scoped + unscoped), 404 / 5xx / network error / malformed JSON / missing fields → undefined, earliest-of-multiple-attestations, defensive number-as-integratedTime, auth header forwarding, trailing-slash normalization. - Existing `minimumReleaseAge` + `verifyLockfileResolutions` integration suites (45 tests) still pass — the fallback chain preserves end-to-end behavior when the new shortcuts don't apply.