diff --git a/.github/workflows/release-validation.yml b/.github/workflows/release-validation.yml
index cfa447319..375ff4dfa 100644
--- a/.github/workflows/release-validation.yml
+++ b/.github/workflows/release-validation.yml
@@ -52,7 +52,7 @@ permissions:
 
 jobs:
   build-artifacts:
-    name: build-artifacts
+    name: "Release Validation / build-artifacts"
     runs-on: ubuntu-latest
     timeout-minutes: 20
     outputs:
@@ -133,7 +133,7 @@ jobs:
           retention-days: 14
 
   install-and-smoke:
-    name: install-and-smoke
+    name: "Release Validation / install-and-smoke"
     needs: build-artifacts
     runs-on: ubuntu-latest
     timeout-minutes: 10
diff --git a/.pre-commit-config.yaml b/.pre-commit-config.yaml
index 9450bab75..472ccd441 100644
--- a/.pre-commit-config.yaml
+++ b/.pre-commit-config.yaml
@@ -32,8 +32,17 @@ repos:
     rev: v4.5.0
     hooks:
       - id: trailing-whitespace
-      # ensures files are either empty or end with a blank line
+        # burr/examples is a symlink. trailing-whitespace would mangle the
+        # link target text (treating "../examples" as a "trailing whitespace"
+        # situation) and break the symlink.
+        exclude: '^burr/examples$'
+      # ensures files are either empty or end with a blank line.
+      # NOTE: burr/examples is excluded — end-of-file-fixer will append "\n"
+      # to the symlink target turning "../examples" into "../examples\n",
+      # which makes the symlink unresolvable on strict consumers (Apache RAT
+      # and several Linux tarball extractors). See PR #748.
       - id: end-of-file-fixer
+        exclude: '^burr/examples$'
       # sorts requirements
       - id: requirements-txt-fixer
       # valid python file
diff --git a/burr/examples b/burr/examples
index beeced1f9..a6573af9c 120000
--- a/burr/examples
+++ b/burr/examples
@@ -1 +1 @@
-../examples
+../examples
\ No newline at end of file
diff --git a/scripts/verify_apache_artifacts.py b/scripts/verify_apache_artifacts.py
index 54350deb5..1939f7242 100755
--- a/scripts/verify_apache_artifacts.py
+++ b/scripts/verify_apache_artifacts.py
@@ -318,7 +318,15 @@ def _check_licenses_with_rat(
                 )
 
             if result.returncode != 0:
-                print(f"    ⚠️  RAT exited with code {result.returncode}")
+                # A nonzero exit means RAT crashed mid-scan (e.g. on a broken
+                # symlink). The XML report it produced will be truncated and
+                # parsing it gives a falsely clean result, so fail hard here.
+                print(f"    ✗ RAT exited with code {result.returncode}")
+                if result.stderr:
+                    print("    --- RAT stderr ---")
+                    for line in result.stderr.splitlines()[-25:]:
+                        print(f"      {line}")
+                return False
 
             print(f"    ✓ RAT XML report: {rat_report_xml}")
         except Exception as e: