Shift from pattern abstraction (creating new nodes) to distillation
(refining existing nodes, demoting redundancies). Priority order:
merge redundancies > file into existing > improve existing > create new.
Query changed to neighborhood-aware: seed → spread → limit, so the
extractor works on related nodes rather than random high-priority ones.
Three places duplicated the agent execution loop (build prompt → call
LLM → store output → parse actions → record visits): consolidate.rs,
knowledge.rs, and daemon.rs. Extract into run_one_agent() in
knowledge.rs that all three now call.
Also standardize consolidation agent prompts to use WRITE_NODE/LINK/REFINE
— the same commands the parser handles. Previously agents output
CATEGORIZE/NOTE/EXTRACT/DIGEST/DIFFERENTIATE/MERGE/COMPRESS which were
silently dropped after the second-LLM-call removal.
The four knowledge agents (observation, extractor, connector,
challenger) were hardcoded in knowledge.rs with their own node
selection logic that bypassed the query pipeline and visit tracking.
Now they're .agent files like the consolidation agents:
- extractor: not-visited:extractor,7d | sort:priority | limit:20
- observation: uses new {{CONVERSATIONS}} placeholder
- connector: type:semantic | not-visited:connector,7d
- challenger: type:semantic | not-visited:challenger,14d
The knowledge loop's run_cycle dispatches through defs::run_agent
instead of calling hardcoded functions, so all agents get visit
tracking automatically. This means the extractor now sees _facts-*
and _mined-transcripts nodes that it was previously blind to.
~200 lines of dead code removed (old runner functions, spectral
clustering for node selection, per-agent LLM dispatch).
New placeholders in defs.rs:
- {{CONVERSATIONS}} — raw transcript fragments for observation agent
- {{TARGETS}} — alias for {{NODES}} (challenger compatibility)
Co-Authored-By: Kent Overstreet <kent.overstreet@linux.dev>
Replace the formatter dispatch with a generic {{placeholder}} lookup
system. Placeholders in prompt templates are resolved at runtime from
a table: topology, nodes, episodes, health, pairs, rename, split.
The query in the header selects what to operate on (keys for visit
tracking); placeholders pull in formatted context. Placeholders that
produce their own node selection (pairs, rename) contribute keys back.
Port health, separator, rename, and split agents to .agent files.
All 7 agents now use the config-driven path.
Each agent is a .agent file: JSON config on the first line, blank line,
then the raw prompt markdown. Fully self-contained, fully readable.
No separate template files needed.
Agents dir: checked into repo at poc-memory/agents/. Code looks there
first (via CARGO_MANIFEST_DIR), falls back to ~/.claude/memory/agents/.
Three agents migrated: replay, linker, transfer.
Co-Authored-By: ProofOfConcept <poc@bcachefs.org>
