Memory Remember Pattern

Pattern: Tiered-Remember-After-Act

Record learnings to ruvector memory after workflow completion, with signal strength determining whether to record automatically, prompt the user, or skip.

What It Does

Calls hooks_remember against the ruvector MCP server at workflow end, with content classified by signal strength (Auto/Prompted/Skip) per plugin and event type. Includes a near-duplicate dedup check (score > 0.82) and quality gates on content length and structure.

When to Use

When authoring a command that produces durable insight worth surfacing in future sessions — root causes, security findings, novel solutions, decision rationale. Skip for low-signal events (status checks, passing tests, plan context already captured in files).

Usage

Replica of canonical source. The protocol constants in this pattern (dedup top_k=1, score > 0.82) are owned by plugins/yellow-ruvector/skills/memory-query/SKILL.md (yellow-ruvector owns the MCP tools); this yellow-core file is a marked replica, kept inline because cross-plugin skills: preload is unavailable (claude-code#15944). The RULE 16 drift lint in scripts/validate-agent-authoring.js enforces the sentinel line below byte-for-byte across the canonical file and all replicas. RULE 16 checks ONLY the sentinel line — the tier/dedup steps below restate the same constants and must be swept manually on any change. When editing inside the yellow-plugins monorepo, to change a constant start at the canonical file — never edit a replica alone; the other replicas are plugins/yellow-core/skills/memory-recall-pattern/SKILL.md and plugins/yellow-core/skills/mcp-integration-patterns/SKILL.md. (Outside this monorepo, treat the sentinel line as authoritative; the canonical file may not be installed.)

Consuming command files adapt the tier rules and dedup strategy inline as context-specific paraphrases, so they are exempt from RULE 16's byte-identity check (the containment scan still covers them) — on any constant or tier-rule change, sweep them manually: plugins/yellow-core/commands/flow/review.md, plugins/yellow-core/commands/flow/compound.md, plugins/yellow-core/commands/flow/work.md, plugins/yellow-review/commands/review/review-pr.md (and plugins/yellow-review/references/review-pr/knowledge-compounding.md), plugins/yellow-review/commands/review/review-all.md, and plugins/yellow-ruvector/commands/ruvector/learn.md (KNOWN DRIFT: carries no protocol constants and lacks the recall-based dedup its purpose implies — open maintainer question; do not silently "fix").

(plugins/yellow-core/commands/flow/brainstorm.md, plan.md, spec.md, plugins/yellow-review/commands/review/resolve-pr.md, and plugins/yellow-ruvector/commands/ruvector/memory.md are recall-only — they never call hooks_remember; see the memory-recall-pattern skill's sweep list instead.)

Protocol sentinel (RULE 16, byte-identical in every copy):

ruvector-protocol-constants v1: recall top_k=5, discard score < 0.5, keep top 3, truncate 800 chars at word boundary; dedup top_k=1, skip if score > 0.82.

Signal Classification Table

Classification by plugin and event type:

Quality Requirements

All remembered content must meet these gates:

• Length: 20+ words
• Structure (all three required):
  • Context: What was built/fixed and where (file paths, commands)
  • Insight: Why a key decision was made or what failed
  • Action: Concrete steps for a future agent in the same situation
• Specificity: Name concrete files, commands, or error messages. "Fixed CRLF in hooks.sh by running sed -i 's/\r$//'" not "Fixed a bug"

Type Guidance

Deduplication Check

Before storing, check for near-duplicates:

1. Call hooks_recall(query=content, top_k=1)
2. If score > 0.82: skip ("near-duplicate exists")
3. If hooks_recall errors (timeout, connection refused, service
   unavailable): wait approximately 500 milliseconds, retry exactly
   once. If retry also fails: skip dedup check, proceed to store.
   Do NOT retry on validation errors or parameter errors.

Execution

1. If .ruvector/ does not exist: skip
2. Call ToolSearch("hooks_remember"). If not found: skip
3. Classify signal tier using the table above
4. If Auto: call hooks_remember(content, type) directly
5. If Prompted: AskUserQuestion "Save this learning to memory?" with
   preview of the content. Record if confirmed.
6. If Skip: no-op
7. If hooks_remember errors (timeout, connection refused, or service
   unavailable): wait approximately 500 milliseconds, retry exactly
   once. If retry also fails: note "[ruvector] Warning: remember
   failed after retry — learning not persisted" and continue.
   Do NOT retry on validation errors or parameter errors.

Note: If memory-recall-pattern already ran earlier in the same session, the MCP server is warm and the warmup step is not needed before this pattern. Only add a warmup call before this pattern if it runs in a workflow that does not use memory-recall-pattern (e.g., /flow:compound).

Anti-Patterns

• Do not omit the dedup check before hooks_remember
• Do not remember low-signal events (status checks, passing tests, style nits)
• Do not omit the hooks_remember execution-error handler — ToolSearch passing does not mean the MCP server is running

Related

• memory-recall-pattern — query past learnings at workflow start.
• morph-discovery-pattern — discover morph tools at runtime.