# Braindump > Long-term memory for agents — dense one-line facts appended to topic files, grepped back on later sessions. Use proactively whenever something surfaces that the code can't record but the next session will need (a constraint, a gotcha, a decision and its reason, an approach already rejected), and read it before starting work in a familiar area. Also triggered by "braindump this", "save this to memory", "use your brain", or "remember anything about...". - Skill: `mohganji/braindump` (Agent Skill, multi-file: 2 files) - Install (CLI): `npx skillmds@latest add mohganji/braindump` - Raw SKILL.md: https://api.skillmd.com/api/skills/mohganji/braindump/raw - Safety review: pending - Works with: Claude Code, Claude.ai, OpenAI Codex - Category: Coding & Dev Tools, Integrations & APIs - Author: mohganji (https://skillmd.com/u/mohganji) - Updated: 2026-09-17 - Page: https://skillmd.com/skills/mohganji/braindump --- # Braindump Memory that survives the session. One dense fact per line, appended to a topic file, grepped back later. Manual triggers: - **"braindump this"** / **"save this to memory"** — store - **"use your brain"** / **"remember anything about..."** — retrieve Otherwise use it proactively, per below. ## Storage `.agents-workshop/braindump/.md` — one file per topic, you choose them. Group by what a future session would search for, not by date or author. Outside a scaffolded repo, use `~/.braindump/`. Committed, never ignored. Shared means shared with the next clone. No index, no database, no CLI. Files and `grep`. ## Retrieve ```bash grep -ri "" .agents-workshop/braindump/ ``` Do this **before storing**, so you update a line instead of adding a near-duplicate. And **before working** in an area that may already be documented. ## Store ```bash echo "- 2026-09-04 — Stripe idempotency keys expire after 24h; replays past that create duplicate charges." \ >> .agents-workshop/braindump/stripe.md ``` Flat list of lines. No frontmatter, no headings. Each line **stands alone** — it gets read a year later, out of order, by an agent with none of today's context. Lead with the noun someone would grep for. Date every line. ## Capture - Constraints, gotchas and quirks that cost time to find - Decisions **with the reason** — the reason isn't recoverable from the diff - Approaches tried and rejected - Domain terms, and what the user actually means by them - External systems behaving unlike their docs - Preferences and conventions no gate enforces ## Don't capture - Anything the code already says - Anything a gate, guardrail or ADR enforces — that's enforcement, this is recall - Transient state, debugging in flight - General programming knowledge - Commentary about the conversation The test: **would the next session pay to know this, and can it not find out any other way?** ## Prune Delete lines that turn out wrong or stale — don't append a correction and leave both standing. Split a file when it stops being one topic. A memory nobody prunes becomes a memory nobody trusts.