claude-mem/CLAUDE.md

/* To @claude: be vigilant about only leaving evergreen context in this file, claude-mem handles working context separately. */

Claude-Mem: AI Development Instructions

What This Project Is

Claude-mem is a Claude Code plugin providing persistent memory across sessions. It captures tool usage, compresses observations using the Claude Agent SDK, and injects relevant context into future sessions.

Current Version: 7.0.10

Architecture

5 Lifecycle Hooks: SessionStart → UserPromptSubmit → PostToolUse → Summary → SessionEnd

Hooks (src/hooks/*.ts) - TypeScript → ESM, built to plugin/scripts/*-hook.js

Worker Service (src/services/worker-service.ts) - Express API on port 37777, PM2-managed, handles AI processing asynchronously

Database (src/services/sqlite/) - SQLite3 at ~/.claude-mem/claude-mem.db with FTS5 full-text search

Search Skill (plugin/skills/mem-search/SKILL.md) - HTTP API for searching past work, auto-invoked when users ask about history

Chroma (src/services/sync/ChromaSync.ts) - Vector embeddings for semantic search

Viewer UI (src/ui/viewer/) - React interface at http://localhost:37777, built to plugin/ui/viewer.html

Privacy Tags

Dual-Tag System for meta-observation control:

• <private>content</private> - User-level privacy control (manual, prevents storage)
• <claude-mem-context>content</claude-mem-context> - System-level tag (auto-injected observations, prevents recursive storage)

Implementation: Tag stripping happens at hook layer (edge processing) before data reaches worker/database. See src/utils/tag-stripping.ts for shared utilities.

Build Commands

Hooks only: npm run build && npm run sync-marketplace

Worker changes: npm run build && npm run sync-marketplace && npm run worker:restart

Skills only: npm run sync-marketplace

Viewer UI: npm run build && npm run sync-marketplace && npm run worker:restart

Configuration

Settings are managed in ~/.claude-mem/settings.json. The file is auto-created with defaults on first run.

Core Settings:

• CLAUDE_MEM_MODEL - Model for observations/summaries (default: claude-haiku-4-5)
• CLAUDE_MEM_CONTEXT_OBSERVATIONS - Observations injected at SessionStart (default: 50)
• CLAUDE_MEM_WORKER_PORT - Worker service port (default: 37777)

System Configuration:

• CLAUDE_MEM_DATA_DIR - Data directory location (default: ~/.claude-mem)
• CLAUDE_MEM_LOG_LEVEL - Log verbosity: DEBUG, INFO, WARN, ERROR, SILENT (default: INFO)
• CLAUDE_MEM_PYTHON_VERSION - Python version for uvx/chroma-mcp (default: 3.13, avoids onnxruntime compatibility issues with Python 3.14+)
• CLAUDE_CODE_PATH - Path to Claude executable (default: auto-detect via 'which claude')

Settings File Format:

{
  "CLAUDE_MEM_MODEL": "claude-haiku-4-5",
  "CLAUDE_MEM_WORKER_PORT": "37777"
}

File Locations

• Source: <project-root>/src/
• Built Plugin: <project-root>/plugin/
• Installed Plugin: ~/.claude/plugins/marketplaces/thedotmack/
• Database: ~/.claude-mem/claude-mem.db
• Chroma: ~/.claude-mem/chroma/
• Usage Logs: ~/.claude-mem/usage-logs/usage-YYYY-MM-DD.jsonl

Quick Reference

npm run build                 # Compile TypeScript
npm run sync-marketplace      # Copy to ~/.claude/plugins
npm run worker:restart        # Restart PM2 worker
npm run worker:logs           # View worker logs
pm2 list                      # Check worker status
pm2 delete claude-mem-worker  # Force clean start

Viewer UI: http://localhost:37777