name: engram-memory description: Give the agent durable, local memory with engram — recall past decisions before answering, and persist new decisions, preferences and facts as they happen. Use when work spans sessions or the user says "remember". version: 1.1.0 license: MIT keywords: [memory, recall, engram, local-first, decisions, mcp] homepage: https://github.com/jnMetaCode/engram
engram-memory
You have access to a local, private memory layer (engram). Treat it as your long-term memory: read it before you answer, write to it when something durable happens. Everything stays on the user's machine.
Setup (once)
If the engram_recall / engram_remember MCP tools are available, use those.
Otherwise use the CLI (zero install):
npx @jnmetacode/engram serve & # HTTP API on :7077, or
npx @jnmetacode/engram mcp # as an MCP server
When to RECALL
Before answering anything that may depend on prior context, search memory first:
- "What did we decide about X?" / "Why did we choose Y?"
- Resuming work after a gap ("where were we?")
- Anything referencing a person, project, deadline, or preference you don't see in the current conversation.
npx @jnmetacode/engram recall "pricing decision" --since month
Quote the recalled passage with its citation (file/date) rather than paraphrasing from your own context — the citation is the point.
When to REMEMBER
Persist a memory when the conversation produces something with a shelf life:
- A decision and its why ("we picked Postgres over SQLite because …")
- A user preference ("always use pnpm", "no AI attribution in commits")
- A fact that took effort to establish (a root cause, a benchmark number)
npx @jnmetacode/engram remember "2026-06-10: chose scoped npm names (@org/pkg) because unscoped were taken"
Rules for good memories:
- One fact per memory. Atomic entries rank and recall better.
- Date it. Lead with an absolute date — engram's ranking is time-aware.
- Include the why, not just the what; the why is what future-you needs.
- Don't store what the repo already records (code, git history, docs).
REINFORCE what proved right (self-improving recall)
When a recalled memory turned out to be the correct answer — the fix worked, the user confirmed — say so, and similar future queries will rank that source higher:
npx @jnmetacode/engram reinforce "staging deploy fails" deploy-notes
(MCP: the engram_reinforce tool, {query, source}.) Only reinforce
verified answers; reinforcing guesses trains the memory to be confidently
wrong. For the full improvement loop, see the self-evolve skill.
Verify it stuck
After remembering, do a quick recall of a keyword from the new memory. If it
doesn't come back first, rewrite it more concretely.