Skip to content

feat: Tiered agent memory — hot/cold/wiki layers for context management #600

New issue
New issue
Closed as not planned
Closed as not planned
feat: Tiered agent memory — hot/cold/wiki layers for context management#600
Labels
go:needs-researchNeeds investigationsquadSquad triage inbox — Lead will assign to a membersquad:state-storage-devAssigned to state-storage-dev (State & Storage Engineer)status:contributor-invitedA specific contributor has been invited to work on thistriagedIssue has been triagedtype:featureNew capabilitywave:3-laterWave 3 — backlog, future

Description

@tamirdresher
tamirdresher
opened on Mar 24, 2026

Problem

Agent history.md files grow to 70KB+ (18K tokens). Agents load everything at spawn, burning context window on old noise. Current summarization (>12KB threshold) helps but doesn't distinguish between recent actionable context and archived knowledge.

Proposal

Three-tier memory architecture:

Layer File Loaded Content
Hot history.md Always at spawn Core Context + last ~20 entries + active-issue-tagged entries
Cold history-archive.md On demand Summarized old entries, preserved for reference
Durable GitHub Wiki Searchable by all agents Major findings, architecture patterns, test results

Scribe maintains the split: During regular maintenance, move old unstructured work reports to archive first (biggest bloat source). Keep issue-tagged entries in hot layer until issue closes.

Spawn template change: Agents read hot by default. Only read cold when task explicitly references historical context.

Measurements

  • Top agents: 34-74KB history files (8.8K-18.5K tokens)
  • 82-96% is old learnings/work reports
  • Realistic savings: 20-55% token reduction per spawn
  • Wiki provides cross-agent knowledge sharing without loading into each agent's context

Deliverables

  • Skill template: .squad/skills/tiered-history/SKILL.md
  • Scribe charter update: hot/cold maintenance rules
  • Wiki-write skill for durable knowledge
  • Spawn template: conditional cold-layer loading

Activity

  1. bradygaster
    added
    wave:3-laterWave 3 — backlog, future
    triagedIssue has been triaged
    on Jun 24, 2026
  2. bradygaster
    removed
    squad:procedures
    squad:fido
    on Sep 9, 2026
  3. github-actions
    added
    squad:flight
    on Sep 10, 2026

  4. github-actions commented on Sep 10, 2026

    @github-actions
    github-actionsBot
    on Sep 10, 2026 – with GitHub Actions
    Contributor

    🔄 Ralph — Auto-Triage

    Assigned to: Flight
    Reason: No module, routing, or role keyword match — routed to Lead/Architect
    Source: lead-fallback

    Ralph auto-triaged this issue using routing rules.
    To reassign, swap the squad:* label.

  5. bradygaster
    removed
    squad:flight
    on Sep 10, 2026
  6. github-actions
    added
    squad:flight
    on Sep 10, 2026

  7. github-actions commented on Sep 10, 2026

    @github-actions
    github-actionsBot
    on Sep 10, 2026 – with GitHub Actions
    Contributor

    🔄 Ralph — Auto-Triage

    Assigned to: Flight
    Reason: No module, routing, or role keyword match — routed to Lead/Architect
    Source: lead-fallback

    Ralph auto-triaged this issue using routing rules.
    To reassign, swap the squad:* label.

  8. bradygaster
    removed
    squad:flight
    on Sep 11, 2026

  9. github-actions commented on Sep 11, 2026

    @github-actions
    github-actionsBot
    on Sep 11, 2026 – with GitHub Actions
    Contributor

    🔄 Ralph — Auto-Triage

    Assigned to: Flight
    Reason: No module, routing, or role keyword match — routed to Lead/Architect
    Source: lead-fallback

    Ralph auto-triaged this issue using routing rules.
    To reassign, swap the squad:* label.

  10. github-actions
    added
    squad:flight
    on Sep 11, 2026

  11. github-actions commented on Sep 11, 2026

    @github-actions
    github-actionsBot
    on Sep 11, 2026 – with GitHub Actions
    Contributor

    🔄 Ralph — Auto-Triage

    Assigned to: Flight
    Reason: No module, routing, or role keyword match — routed to Lead/Architect
    Source: lead-fallback

    Ralph auto-triaged this issue using routing rules.
    To reassign, swap the squad:* label.

  12. github-actions commented on Sep 11, 2026

    @github-actions
    github-actionsBot
    on Sep 11, 2026 – with GitHub Actions
    Contributor

    🔄 Ralph — Auto-Triage

    Assigned to: Flight
    Reason: No module, routing, or role keyword match — routed to Lead/Architect
    Source: lead-fallback

    Ralph auto-triaged this issue using routing rules.
    To reassign, swap the squad:* label.

  13. github-actions commented on Sep 11, 2026

    @github-actions
    github-actionsBot
    on Sep 11, 2026 – with GitHub Actions
    Contributor

    🔄 Ralph — Auto-Triage

    Assigned to: Flight
    Reason: No module, routing, or role keyword match — routed to Lead/Architect
    Source: lead-fallback

    Ralph auto-triaged this issue using routing rules.
    To reassign, swap the squad:* label.

  14. github-actions
    added
    squad:architectAssigned to architect (Lead Architect)
    on Sep 13, 2026

  15. github-actions commented on Sep 13, 2026

    @github-actions
    github-actionsBot
    on Sep 13, 2026 – with GitHub Actions
    Contributor

    🔄 Ralph — Auto-Triage

    Assigned to: architect
    Reason: No module, routing, or role keyword match — routed to Lead/Architect
    Source: lead-fallback

    Ralph auto-triaged this issue using routing rules.
    To reassign, swap the squad:* label.

  16. bradygaster
    marked feat: Tiered history retrieval (hot/cold layer pattern) #595 as a duplicate of this issue on Sep 23, 2026
  17. bradygaster
    added
    squad:state-storage-devAssigned to state-storage-dev (State & Storage Engineer)
    and removed
    squad:flight
    squad:architectAssigned to architect (Lead Architect)
    on Sep 24, 2026

  18. github-actions commented on Sep 24, 2026

    @github-actions
    github-actionsBot
    on Sep 24, 2026 – with GitHub Actions
    Contributor

    📋 Assigned to state-storage-dev (State & Storage Engineer)

    Issue: #600 — feat: Tiered agent memory — hot/cold/wiki layers for context management

    state-storage-dev will pick this up in the next Copilot session.

    For Copilot coding agent: If enabled, this issue will be worked automatically.
    Otherwise, start a Copilot session and say:
    state-storage-dev, work on issue #600

  19. bradygaster commented on Nov 5, 2026

    @bradygaster
    bradygaster
    on Nov 5, 2026 – with Copilot SWE Agent
    Collaborator

    Closing during 2.0 board triage (owner decision). The idea is evaluated, with prior art and an opinion, in the roll-up issue #2390. Original text remains here for reference.

  20. bradygaster
    closed this as not plannedon Nov 5, 2026
Sign up for free to join this conversation on GitHub. Already have an account? Sign in to comment

Metadata

Metadata

Assignees

No one assigned

    Labels

    go:needs-researchNeeds investigationsquadSquad triage inbox — Lead will assign to a membersquad:state-storage-devAssigned to state-storage-dev (State & Storage Engineer)status:contributor-invitedA specific contributor has been invited to work on thistriagedIssue has been triagedtype:featureNew capabilitywave:3-laterWave 3 — backlog, future

    Type

    No type

    Projects

    No projects

      Milestone

      No milestone

      Relationships

      None yet

      Development

      No branches or pull requests

      Issue actions