just-demand-memory

name	just-demand-memory
description	Use when recording durable preferences, decisions, deferred options, workspace facts, open questions, or when the user chooses a lightweight path over a more robust option.

Workflow Memory

Persist durable knowledge without turning exploratory chat into permanent policy by accident.

What To Persist

• Workspace preferences: long-lived defaults for future work.
• Workspace decisions: accepted architecture or workflow choices.
• Deferred options: robust or broader approaches intentionally postponed.
• Task decisions: choices that apply only to the current formal work item.
• Open questions: unresolved items that block or shape future work.
• Operating principles: durable role model, priorities, and communication defaults that apply across all work.

Deferred Option Rule

When the user chooses a minimal or fast path, record the more robust option if it matters later:

## Deferred Option: <name>

Id: O001
Scope: workspace | task
Status: deferred
Chosen Instead: <chosen path>
Reason: <why not now>
Risk: <risk of deferring>
Source Task: <task-id or none>
Revisit When:
- <trigger>

Lesson Storage Tiers

When extracting durable knowledge from debugging or exploration, choose the right tier:

Tier	Use when	Destination
Global reusable skill	Pattern applies across modules, projects, or repos; triggers capture-lessons conditions (>=3 attempts, architectural trap, reusable methodology)	.agents/skills/<pattern-name>/SKILL.md via capture-lessons
Workspace memory	Durable but project-local: this repo's conventions, scripts, architecture decisions, verified local facts	.just-demand/knowledge/memory.md
Task decisions	Task-only or one-off: not reusable beyond the current work item	Task decisions.md

Do not promote a lesson to global skill tier unless it is clearly pattern-based and portable. When in doubt, keep it workspace-local.

Task-Local Extraction Before Archival

When a task is about to leave the active set (archived or cleaned up), extract durable knowledge first:

• Copy reusable decisions from task decisions.md to workspace memory if they apply beyond the task.
• Route reusable patterns through capture-lessons if they meet the global skill threshold.
• Keep one-off business details, raw logs, secrets, and unverified guesses out of skills and workspace memory.
• If extraction fails, preserve the full task package in archive rather than losing information.

Boundaries

• Do not store secrets, credentials, tokens, cookies, or private keys.
• Prefer references to secure locations over copying sensitive values.
• Promote a task-local decision to workspace memory only when the user confirms it should become a default.