Cortec

Local-first memory server for developer workflows.

Cortec runs as an MCP server inside your coding environment. It remembers your project decisions, bugs, fixes, and session context and retrieves exactly the right memory when you need it. Everything stays on your machine.

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The Problem

Every developer hits the same wall: you finish a session, start a new one, and spend the first 20 minutes re-explaining what was already figured out. What database you chose and why. What that bug was and how you fixed it. What you decided not to do. That context doesn't live anywhere — it just disappears.

What Cortec Does

Cortec stores that context as structured memories and retrieves them semantically when you need them. You ask it a question, it finds the right answer from your own history.

cortec remember "We use Chroma for vector storage — simpler local setup than Qdrant" \
  --type decision --project myapp

cortec recall "vector database choice"

╭── 6474b9db  score=0.94  confidence=0.7 ──────────────────────────╮
│ We use Chroma for vector storage — simpler local setup than Qdrant │
╰── source=session  project=myapp  2026-05-25 ─────────────────────╯

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Install

pip install cortec-mcp

cortec init
cortec doctor

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Connect it as an MCP server

Cortec speaks the Model Context Protocol over stdio. After installing, point any MCP-compatible client at the cortec serve command — add this to the client's MCP server config (commonly an mcpServers block in its JSON):

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "cortec": {
      "command": "cortec",
      "args": ["serve"]
    }
  }
}

Once connected, the client can call remember, recall, and the other tools below. Memory lives in ~/.cortec on your machine — nothing leaves it.

Prefer not to install the console script on PATH? The server also runs as a module:

python -m cortec.server

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Core Features

Secret scanning — before anything is stored, Cortec scans for API keys, tokens, passwords, and private keys. If it finds one, storage is blocked.

Approval mode — nothing is stored silently. By default, every memory goes through an approval step before it's indexed.

Conflict detection — if a new memory contradicts an existing one (Flask vs Django, Chroma vs Qdrant), Cortec flags it and asks you to resolve it before storing.

Source citations — every recalled memory tells you where it came from, when it was saved, and how confident the match is.

Project isolation — each project has its own memory space. A recall in one project never pulls from another.

Memory types — memories are categorized so you can filter by what you need:

Type	What it stores
decision	A choice made about tech, design, or approach
bug	A bug or error encountered
fix	The solution that worked
architecture	A structural or design pattern decision
preference	A personal or team preference
command	A useful CLI command worth remembering
dependency	A library or package decision
pattern	A reusable solution pattern, often from Stack Overflow
portfolio	Something worth showcasing
resume	An achievement or skill
general	Anything else

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MCP Tools

Cortec exposes these tools to your coding environment:

Tool	Description
remember	Store a memory — scans secrets, checks conflicts, gates approval
recall	Semantic search across your memory — filter by project and type
summarize_session	Summarize and archive a session automatically
list_memories	Browse stored memories with citations
project_context	Load full project memory grouped by type at session start
index_github_repo	Index a repo's commits, PRs, and issues as memories
link_memory_to_commit	Link a memory to a specific commit SHA
commits_for_memory	Find all memories linked to the same commit
store_so_pattern	Fetch a Stack Overflow answer and store it as a pattern
recall_patterns	Semantic search over stored Stack Overflow patterns
build_graph	Build a knowledge graph for a project and return its summary
graph_neighbors	Return memories connected to a given memory within N hops
link_memories	Explicitly link two memories in the knowledge graph
draft_pr_summary	Draft a PR description from project decisions, fixes, and bugs
debug_suggest	Find related bugs, fixes, and patterns for an error message
build_portfolio	Aggregate portfolio and resume memories into a Markdown export
stale_memories	List memories whose confidence has decayed below a threshold
forget	Permanently delete a memory

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CLI

cortec remember "text" --type decision --project myapp
cortec recall "query" --type bug
cortec approve <id>
cortec conflicts
cortec resolve <id>
cortec status
cortec export
cortec doctor
cortec audit
cortec github-index owner/repo --project myapp
cortec github-link <memory_id> <commit_sha>
cortec so-store https://stackoverflow.com/a/11227902
cortec so-search "async generator pattern"
cortec graph-summary --project myapp
cortec graph-neighbors <memory_id> --depth 2
cortec graph-link <memory_id_a> <memory_id_b>
cortec pr-draft --project myapp --context "refactor auth layer"
cortec debug "TypeError: cannot unpack non-sequence NoneType"
cortec portfolio --project myapp
cortec portfolio --markdown
cortec stale --project myapp --threshold 0.4
cortec browse

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Confidence Scale

Every memory starts with a confidence score based on its source:

Score	Source
0.9	User confirmed
0.8	GitHub commit or PR
0.7	Session summary
0.6	Stack Overflow pattern
0.5	Inferred

That starting score then decays with age — recall reports the effective confidence after decay, not just the original.

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Current Status

Phases 1–7 are complete.

• MCP server with 18 tools
• SQLite metadata store + Chroma vector search
• Secret scanning (15 patterns), approval mode, conflict detection
• GitHub integration — index commits, PRs, and issues; link memories to commit SHAs
• Stack Overflow pattern store — fetch answers by URL, store and search locally
• Knowledge graph — connect memories by explicit links, shared tags, and type; traverse with BFS
• Agent workflows — PR draft, debug assist, and portfolio builder from memory
• Memory decay — confidence ages toward a floor with per-type half-lives; stale memories surface in recall
• Runs as an MCP server over stdio (cortec serve); session summarization via a local LLM or extractive fallback
• Interactive terminal browser (cortec browse) — page, filter, search, inspect, and prune memories
• Full CLI with 24 commands
• 166 tests passing, CI across Python 3.10–3.12
• Local-first — no cloud, no telemetry, no external services

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GitHub Integration

Index any GitHub repo directly into your memory store:

cortec github-index rajkumar-prog/cortec-mcp --project cortec

This pulls recent commits, pull requests, and issues and stores them as searchable memories. Commits get confidence=0.8 — same as a verified GitHub source.

Link a memory you already have to the commit that caused or fixed it:

cortec github-link a1b2c3d4 79ac0d5e

Or use the MCP tools directly from your coding environment — index_github_repo, link_memory_to_commit, commits_for_memory.

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Stack Overflow Pattern Store

When a Stack Overflow answer solves your problem, save it so you never search for it again:

cortec so-store https://stackoverflow.com/a/11227902

Cortec fetches content from the Stack Overflow URL (answer or question, using the best available answer), strips the HTML, and stores it as a pattern memory with confidence=0.6. Later, search it semantically:

cortec so-search "close file descriptor python"

Or use the MCP tools directly — store_so_pattern and recall_patterns — from inside your coding environment.

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Knowledge Graph

Memories are connected automatically based on shared tags, memory type, and explicit links. Traverse that graph to discover what else is related to any memory.

# See the shape of a project's memory graph
cortec graph-summary --project myapp

# Find what's connected to a specific memory (up to 2 hops away)
cortec graph-neighbors a1b2c3d4 --depth 2

# Manually link two memories you know are related
cortec graph-link a1b2c3d4 e5f6g7h8

Edges are weighted by connection strength:

Weight	Reason
1.0	Explicit link (graph-link or link_memories)
0.7	Shared tag
0.4	Same memory type within the same project

The build_graph, graph_neighbors, and link_memories MCP tools expose the same capability from inside your coding environment.

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Agent Workflows

Three memory-powered assistants that synthesize stored knowledge into actionable output — no LLM calls, everything runs locally.

PR Draft

Pull the latest decisions, fixes, and bugs from memory and get a ready-to-paste PR description:

cortec pr-draft --project myapp
cortec pr-draft --project myapp --context "refactor auth middleware"

Or call draft_pr_summary(project, context) from your MCP environment.

Debug Assist

Give Cortec an error message and it searches your stored bugs, fixes, and Stack Overflow patterns for relevant suggestions:

cortec debug "TypeError: 'NoneType' object is not subscriptable"
cortec debug "connection refused 5432" --project myapp

Results are ranked by semantic score and grouped by type (bug, fix, pattern). Call debug_suggest(error, project) from MCP.

Portfolio Builder

Aggregate everything worth showcasing into a structured summary or Markdown export:

cortec portfolio --project myapp
cortec portfolio --markdown > portfolio.md

Store portfolio items as you work:

cortec remember "Built semantic search over 10M tokens in < 200ms" --type portfolio
cortec remember "Led migration from Django to FastAPI, 3x throughput gain" --type resume

Call build_portfolio(project) from MCP to get the same output programmatically.

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Memory Decay

Old context shouldn't be trusted as much as fresh context. Cortec ages each memory's confidence toward a floor over time, so a decision you made 18 months ago no longer outranks one from last week.

Decay is computed at read time — the stored confidence is never overwritten. It's treated as immutable provenance, and decay is a lens applied on top:

effective = floor + (base − floor) × 0.5 ^ (age_days / half_life)

Each memory type has its own half-life, so timeless context decays slowly and volatile context decays fast:

Half-life	Types
365 days	architecture, resume, portfolio
270 days	decision, preference
120 days	dependency, command, general
90 days	pattern, fix
60 days	bug

recall reports the decayed value (confidence=0.8→0.52) and flags anything below the stale threshold. To review what's gone stale and prune it:

cortec stale --project myapp
cortec stale --threshold 0.5

Or call stale_memories(project, threshold) from MCP.

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Session Summarization

summarize_session turns a raw coding session into a few sharp bullet points — decisions, bugs, fixes, architecture choices — and can store the result as a memory.

By default it's extractive: it ranks and keeps the most signal-rich sentences, with no model and no network call. For sharper summaries, point it at a local OpenAI-compatible LLM — Ollama works out of the box and stays entirely on your machine:

ollama serve
ollama pull llama3

Then pass the endpoint when calling the tool:

summarize_session(
    text=session_log,
    project="myapp",
    llm_endpoint="http://localhost:11434",  # Ollama's OpenAI-compatible API
    llm_model="llama3",
    auto_store=True,
)

If the LLM is unreachable, Cortec falls back to extractive summarization automatically — the call never fails on a missing model.

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Interactive Browser

cortec browse opens a paged terminal view of your memory store — no flags to memorize. Filter, search, inspect, and prune in place:

cortec browse
cortec browse --project myapp --type bug

Inside the browser, type short commands:

Command	Action
n / p	Next / previous page
page N	Jump to page N
type <type>	Filter by memory type (e.g. type bug)
project <name>	Filter by project
search <text>	Full-text search over summaries
clear	Clear all filters
open <id>	Show a memory's full detail
forget <id>	Delete a memory (with confirmation)
h	Help · q Quit

Stale memories (decayed below the threshold) are highlighted, and each row shows effective confidence and age at a glance.

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Privacy

• All data stays local — no cloud upload, ever
• Full export and delete support
• Per-project memory isolation
• .cortec/ folders excluded from git by default

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License

MIT — Raj Kumar Satya