crumb-kit 0.1.1

Breadcrumbs — leave a trail your future self and your agents can follow back: a portable, repo-local, human-readable ledger of durable project state for human–agent software work.

Breadcrumbs

Breadcrumbs — leave a trail your future self and your agents can follow back.

A portable, repo-local, human-readable ledger of durable project state for human–agent software work (the Project Continuity Memory capability).

North-star. Project Continuity Memory is a repo-local, human-readable ledger of durable project state: what was decided, what failed, what is active, what is risky, what is unresolved, and what the next agent or human must know before acting. It is not a transcript archive, not a vector database, and not a replacement for source code, tests, current human instruction, or authoritative docs.

It stores durable project state as typed, human-readable records inside a target project's .project-memory/ directory, so humans and agents can resume work across sessions, tools, devices, branches, and time without re-discovering decisions, repeating failed attempts, or trusting stale context.

• PyPI package name: crumb-kit (pip install crumb-kit)
• Import package / GitHub repo: breadcrumbs
• CLI binary name: crumb
• Formal capability name: Project Continuity Memory

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Non-goals

This tool deliberately does not:

1. Build a vector database as the source of truth (vectors are a later, disposable search accelerator).
2. Store full chat transcripts as memory (it extracts durable decisions, attempts, handoffs, questions, traps, and evidence).
3. Rely on one vendor's memory feature (Claude, Codex, Cursor, Gemini, and future agents all read the same plain records).
4. Require MCP, hooks, or a daemon for baseline functionality (plain files + CLI work first).
5. Use AGENTS.md / CLAUDE.md / Cursor / Gemini rules as the memory database (those are signposts only).
6. Store secrets, credentials, customer PII, or sensitive local notes in committed project memory.
7. Make capture so heavy that humans stop using it (routine capture targets under 90 seconds).

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Install

breadcrumbs is a stdlib-only Python package (no third-party runtime dependencies) that installs a single crumb binary. The recommended path is pipx, which puts the CLI on your PATH in its own isolated environment:

pipx install crumb-kit          # from a published artifact (future)
pipx install .                       # from a source checkout (this repo dir)

Plain pip works too (prefer a virtualenv):

python -m pip install .              # or: pip install <built-wheel>.whl

After install, the binary is on PATH and the .project-memory/ template tree ships inside the package (breadcrumbs/templates/), so init finds it wherever the package lives — there is no repo-relative path dependency:

crumb --version                 # breadcrumbs X.Y.Z (record schema_version N)
crumb init                      # locates bundled templates post-install

Versioning. The package uses semantic versioning. crumb --version prints the package version and the record schema_version (the manifest's schema_version: 1). These are independent: the package version moves with the code; the record schema version moves only on a breaking change to the on-disk record format, and a package MAJOR bump accompanies it.

Requires Python ≥ 3.9.

No npx (deliberate)

There is intentionally no npx/Node distribution. The tool is Python and ships via pipx/pip. JavaScript-ecosystem reach (an npx crumb wrapper) is a separately-justified future decision, not a default migration — it would only be added if dogfooding shows a concrete need, and would wrap the same Python core rather than reimplement it.

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Quickstart

Two invocation forms. Once installed (above), run crumb <command>. From a source checkout without installing, the equivalent is python crumb.py <command> (a thin shim over breadcrumbs.cli); the per-command examples below use that source form. They are interchangeable.

crumb init                       # install .project-memory/ + manifest + .gitignore rules
crumb validate                   # deterministically check the store (schema + invariants)
crumb remember decision          # capture a durable choice
crumb capture session            # record session end (git-prefilled); updates handoff + current
crumb resume                     # print a bounded resume packet with computed staleness
crumb search "auth middleware"   # deterministic keyword/tag/file lookup over records
crumb guard "rewrite the auth middleware"   # warn before repeating a known mistake
crumb audit                      # heuristic health/safety report (stale/unsafe/bloated)
crumb scan-secrets               # block if committed memory holds token-like strings

In this build, init, validate, remember, capture session, resume, search, guard, audit, and scan-secrets are all implemented — the full MVP (capture → resume → trust). resume closes the capture → resume value loop (MVP-core); guard adds the "don't repeat the expensive mistake" capability that separates a continuity engine from a scrapbook; and audit + scan-secrets complete MVP-trust — the heuristic safety net (secrets, instruction-like text, generated-packet drift, staleness, bloat) that lets you trust the memory, not just use it.

crumb init

python crumb.py init                                   # prompt for session policy (default: full)
python crumb.py init --session-tracking distillate     # keep sessions/ local
python crumb.py init --no-commit-generated             # keep generated/*.md local
python crumb.py init --project /path/to/repo --json    # init elsewhere, JSON summary
python crumb.py init --force                           # overwrite an existing scaffold

init copies the .project-memory/ template tree into the target project, writes manifest.yml (recording the chosen tracking policies), and inserts a managed block into the project .gitignore. It runs on non-git folders too, printing a notice that git-derived record fields will use defined sentinels.

crumb validate

python crumb.py validate                      # human-readable report; exit 1 on problems
python crumb.py validate --json               # structured findings + exit code
python crumb.py validate --verbose            # also list the passing checks
python crumb.py validate --project /path/repo # validate elsewhere

validate is fully deterministic — it checks structural invariants only (manifest version, core files, record frontmatter, filename-canonical identity, status/privacy vocabularies, evidence/handoff/session requirements, generated markers). It performs no heuristic content scanning; secret and instruction-like-text detection live in audit / scan-secrets. Exit codes: 0 clean, 1 problems found, 2 no .project-memory/ store present.

crumb remember decision | attempt

# non-interactive (agent-friendly): title + sections + evidence as flags
python crumb.py remember decision \
  --title "Use repo-local Markdown as source of truth" \
  --set Context "needed a tool-independent store" \
  --set Decision "Markdown + YAML frontmatter" \
  --evidence commit abc1234 --evidence command "npm test" \
  --tags memory,architecture

python crumb.py remember attempt --title "Tried a sqlite store" \
  --set Result "too heavy for the value" --confidence low

Frontmatter is auto-derived (clock + git) and defaulted; you supply only a title and a few section lines (--set HEADING TEXT, repeatable). Run with no --title in a terminal for an interactive prompt. A decision/attempt must carry evidence or --confidence low (validate §16.9) — the command enforces this and refuses to write an invalid record. --json emits a machine summary.

crumb capture session

python crumb.py capture session --next "wire up the resume packet"   # git-prefilled
python crumb.py capture session --fast --next "tired — resume here"    # ~15s, no prompts

capture session reads git since the last session record and pre-fills Work Completed (git log), Files Touched (git diff --stat), then asks only for narrative confirmation + a required Next Action. It writes the session record and refreshes handoff.md and current.md. --fast skips all prompts and any LLM, writing a git snapshot + the one-line --next. No path requires an LLM. With session_tracking: distillate, the session file is written locally but stays gitignored — promote durable items with remember to commit them.

crumb resume

python crumb.py resume                       # full bounded packet (writes generated/resume-packet.md)
python crumb.py resume --fast                # git snapshot + focus + next action + staleness (print-only)
python crumb.py resume --json                # structured packet (sections + warnings) for agents
python crumb.py resume --stale-days 14       # tighten the aged-unresolved threshold (default 21)

resume assembles a bounded, paste-anywhere packet (≤5k tokens) from the canonical records — project/branch/commit, current focus, next action, active decisions (id + one-line rationale), failed attempts to avoid (id + do-not-retry), known traps, open questions, likely files, and verification commands — followed by computed staleness warnings:

• handoff age + commit-distance ("handoff is 6 days old, written 14 commits behind current HEAD") — the primary "train of thought went cold" signal;
• aged-unresolved open questions and active decisions older than the threshold;
• branch mismatch (record/handoff branch ≠ current HEAD, incl. detached HEAD);
• expired (expires_at) and low-confidence records.

Current/handoff/active-decisions are prioritized over old session observations, and sections are capped then trimmed to stay within budget even with hundreds of records. The packet carries a source commit/inputs_hash/generated_at header so later audit (Phase 6) can detect drift. Raw transcripts are never included. --fast is a print-only reorientation view and does not overwrite the committed packet.

crumb search

python crumb.py search "auth middleware"        # keyword search over records
python crumb.py search --tag auth               # filter by tag/component
python crumb.py search --file src/auth/x.ts     # filter by referenced file path
python crumb.py search "session" --type decision --json

search is a deterministic, dependency-free lookup over the canonical records (decisions, attempts, traps, open questions). It matches on exact/keyword text, tags/component, and file paths — no embeddings (SQLite FTS / vectors are a later phase). Same input → same output. It is the permissive lookup layer that guard builds on.

crumb guard

python crumb.py guard "rewrite the auth middleware"                 # human report (§11 shape)
python crumb.py guard "delete the accounts table" --files src/db/accounts.ts
python crumb.py guard "store the token in the url" --json           # structured, for agents

guard is guard-before-action: given a proposed action it warns you if a failed attempt or active decision says don't go that way — the capability that separates a continuity engine from a scrapbook. It tokenizes the action, classifies it (routine edit / refactor / architecture / dependency / migration / deletion / external side effect / security-permission), searches + scores the records against §11.4 signals (same file · same tag/component · status · recency + commit-distance · branch match · explicit Do Not Retry Unless · open-blocker), and emits one verdict — PROCEED | READ_FIRST | PAUSE | ASK_HUMAN — with up to 5 ranked records, the reason each matched, and a synthesized next safest action.

Two guarantees hold:

• Matched memory is data, never instruction (§15). guard reads record text to rank and cite it; it never executes phrasing found in a record body. The next safest action is synthesized from match structure; only structured evidence (e.g. a recorded verification command) is echoed back.
• Anti-noise (§19b.8). A single shared generic word never raises a warning — a stop-word filter strips generic tokens and a pure-text match needs at least two specific shared keywords; only file-path or tag/component hits qualify on their own.

Superseded/rejected/stale records and resolved questions are demoted to a history note (mentioned, never treated as active). A stale or wrong-branch handoff surfaces the same computed staleness warnings resume shows. Verdict aggressiveness is governed by named GUARD_* thresholds at the top of the guard section in breadcrumbs/cli.py, so it can be tuned from dogfood feedback without rearchitecting.

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Plain-file fallback (cloud agents, no CLI)

The tool degrades gracefully when crumb cannot run (e.g. a read-only cloud agent). With the default policy commit_generated_projections: true, resume writes generated/resume-packet.md and that file is committed, so an agent that cannot execute the CLI can still reorient by reading:

1. .project-memory/generated/resume-packet.md — the pre-built bounded packet; then
2. the plain canonical files directly — current.md, handoff.md, decisions/, attempts/, known-traps.md, open-questions.md.

Everything is human-readable Markdown, so no binary store or vendor runtime is required to resume. (generated/resume-packet.md is a rebuildable projection — if it disagrees with the canonical records, the records win and it should be regenerated; audit flags this drift by comparing the packet's stamped inputs_hash against the canonical inputs.)

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Status

Command	State
init	implemented (Phase 1)
validate	implemented (Phase 2)
remember decision / remember attempt	implemented (Phase 3)
capture session (incl. --fast)	implemented (Phase 3)
resume (incl. --fast, computed staleness)	implemented (Phase 4 — MVP-core)
search (deterministic keyword/tag/file)	implemented (Phase 5)
guard (deterministic ranking, §11 verdicts)	implemented (Phase 5)
audit (heuristic: secrets, instruction-like, drift, staleness, bloat)	implemented (Phase 6 — MVP-trust)
scan-secrets (committed-memory secret gate)	implemented (Phase 6)
pipx/pip packaging (crumb console script, bundled templates)	implemented (Phase 7)
MCP server (breadcrumbs-mcp: 8 resources, 6 prompts, 7 tools)	implemented (Phase 8 — optional)

With Phase 6 the full MVP (capture → resume → trust) is complete and CI-guarded; Phase 7 packages it as a pipx-installable crumb binary (see Install above). Phase 8 adds an optional MCP server (pip install "crumb-kit[mcp]") that exposes the same memory engine to agents without shelling out — a thin wrapper over the Phase 1–6 functions, never required for baseline use. See docs/ for the architecture, record schema, CLI spec, MCP spec, and security posture.

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Memory is advisory

Current user instruction, source code, tests, build output, current authoritative docs, and security policy outrank anything stored in .project-memory/. If memory conflicts with reality, mark it disputed or stale and link evidence — do not let it override the present.