Keeping memory clean

A body of knowledge is at its best on the day it is set up. After that the decay begins: prices change, responsibilities move, and the note stays put. For a human that is a nuisance. For an agent it is dangerous, because it does not hesitate – it treats what it reads as true.

1. A stale entry is worse than none

If a detail is missing, a good agent asks or says it does not have it. If a wrong one is there, it carries on working with it. So the first duty of upkeep is not collecting but striking out.

2. Date and source on every statement

“Free shipping from 60 euros (as of 3 Nov 2026, source: price list in the store back end)” can be checked. “Free shipping from 60 euros” cannot. The date answers two questions: how old is this, and was it already valid when the decision in question was made?

Watch one distinction here: the date on which you noted or re-sorted something is not the date on which it was verified.

3. Separate three kinds of entry

• Rules apply until someone changes them. “Invoices always go to accounting.”
• Decisions were made on one day and remain as history. “Decided on 12 Sept: no shipping to the UK.”
• Statuses change continuously. “Open: quote from supplier B.”

If all three sit in one list, an agent reads an old status as a rule. Separate notes are safest – and running tasks belong in a task tool, not in memory.

4. History stays visible, but marked

Delete what is superseded and you lose the answer to “why did we do it that way back then?”. Leave it standing and you risk it being followed. The solution is a marker: “Superseded since 1 Oct 2026, see …”. The same goes for approvals. A permission for one case is not a standing permission – write down what it applied to.

5. One fact, one place – across tools too

The rule from the notes station applies all the more at scale. If the project description is in the notes tool, in the project folder and in the assistant’s memory, you have three versions. Decide what leads where: technical instructions with the code, tasks in the task tool, decisions and private facts in the notes. Everywhere else there is only a pointer.

6. A fixed slot

Upkeep that happens “when there is time” happens after the first damage. One slot a month, thirty minutes:

1. Check three random statements against reality.
2. Strike out or mark everything that is no longer true.
3. Go through the assistant’s built-in memory and delete entries that no longer hold.
4. Check connected services: what is still attached, what does nobody need any more?

Let the agent help with upkeep

An agent cannot replace upkeep, but it can support it – if the rules for that are in its rules file: read the current content before changing, change precisely, check back, give new statements a date and a source. And do not retell a routine event in three notes. A memory that contains everything is as useless as one that contains nothing.

That lays the foundation: the assistant knows what it needs to know. The next path gives it hands – Agents that act.