Memory Types

Memchentic keeps long-lived knowledge in spaces. Every memory is one of two kinds: an entry or a guide.

Kind	In plain terms
Entry	Something worth remembering — a fact, preference, decision, or lesson
Guide	Something worth following again — standing advice for a recurring situation

They live in the same places and share the same privacy rules. The difference is the job each one is for.

The same idea can show up as both when you want the record and the playbook (for example a decision you made, plus the habit you want next time).

Spaces

Memories belong to a space: your private personal space, or an optional shared group. Personal is the default. Shared groups are covered in Groups.

Entries

An entry is a durable record. Save one when the important part is what is true, what you chose, or what you learned.

Good entries tend to:

• Still matter after the current conversation ends

• Save someone from rediscovering the same hard-won detail later

• Name something concrete — a preference, a decision, a root cause, a quirk

Skip chatter, unfinished todos, raw dumps, guesses, and secrets. Skip things that are already obvious without storing them.

Entry types

Every entry has a type. The type is a label so you can filter and scan memories more easily — it does not change how search works under the hood.

Type	Meaning	Example
fact	A stable truth	“Production publishes the GUI on port 18080.”
preference	How someone wants work done	“Prefer short answers unless detail is asked for.”
decision	A choice and why	“Docs ship as their own image, separate from the app.”
instruction	A standing always / never rule	“Never commit unless asked.”
feedback	A correction after a mistake	“Hard-cut API changes — no legacy shims.”
insight	A non-obvious lesson	“The test database is separate from the live one.”
note	Anything that does not fit cleanly above	A short durable scratch note

A guide is its own kind of memory, not an entry type. If what you need is reusable advice rather than a labeled record, use a guide.

Guides

A guide is reusable advice. Save one when the important part is what to do next time — especially “when this happens, do that, and avoid the other thing.”

Good guides tend to:

• Apply to more than one incident

• Stay useful without rereading the original conversation

• Get stronger when the same advice is confirmed again, instead of spawning near-duplicate copies

A natural shape looks like:

When this situation comes up:
do this
Avoid that

Optional context: why this advice stuck

When similar guide content is saved again, Memchentic updates the existing guide and raises its confidence. Higher confidence means that advice ranks more strongly when you search later.

Choosing entry or guide

If you mainly need…	Choose
A record of what is true or what was decided	Entry
A playbook for a situation that will come up again	Guide
Both the record and the playbook	Both
Something temporary, unverified, or secret	Neither

Finding memories later

Search looks at both the words you use and the meaning behind them. You usually see a short summary first, then open the full text when you need it. Guides can rank higher as their confidence grows. Memories can also be tied to a file or project path so related work is easier to find again.