Rules and facts
Dropstone keeps two kinds of memory. Standing rules apply to every task without being searched for. Facts are recalled only when they are relevant. Here is why the difference matters and how it decides.
Not everything worth remembering should be treated the same way. A preference about how you like code written has to apply every time. The name of your staging server only matters when you are talking about staging. Dropstone keeps these as two different kinds of memory.
Standing rules
A rule is something you want followed from now on. A convention, a style preference, a prohibition.
function declarations.Rules are applied to every task, whether or not the task looks related. That is deliberate. A rule about how you like functions written has to hold when you ask for a slug helper, a date parser, or anything else. If Dropstone only applied it when the subject seemed relevant, the rule would quietly stop working the moment you changed topics.
Because rules follow you everywhere, Dropstone is careful about what becomes one.
Facts
A fact is something that is simply true right now.
Facts are recalled only when they are relevant to what you are working on. There are far more of them than rules, and pulling every one into every conversation would bury the ones that matter. When a task comes up that a fact bears on, Dropstone brings it in. Otherwise it stays out of the way.
How Dropstone decides which is which
When you correct it or state a preference, Dropstone chooses the kind for you.
Something phrased as a standing instruction becomes a rule: "always", "never", "from now on", "use X not Y". A correction from you is almost always a rule, because it is you telling it how you want things done.
Everything else becomes a fact: a detail it discovered, a technique that worked, a name, a version.
When it is genuinely unsure, it chooses fact. The reasoning is simple: a missed rule costs you one reminder, but a wrong rule follows you into every conversation until you notice and remove it.
What you can do about it
You can see which kind each memory is, and you can change it. Ask Dropstone to show your standing rules and it lists only those. If something it filed as a fact should really apply every time, tell it so and it becomes a rule. If a rule is firing on tasks it should not, you can ask it to stop applying it.
See what Dropstone has learned and Change or forget a memory walk through both.
Related articles
- How Dropstone remembers youDropstone keeps a persistent memory that follows your account across chat, the CLI, and the SDK. Correct it once and it should not need correcting again, anywhere you use it.
- See what Dropstone has learnedAsk Dropstone what it remembers and it lists everything, standing rules separately from facts. You can also ask what memory it used on a specific reply. Nothing is hidden from you.
- Change or forget a memoryTell Dropstone to forget something and it stops applying it. Tell it a fact should be a rule, or a rule is too broad, and it adjusts. Only you can remove a memory. It never forgets on its own.
- How an agent learns as it worksDropstone is a self-learning agent. It records what it learns from corrections, from finished work, and from sources you ask it to study, and it uses that the next time without being told. Here is the loop.