Writing back

How a tool saves what it learns, and why nothing writes straight into your notes.

A memory only helps if tools add to it. Every connected tool can save three kinds of things, and each lands in a different place.

When a tool…	It calls	It lands in
learns something about you or your work	`remember`	`inbox/<tool>/<date>-<slug>.md`
sees a decision being made	`log_decision`	`journal/<date>-<slug>.md`
notices a standing preference	`propose_rule`	the inbox, tagged as a rule proposal

Why an inbox

Tools write fast and repeat themselves. If they wrote straight into knowledge/, the vault would fill with duplicates. So captures wait in each tool's inbox, and the tidy-up files them: merging duplicates, linking related notes and flagging contradictions. Decisions skip the inbox because they're dated facts, not drafts.

Every write is a signed commit

Each change is a Git commit authored by the tool that made it, with a sentence saying why. You can always see who wrote what, and undo it.

~/alwen-vault

$ git log --format="%h  %an  %s"
9f2e1c0  Alwen      Link pricing decision to a note from March
a41f9c2  Cursor     Build billing page from rules/product.md
3d10e88  Claude     Log decision: usage-based pricing
0b52a19  You        Edit launch plan

Every note also carries its provenance in the frontmatter: the tool, the conversation and the time. The note format.