🧠 Corti

Cognitive Substrate for AI Agent Swarms

Markdown Source of Truth · Sub-second Cascade Sync · Postgres Vector Search · Multi-Agent Adaptive

Quick Start · Install & Integration · Storage Stack · Lifecycle · Design Philosophy

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Corti (corti): persistent, self-evolving memory layer for AI agents. Decouples runtime state from static weights. Stores state as diffable Markdown. Rebuilds high-performance Postgres/SQLite vector/BM25 indexes. Fully self-hosted.

┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
|                          AI AGENT COGNITIVE ARCHITECTURE                 |
|                                                                         |
| 1. LLM Backend (API)     --> Brainstem / Basal Ganglia (Stateless Core) |
| 2. Agent Framework       --> Sensorimotor Exoskeleton (Hands & Feet)   |
| 3. Memory ───────────────--> Agent Cortex (Persistent State Core)       |
└─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘

1. Persona Agent vs. CLI Agent: Target audience = Persona Agents (e.g., Hermes Agent, OpenClaw Agent) ≠ CLI task-runners. Persona Agents require persistent background identity, preference awareness, context stability.
2. State-Weight Decoupling: Trillion-parameter static model weights cannot mutate for local projects. Runtime state must be decoupled from static weights.
3. Random Pre-Injection of Memory Fragments: Random pre-injection of memory fragments ➔ context. Matches human long-term memory: constant background context + targeted activation weights. Widens activation surface, prevents recall omission.
4. Runtime Epistemic Limits: Map vector spaces directly to context. Resolves runtime bottleneck: LLMs "do not know what they do not know". Resident memory ≠ On-demand query ("document lookup"). Memory requires residency to define identity.

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⚡ Key Features

• Simplicity over Complexity (Why Not Knowledge Graphs?):
  • Open-World Semantic Discrepancy: Open-world semantic parsing fails to converge. Code parsing has strict AST syntax, but natural language has systemic ambiguity. LLM parsing under AST/Safeguards generates naming collisions (e.g., "ABC Project" parsed sometimes as "ABC", other times as "ABC Project"), stalling graph construction. Formal ontology engineering (KBpedia, Wikipedia scale) is cost-prohibitive.
  • Diminishing Search Utility: Graph traversal provides minimal marginal gain over raw keyword/semantic search. Open-world information lacks strict dependency chains; it relies on loose causality/inclusion. LLMs possess massive pre-trained associative spaces; passing raw keywords + semantic vectors triggers the correct associative touchpoints instantaneously without explicit graph edges.
  • Memory-Knowledge Isomorphism & Limitation: Memory and knowledge are isomorphic at the root [1] [2]. Limitation: Corti does not currently distill memory into structured academic knowledge. Resolution: Semantic keywords/vectors are the most cost-effective trigger mechanism to activate LLM's pre-trained latent space.
  • Theoretical Grounding: "Memory and knowledge share an isomorphic graph base $G = (V, E)$. The distinction is operational (meta-attribute variance), not structural (data format divergence)." [1]
• Dual Ingestion Paths:
  • Silent Background Digestion: Automatic, silent background ingestion of conversation logs from active agent sessions.
  • Explicit Agent PUT: Direct, programmatically triggered memory writes committed by the agent.
• Retrieval & Context Injection:
  • Startup Fragment Pre-injection: Pre-loads random memory fragments at session startup ➔ resident context. Prepares cognitive triggers for keyword activation.
  • Targeted Prompt Enrichment: Per-prompt targeted semantic search. Directly appends retrieved memory context to user input.
• Flexible Sharing & Isolation:
  • Multi-dimensional namespace isolation across 5 axes: app_id, user_id, agent_id, project_id, session_id.
  • Namespace mapping: identical setting values across axes ➔ memory sharing; distinct setting values ➔ absolute memory isolation.
• Markdown Source of Truth — Human-readable, diffable, Git-versioned .md files (~/.corti/). Rebuilds 100% from flat files.
• Sub-Second Cascade Watcher — Direct edits (VS Code, Obsidian, Neovim) ➔ automatic SQLite metadata & Postgres vector synchronization.
• Self-Evolving Offline Memory Engine (OME) — Background reflection loops compress raw conversation logs into atomic facts and dynamic profiles.
• Hybrid Postgres / PGLite Vector Search — Merges pgvector semantic similarity, BM25 keyword matching, and scalar SQL filters in single-query execution.
• Seamless Agent Integrations — Plugins for Hermes Agent, Claude Code, DeepSeek Harness (dsh), FastAPI HTTP endpoints, and CLI.

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💾 Storage Stack & Path Layout

Three-piece embedded engine. Markdown = Single Source of Truth. SQLite + Postgres = Derived, 100% Rebuildable.

1. SQLite State Manager

• Role: Primary state engine, audit logger, and raw conversation buffer.
• Storage Mechanism: Collects raw conversation stream inputs. Stores them as structured JSON blobs / block objects representing unprocessed message arrays. Serves as canonical source for all downstream compiled memory artifacts.

2. PostgreSQL (PG) Memory Core

• Role: High-performance carrier substrate of persistent, query-ready memories.
• Storage Mechanism: Evaluates raw Markdown files, "chews" (digests) semantic structures, and compiles them into hierarchical Postgres table schemas:
  • Episode: Individual Agent Session / Conversation segment (conversation streams chunked logically by topic boundaries).
  • Facts: Refined and distilled semantic outputs extracted from Episodes. Carries structured attributes, subject indexing, and concise keyword-triggered title metadata.

Layer	Technology	Function / Assets	Rebuildability
Truth	Plain Markdown (.md)	Canonical memory content, human-editable, portable.	—
State	SQLite (aiosqlite)	Raw transaction buffer (JSON blobs), audit log, OME state.	✅ Rebuildable from .md
Index	Postgres + pgvector	Epised/Facts vector + BM25 hierarchical search index.	✅ Rebuildable from .md

Path Namespace Mapping:

~/.corti/                                ← Memory Root (CORTI_ROOT)
├── <app_id>/                                  ← App isolation boundary
│   └── <project_id>/                          ← Project isolation boundary
│       ├── users/
│       │   └── <user_id>/
│       │       ├── user.md                    ← Single-file rewrite (User Profile)
│       │       ├── episodes/                  ← Daily-log append (Raw conversations)
│       │       └── .atomic_facts/             ← Daily-log append (OME extracted facts)
│       └── agents/
│           └── <agent_id>/
│               └── .foresights/               ← Daily-log append (OME extracted foresight)
└── .index/                                    ← Ignored system cache (SQLite + Postgres)

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🔄 Memory Lifecycle Pipeline

Phase 1: Stream Accumulation

• /add endpoint buffers raw messages per (session, app, project) in SQLite.
• Real-time boundary detector evaluates message transitions ➔ triggers extraction.

Phase 2: Boundary Ingestion (Sync)

• /flush endpoint triggers manual/forced boundary extraction.
• Extracted MemCell written synchronously to episodes/episode-<date>.md on disk.
• HTTP response returns immediately after Markdown commit.

Phase 3: Offline Synthesis (Async OME)

• Offline Memory Engine (OME) schedules asynchronous synthesis strategies.
• Evaluates raw episodes ➔ generates derived Markdown assets:
  • atomic_facts (individual facts)
  • foresights (predictive context)
  • user.md (user profiles)

Phase 4: Cascade Sync (FS Watcher)

• Native file system events (watchdog on Linux/macOS) intercept Markdown writes.
• Pending changes queued to durable SQLite table md_change_state (prevents crash loss).
• Multi-threaded workers pull from queue ➔ compute incremental SHA256 diffs ➔ re-embed only mutated entries ➔ upsert Postgres (Episodes / Facts schemas).

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🚀 Quick Start

1. One-Command Install

curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/m1k-rsch/corti/main/install.sh | bash

What this does: checks Docker → pulls the pre-built image from Docker Hub → seeds ~/.corti/ with default config → auto-installs agent plugins (Hermes, Claude Code, DeepSeek Harness) if detected.

Wire a single agent only (Corti server already running elsewhere):

curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/m1k-rsch/corti/main/install.sh | bash -s -- --only-dsh      # DeepSeek Harness
curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/m1k-rsch/corti/main/install.sh | bash -s -- --only-hermes   # Hermes Agent
curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/m1k-rsch/corti/main/install.sh | bash -s -- --only-claude   # Claude Code

Requirements: Docker 24+.

Slim variant — if you already have PostgreSQL 18+ with pgvector:

export DB_HOST=... DB_PORT=5432 DB_NAME=corti DB_USER=corti DB_PASSWORD=...
curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/m1k-rsch/corti/main/install.sh | bash -s slim

Slim image: ~400 MB vs 1.2 GB all-in-one. Pinned version: bash -s v0.2-slim.

2. Start the Server

docker run -d --name corti \
  -p 5473:5473 \
  -v ~/.corti:/home/app/.corti \
  m1research/corti:latest
# Slim variant (external PG):
# docker run -d --name corti -p 5473:5473 -v ~/.corti:/home/app/.corti \
#   -e DB_HOST=... -e DB_NAME=corti -e DB_USER=corti -e DB_PASSWORD=... \
#   m1research/corti:slim
# Verify
curl http://localhost:5473/health
# → {"status":"ok"}

3. Store & Search (HTTP API)

# Store preference
curl -s -X POST http://localhost:5473/api/v1/memory/add \
  -H 'Content-Type: application/json' \
  -d '{"user_id":"default_user","messages":[{"role":"user","content":"Prefer strictly typed Python, dark mode UI","timestamp":'"$(date +%s)000"'}]}'

# Search memory store
curl -s -X POST http://localhost:5473/api/v1/memory/search \
  -H 'Content-Type: application/json' \
  -d '{"user_id":"default_user","query":"dev styling preference"}'

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⚙️ Installation & Plugin Integration

1. One-Command Docker Install

The install script (install.sh) handles everything automatically:

1. Docker pull — fetches pre-built m1research/corti:latest from Docker Hub (no clone, no build)
2. Data seeding — extracts default config from the image into ~/.corti/corti.toml
3. Agent plugin installation — extracts plugin source from the image into the agent's local plugins directory:

Agent	Target	Source
Hermes Agent	~/.hermes/plugins/corti/	src/integrations/hermes/
Claude Code	~/.claude/skills/corti/	src/integrations/claude-code/
DeepSeek Harness	every ~/.dsh/profiles/* (via dsh plugin add)	src/integrations/deepseek-harness/

Plugins are copied (not symlinked), so they survive repo updates and work independently. The dsh plugin instead installs through dsh's own pnpm-backed profile manager — from the GitHub repo directly, so it works even without the Docker image on the same host.

2. Manual Plugin Install

If the install script's auto-detection didn't pick up your agent, or you installed a new agent after Corti — pull the plugins directly from the GitHub repo (no Docker required):

# Hermes Agent
curl -fsSL https://github.com/m1k-rsch/corti/archive/refs/heads/main.tar.gz | \
  tar -xz --strip-components=3 -C ~/.hermes/plugins/ corti-main/src/integrations/hermes
mv ~/.hermes/plugins/hermes ~/.hermes/plugins/corti
hermes plugins enable corti

# Claude Code — dropped into ~/.claude/skills/ for auto-discovery
# (hooks/hooks.json + MCP auto-loaded on next session, zero CLI)
curl -fsSL https://github.com/m1k-rsch/corti/archive/refs/heads/main.tar.gz | \
  tar -xz --strip-components=3 -C ~/.claude/skills/ corti-main/src/integrations/claude-code
mv ~/.claude/skills/claude-code ~/.claude/skills/corti

# DeepSeek Harness (dsh) — installs into every existing dsh profile
dsh plugin --profile web add https://github.com/m1k-rsch/corti#src/integrations/deepseek-harness
# then point it at your Corti server (once):
#   echo "CORTI_BASE_URL=http://<corti-host>:5473" >> ~/.dsh/.env

Pin to a specific version by replacing main with a tag (e.g. v0.2).

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🛠 Design Philosophy: Feature Removals

Corti actively removes legacy Agent Case and Agent Skill modules from the execution loop.

1. Removal of Agent Case (Trajectory Summaries)

• Original Feature: Reviewed memory histories to summarize individual Agent trajectories and task scenarios for future replays.
• Removal Reason: Trajectory contexts are already cleanly digested into the base hierarchical schemas (episode, facts, subject, title). High-parameter LLMs contain massive native pre-trained intelligence. When a semantic cue is matched, passing raw facts and conversation logs directly into the context is mathematically sufficient. The LLM can generalize and resolve local tasks dynamically. Artificial pre-summarization is redundant.

2. Removal of Agent Skill (Custom Capability Stores)

• Original Feature: Provided execution environments for registered Agent capability scripts.
• Removal Reason: Legitimate Agent platforms (Hermes, Claude Code, OpenClaw) possess robust, native, open skill registries and plugins. Repeating these capabilities inside the memory substrate violates minimalism.

3. Core Architectural Philosophies

• Linux Single-Tool Philosophy: Adherence to radical minimalism. Focus entirely on optimizing the memory state layer to the absolute theoretical limit. Never duplicate services handled by surrounding execution chassis.
• Mitigating Cognitive Overlap: The primary pain point of autonomous agents is "not knowing what they do not know". Memory exists to guide prompt context to the correct coordinate in the model's pre-trained latent space. In the 2026 AI-driven development era, top-level architectural blueprints and prompt context selection are far more valuable than local code generation scripts. Selecting and attaching correct facts/episodes to prompt context is fully sufficient for high-parameter LLM reasoning.

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🔬 Theoretical Foundations & Cognitive Grounding

1. Updated Complementary Learning Systems (CLS)

• Citation: Kumaran, D., Hassabis, D., & McClelland, J. L. (2016). What learning systems do intelligent agents need? Complementary learning systems theory updated. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 20(7), 350-375. [1]
• Finding: Neocortical learning rates scale with consistency of new input against existing schema topology.
• Relevance: Verifies memory consolidation processes scale on mutual compatibility; hippocampal replay trains neocortical generative structures. Empirically anchors the Memory-Knowledge Isomorphism Hypothesis (MKIH).

2. Tolman-Eichenbaum Machine (TEM)

• Citation: Whittington, J. C., Muller, T. H., Mark, S., Chen, G., Barry, C., Burgess, N., & Behrens, T. E. (2020). The Tolman-Eichenbaum Machine: Unifying space and relational memory through generalization in the hippocampal formation. Cell, 183(5), 1249-1263. [2]
• Finding: Medial entorhinal cortex (MEC) forms abstract structural knowledge basis ↔ hippocampus binds sensory episodic memories.
• Relevance: Proves memory and abstract schema share identical spatial basis representations; distinction is topological conjunction, not data format.

3. Clone-Structured Cognitive Graph (CSCG)

• Citation: George, D., Rikhye, R. V., Gothoskar, N., Guntupalli, J. S., Dedieu, A., & Lázaro-Gredilla, J. (2021). Clone-structured graph representations enable flexible learning and vicarious evaluation of cognitive maps. Nature Communications, 12(1), 2392.
• Finding: Space navigation, relational reasoning, and episodic maps consolidate within identical unified graph structures.
• Relevance: Mathematical validation of multi-format memory-schema convergence under unified graph topologies.

4. Empirical Validation: LoCoMo Dataset

• Evaluation baseline: LoCoMo benchmark (Maharana et al., 2024), 1,540 multi-session evaluation queries.
• Results Matrix:
  • Single-hop Fact Retrieval: 94.0%
  • Multi-hop Reason Ingestion: 91.0%
  • Dialogue-Grounded Open-Domain: 80.2%
  • Temporal Sequence Reasoning: 95.5%
  • Weighted Average: 93.3%
• Theoretical Interpretation:
  • Simple semantic vector retrieval + temporal metadata-filtering resolves 95.5% of complex chronological reasoning.
  • Confirms "Keyword + Semantic Similarity + Temporal Metadata" is mathematically sufficient to trigger context-appropriate recall.
  • Bypasses the high parsing latency, cost, and parse-divergence bottlenecks of formal knowledge graph construction.

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⚖️ EverOS Provenance & Minimalist Production Overhaul

Corti originally borrowed code structures and core concepts from the upstream EverOS codebase (Apache-2.0). However, the system has undergone deep local redevelopment, custom architecture optimization, and design philosophy shifts.

Minimalist Engineering & Feature Removal:

• Applied strict UNIX-style minimalism to optimize execution paths and reduce cognitive bloat.
• Removed agent_case (trajectory summaries) and agent_skill (capability stores) entirely. Upstream EverOS retains these components; Corti prunes them because high-parameter LLM latent spaces need only raw semantic triggers (episode and facts schemas) rather than redundant, pre-summarized local structures and custom execution registries.

Upstream Open-Source Limitations:

• The LanceDB Bottleneck: Upstream EverOS relies on LanceDB—an embedded columnar store designed for flat, high-read research data. In persistent daemon workloads, LanceDB loads full tables into memory and copies during mutation. This results in severe, unrecoverable memory leaks and thread-locking, rendering it completely unsuitable for multi-agent self-hosted production.
• SaaS Commercial Split: EverOS open-source core acts as a funnel for their proprietary cloud SaaS. Consequently, its "out-of-the-box" local self-hosted readiness is low, lacking multi-tenant transactional safety, concurrent execution pipelines, and robust local persistence guarantees.

Custom Corti Enhancements:

• Transactional Postgres Overhaul: Replaced the entire retrieval chassis with a robust, production-grade PostgreSQL / pgvector backend (offering embedded PGLite support for lightweight instances), resolving storage leaks and securing transactional safety.
• Persistent API Daemon: Overhauled execution-loop CLI overhead, replacing it with an active, concurrent FastAPI daemon to serve concurrent Agent swarms safely.
• Lightweight Memory Fragments: Dumped prompt-bloating full-episode ingestion, replacing it with title-based fragment retrieval. Injecting 20 concise metadata fragments widens the recall trigger surface while preserving token context boundaries.
• Plugin Overhaul: Fully rewrote both the Hermes and Claude Code plugins to communicate seamlessly with the self-hosted local daemon (decoupling them from cloud API bindings).

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📄 Footnotes & Citations

[1] Kumaran, D., Hassabis, D., & McClelland, J. L. (2016). What learning systems do intelligent agents need? Complementary learning systems theory updated. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 20(7), 350-375.

[2] Whittington, J. C., Muller, T. H., Mark, S., Chen, G., Barry, C., Burgess, N., & Behrens, T. E. (2020). The Tolman-Eichenbaum Machine: Unifying space and relational memory through generalization in the hippocampal formation. Cell, 183(5), 1249-1263.

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📄 License

Apache-2.0 License.