Agent skill
read-memories
Search past Claude Code session logs to recover your own context. Invoke this proactively when you need to recall past decisions, patterns, or unresolved work — either across all projects or scoped to the current one.
Install this agent skill to your Project
npx add-skill https://github.com/tobi/imsa_data/tree/main/.pi/skills/read-memories
SKILL.md
Use this to recover your own context from past sessions. Do NOT narrate the process to the user — silently run the query, absorb the results, and continue with enriched context.
$0 is the keyword to search for.
Pass --here as a second argument ($1) to scope the search to the current project only.
Step 1 — Set the search path
ALL_PROJECTS="$HOME/.claude/projects/*/*.jsonl"
CURRENT_PROJECT="$HOME/.claude/projects/$(echo "$PWD" | sed 's|[/_]|-|g')/*.jsonl"
Use $CURRENT_PROJECT if $1 is --here, otherwise use $ALL_PROJECTS.
Step 2 — Query
duckdb :memory: -c "
SELECT
regexp_extract(filename, 'projects/([^/]+)/', 1) AS project,
strftime(timestamp::TIMESTAMPTZ, '%Y-%m-%d %H:%M') AS ts,
message.role AS role,
message.content::VARCHAR AS content
FROM read_ndjson('<SEARCH_PATH>', auto_detect=true, ignore_errors=true, filename=true)
WHERE message::VARCHAR ILIKE '%<KEYWORD>%'
AND message.role IS NOT NULL
ORDER BY timestamp
LIMIT 40;
"
Replace <SEARCH_PATH> and <KEYWORD> with the resolved values before running.
Step 3 — Handle large result sets
If Step 2 returns more than 40 rows or the output is very large, offload the results to a temporary DuckDB file so you can query them interactively without flooding the conversation context:
Resolve the state directory first:
STATE_DIR=""
test -d .duckdb-skills && STATE_DIR=".duckdb-skills"
PROJECT_ROOT="$(git rev-parse --show-toplevel 2>/dev/null || echo "$PWD")"
PROJECT_ID="$(echo "$PROJECT_ROOT" | tr '/' '-')"
test -d "$HOME/.duckdb-skills/$PROJECT_ID" && STATE_DIR="$HOME/.duckdb-skills/$PROJECT_ID"
# Fall back to project-local if neither exists
test -z "$STATE_DIR" && STATE_DIR=".duckdb-skills" && mkdir -p "$STATE_DIR"
duckdb "$STATE_DIR/memories.duckdb" -c "
CREATE OR REPLACE TABLE memories AS
SELECT
regexp_extract(filename, 'projects/([^/]+)/', 1) AS project,
timestamp::TIMESTAMPTZ AS ts,
message.role AS role,
message.content::VARCHAR AS content
FROM read_ndjson('<SEARCH_PATH>', auto_detect=true, ignore_errors=true, filename=true)
WHERE message::VARCHAR ILIKE '%<KEYWORD>%'
AND message.role IS NOT NULL
ORDER BY timestamp;
"
Then query the table interactively to drill down:
duckdb "$STATE_DIR/memories.duckdb" -c "SELECT count() FROM memories;"
duckdb "$STATE_DIR/memories.duckdb" -c "FROM memories WHERE content ILIKE '%<narrower term>%' LIMIT 20;"
Clean up when done:
rm -f "$STATE_DIR/memories.duckdb"
Step 4 — Internalize
From the results, extract:
- Decisions made and their rationale
- Patterns and conventions established
- Unresolved items or open TODOs
- Any corrections the user made to your prior behavior
Use this to inform your current response. Do not repeat back the raw logs to the user.
Cross-skill integration
- Session state: If a
state.sqlexists (in.duckdb-skills/or$HOME/.duckdb-skills/<project-id>/), you can add the memories table to the session temporarily by appending an ATTACH to it — useful if the user wants to cross-reference memories with their data. - Error troubleshooting: If DuckDB returns errors when reading JSONL logs, use
/duckdb-skills:duckdb-docs <error keywords>to search for guidance.
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