Link

Local, source-backed memory for LLM agents.

Link gives Codex, Claude, Cursor, Kiro, VS Code, Copilot, and other MCP clients the same durable memory about you and your work. It stays on your machine as plain Markdown, with sources, backlinks, graph context, review state, and an audit trail you can inspect.

It follows Andrej Karpathy's LLM Wiki pattern: keep knowledge outside the chat window, make claims inspectable, and let context compound over time.

Product site · First 10 minutes · Why Link? · Web UI · MCP setup · CLI · Security · Changelog

Why It Exists

Most agent sessions start from zero. You re-explain preferences, repo decisions, project constraints, and why something matters. Link turns that repeated context into local memory agents can query.

Pain	Link's answer
Agents forget you between sessions.	Save reviewed preferences, decisions, facts, and project context.
Notes are private or messy.	Keep raw sources local, then turn them into source-backed Markdown.
Context windows are expensive.	Return compact query packets with provenance and follow-up actions.
Memory needs trust.	Every page and memory can be inspected, reviewed, archived, or forgotten.

Quick Start

Run the demo first. It creates a complete local wiki with raw sources, wiki pages, one starter memory, graph data, and query packets ready to inspect.

macOS with Homebrew:

brew install gowtham0992/link/link
link demo
link next link-demo
link serve link-demo

Windows or source checkout:

git clone https://github.com/gowtham0992/link.git
cd link
py link.py demo
py link.py next link-demo
py link.py serve link-demo

Or from source:

git clone https://github.com/gowtham0992/link.git
cd link
python3 link.py demo
python3 link.py next link-demo
python3 link.py serve link-demo

Open:

http://127.0.0.1:3000
http://127.0.0.1:3000/graph
http://127.0.0.1:3000/health

The web viewer is for local use only. It binds to 127.0.0.1, has no user accounts or authentication, and should not be exposed to the internet unless you add your own auth layer.

For the shortest guided proof path, run link welcome link-demo.

Try the value loop:

link query "why does Link help agents?" link-demo --budget small
link brief "working on agent memory" link-demo
link benchmark "agent memory" link-demo
link health link-demo

The /health page mirrors the readiness loop in the browser: validation state, interrupted writes, memory review status, and copyable repair commands. The viewer itself stays document-first: common paths are in the top nav, deeper tools live under more, and structured wiki pages get a local contents outline plus related-page links from the graph. Home shows recently updated pages, while /all and search group results by page type with chips for narrowing larger wikis.

From a source checkout, use python3 link.py ...:

python3 link.py query "why does Link help agents?" link-demo --budget small
python3 link.py brief "working on agent memory" link-demo
python3 link.py benchmark "agent memory" link-demo
python3 link.py health link-demo

The generated demo is the public proof wiki. The repo's root wiki/ directory is only a scaffold for local development and personal testing. Generated content inside wiki/, raw/, and link-demo/ is ignored by git so personal memory is not published by accident.

For local scale checks from a source checkout, run:

python3 scripts/smoke_large_wiki.py --pages 10000

This generates a temporary synthetic wiki, verifies bounded graph/query payloads, and reports cache timing, persistent-cache reuse, search, query, graph, and health signals without touching your real Link wiki.

Three Ways To Use Link

Pick the surface that matches how you work. They all read and write the same local Markdown wiki.

Web UI Read the local wiki, then review memory, ingest, graph, audits, captures, and explanations.

CLI Script readiness, query packets, briefs, validation, backup, benchmark, and repair.

MCP Let Codex, Claude, Cursor, Kiro, VS Code, Copilot, and other agents recall memory.

Install For Your Agent

Run one installer from the cloned checkout:

bash integrations/codex/install.sh
bash integrations/kiro/install.sh
bash integrations/claude-code/install.sh
bash integrations/cursor/install.sh
bash integrations/copilot/install.sh
bash integrations/vscode/install.sh
bash integrations/antigravity/install.sh

Installers create or update ~/link, install or upgrade link-mcp, write lightweight agent instructions, and preserve existing wiki data on reinstall. Use --project when a repo needs separate project memory.

The shell installers are intended for macOS/Linux-style agent config paths. On Windows, use the source commands above plus the MCP-only config below until your agent has a Windows-specific installer.

Then ask your agent:

is Link ready?
brief me from Link before we continue
ingest raw/notes.md into Link
remember that I prefer short release notes
query Link for the release process
what does Link remember about local personal memory?

MCP-only install

python3 -m pip install --upgrade link-mcp

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "link": {
      "command": "python3",
      "args": ["-m", "link_mcp", "--wiki", "~/link/wiki"]
    }
  }
}

On macOS/Homebrew Python, if pip reports externally-managed-environment, use a dedicated venv:

python3 -m venv ~/.link-mcp-venv
~/.link-mcp-venv/bin/python -m pip install --upgrade pip link-mcp

Full setup: MCP guide.

How Link Works

Link separates source-backed knowledge from durable agent memory:

1. Drop raw notes, transcripts, articles, and project context into raw/.
2. Agents compile those sources into inspectable pages under wiki/.
3. Explicit "remember" requests become reviewable memory pages.
4. Queries retrieve compact MCP context from both the wiki and memory layer.

The storage model is plain and inspectable:

Layer	What lives there
raw/	Original notes, transcripts, articles, PDFs, screenshots, and project files.
wiki/	Source-backed pages, concepts, entities, explorations, comparisons, and memories.
MCP tools	Compact packets agents can use without dumping the whole wiki into context.

If a raw file was already ingested and later edited, link ingest-status marks it as stale and tells your agent to refresh the existing source page instead of creating a duplicate.

What Agents Get

• query_link: an answer-ready packet with relevant memories, pages, graph neighborhood, reasons for selection, budget limits, and follow-up actions.
• memory_brief: a compact pre-work brief with user/project preferences, active context, review warnings, and safe memory-use rules.
• ingest_status: exact next steps for raw files, including source safety, stale ingest detection, validation, and memory proposal guidance.
• remember_memory: durable local memory with duplicate/conflict checks, review state, provenance, and audit logging.
• explain_memory: why a memory exists, what it links to, whether it is ready for recall, and what needs review.

Agent Contract

Agents should use Link in this order:

1. link_status to check readiness and safe next actions.
2. starter_prompts when the user asks what to try first.
3. ingest_status before touching raw sources.
4. query_link for compact answer-ready context.
5. memory_brief before longer work.
6. get_graph_summary when graph context is useful but the full graph would be noisy.
7. backup_wiki before broad repair or migration work.
8. validate_wiki after ingest or broad wiki edits.

Full MCP tool list: MCP setup.

Privacy And Safety

Link itself is local-first:

• No telemetry in the installed CLI, MCP server, local web UI, or wiki runtime.
• No hosted backend.
• No external API calls from serve.py or link-mcp.
• Raw sources and generated wiki pages are ignored by git by default.
• link backup excludes raw/ unless you explicitly pass --include-raw.
• Secret-looking values are detected in raw sources, captures, and release hygiene checks.
• The local web server binds to 127.0.0.1 and is not meant to be exposed to the internet without additional auth.

Before sharing a repo, demo, or wiki:

python3 link.py doctor
python3 link.py validate
python3 scripts/check_release_hygiene.py

More detail: Security guide.

Documentation

Need	Go here
Run Link for the first time	First 10 minutes
Decide whether Link fits	Why Link?
Use the local viewer	Web UI
Understand raw/wiki/memory	Concepts
Configure MCP	MCP setup
Find a command	CLI reference
Use local HTTP endpoints	HTTP API
Review security boundaries	Security model
Fix setup issues	Troubleshooting

Contributing

Contributions should come through pull requests targeting main. The develop branch is a maintainer integration branch for larger release work before it is proposed to main.

Before opening a PR:

python3 -m ruff check .
python3 -m pytest tests
python3 scripts/check_release_hygiene.py
python3 scripts/check_runtime_duplication.py
python3 scripts/check_tool_contract.py
git diff --check

Full contributor guide: Contributing.

Do not include personal wiki data, raw sources, registry tokens, .env files, or local MCP credentials in a PR.

If Link helps your agents remember better, star it on GitHub so more people can find it.