---
description: A Project memory needs both its user's words and the reason those words were filed under that project. Neither alone proves work was completed.
tags: [REM, Memory, Design]
---

# A folder is a route, not a proof

The first Project memories in a private trial looked useful. They described
what the user wanted to collect, what they had asked to filter, and where a
later folder needed organizing. A source audit caught two opposite ways a
page could mislead. One candidate tied old work to a newly linked subfolder
without a message making that connection. Another audit could see each user
message but not the session folder that had led the mapper to place it on this
Project page. It treated the whole older conversation as unrelated.

The distinction matters. A coding session's mapped folder explains why its
inputs appear together. It does not prove the requested system exists, that
someone ran a crawler, or that a later subfolder contains the older work. We
now give the audit that folder provenance alongside each cited input and show
it in the owner's source dialog with the same limit. The page can describe
folder-scoped conversation history while leaving implementation and
subfolder identity unknown.

We also stopped using citations as a mere formatting check. The Project
candidate must cite an openable original, and a separate audit compares each
claim with its adjacent source. A request for a list is still a request;
permission to commit does not show what was committed. When one audit finds a
problem, the writer may revise the candidate a bounded number of times. A
failed candidate stays available for inspection while the previous page
remains intact.

This approach costs extra model turns and can still refuse a useful page. It
buys a clearer boundary between what the notebook observed and what it would
be tempting to infer. The next test is a broader set of written Project pages
with source-by-source review at desktop and phone widths. A single passing
page cannot establish whole-notebook accuracy.

The [1.9.0a31 preview notes](/releases/1.9.0a31) explain the shipped guard and
the single-page retry command.