session 2026-08-24: the heap got a dynamo — thread-query.py + daybook-cue.py, 11 user-memories harvested to the vault

- thread-query.py: the turning. Queries both corpora with the pulling thread, excluding
  the recency slice (/wake-up reaches 0.71% of an 859,803-word corpus) and favouring age.
  Wired into /wake-up §2.b.3, replacing a described-not-invoked grep step. Trial
  pre-registered, graded 2026-10-05 from --log. Caught PASS-BUT-FALSELY on its first live
  run at 14/14 green; rescored on windowed co-occurrence, length-bias control added.
- daybook-cue.py: PostToolUse cue for the daily note. Diagnosed from the record — the
  hook only ever CREATED and nothing ever prompted filling. 16/16, fail-open, never blocks.
- All 11 user-* memories harvested into the vault (12 notes, 10 into 09. Atlas of Roots,
  empty since 2025-09-29); each memory file back-pointed, vault note canonical for the idea.
- N-now corrected in MEMORY.md: 49/84, down 11 — the counter is a rolling window.

Steward-authorized. Trials: thread-query + Smart Connections, both graded 2026-10-05.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_01JQKeKY9T9d95KpvHwwok8T

claude/governance/thread-query-trial.md

@@ -0,0 +1,69 @@
+# thread-query.py — pre-registered trial
+
+**Built and wired 2026-08-24 on steward authorization.** Pre-registered *before* it runs, so the
+verdict is not written afterwards to match whatever happened.
+
+## What it is
+
+`~/dotfiles/scripts/thread-query.py`, invoked from `/wake-up` §2.b.3 with `--log`. It queries the
+memory corpus **and** the vault using the pulling thread, **excluding the recency slice the wake
+already loads** and **favouring older material**. Returns pointers and literal matching lines,
+never summaries.
+
+## Why
+
+Measured 2026-08-24: `/wake-up` reads **6,107 words of an 859,803-word memory corpus — 0.71%**,
+always the newest. Everything else is dark unless someone goes looking. Twice that day someone did,
+by hand, and both greps produced the session's best findings (the Hearth definition in a December
+Compass document; the humic layer from April). This turns that hand-motion into an instrument.
+
+The step was previously **described** in the skill ("grep the memory dir…") and fired almost never
+— the same described-not-invoked gap that had the link canary hand-typed twice.
+
+Motion comes from the current work, not the calendar. Matuschak's report is that scheduled
+resurfacing fails because you are thinking about something else when it arrives.
+
+## ⚠ Known weakness, stated before the trial rather than after
+
+Live run 2026-08-24: results are **plausible but noisy**. Generic terms in a thread — *vault*,
+*instruments*, *conventions* — are this corpus's own background vocabulary and pull weak matches.
+Threads phrased with distinctive terms do markedly better. **No further blind tuning:** more
+adjustment without evidence is guessing, and the trial is the evidence.
+
+## What was already caught, and how
+
+**PASS-BUT-FALSELY on first live run**, at 14/14 selftests green. Scoring on distinct terms present
+anywhere in a document made Carruthers' *Book of Memory* (1.6 MB) and Yates' *Art of Memory* (1 MB)
+the top hits for every query — a million-word book contains "instruments" and "heap" by accident.
+**Presence over an unbounded document measures length, not relevance.** The fixture held only small
+uniform files, so the selftest certified its author's blind spot — the identical shape
+`vault-links.py` hit on 2026-08-23.
+
+Fixed by scoring on **distinct terms co-occurring inside a ~40-line window**. A length-bias control
+is now in the selftest (16 checks).
+
+Also caught: the first archive fix reintroduced the 2026-08-23 substring bug, and was replaced by
+**adopting `vault-links.py`'s rule rather than writing a second one**.
+
+## Pre-registered questions — grade 2026-10-05
+
+File the result whichever way it falls. **Grade from `thread-query-log.jsonl`, not from memory** —
+a trial graded by recollection has the same shape as the obligation that failed the daily note.
+
+1. **How many wakes surfaced something the steward would have wanted and would not otherwise have
+   found?** Count them. Zero is a real answer.
+2. **Was any of it dormant** — older than three months and not already linked from the thread?
+   Recent-and-obvious does not count; the deficit is re-encounter, not search.
+3. **What fraction of runs returned nothing?** A tool that returns something every time is probably
+   returning noise.
+4. **Did the two-pointer cap ever cut something better than what was shown?**
+
+**Falsifier.** If (1) is zero or near-zero, the step comes out of `/wake-up`. If (3) is near zero
+while (1) is low, the scoring is returning noise and the tool comes out. A trial that can only
+conclude "keep it" is not a trial.
+
+## Related
+
+- `97. Tools and Systems/Smart Connections — six-week trial.md` — the *while-you-write* half, same
+  grading date. This is the *at-the-wake* half.
+- `08. Notes/The compost heap — putrefaction as a phase.md` — the figure. This is the turning.