Reference

Files and paths

Every file Minne writes, where it lives, which half of the app owns it, and what happens if you delete it.

Minne writes to two directories and nowhere else. One holds your memory as plain markdown; the other holds what is derived from it or must be kept private.

#The two roots

Root	Holds	Mode
`~/Minne`	The memory: schema, wiki, raw captures. Plain markdown.	default
`~/Library/Application Support/Minne`	Search index, sync state, credentials, brain config.	`0700`

Both are created on first run, and both can be moved:

Variable	Overrides
`MINNE_MEMORY_ROOT`	`~/Minne`
`MINNE_APP_SUPPORT_DIR`	`~/Library/Application Support/Minne`

The Swift app and the brain read the same two variables, because the two halves must agree on where minne.db is. See CLI and environment.

#`~/Minne`

Path	Written by	Notes
`SCHEMA.md`	seeded once	Human-owned. Never rewritten. See Steering with SCHEMA.md.
`index.md`	the agent	One `- [[Title]] — summary` line per page, under five headings. The rest is yours.
`log.md`	the agent	Append-only. One `## <ISO timestamp> — <pass>` entry per pass.
`sources/YYYY-MM-DD/HHmm-<app>.md`	the app	Raw captures, one file per app per hour. Append-only.
`wiki/<slug>.md`	the agent	`person`, `project` and `topic` pages.
`wiki/daily/YYYY-MM-DD.md`	the agent	One per day.
`wiki/style/style-<app>[-<recipient>].md`	the agent and the brain	Prose from the agent; `## Register` and `## Standing guidance` maintained mechanically.

HHmm is the start of the hour bucket in local time: a capture at 14:31 lands in 1400-safari.md.

The four log passes are bootstrap, sync, lint and chat. The five index.md headings are People, Projects, Topics, Daily logs and Writing style.

#`~/Library/Application Support/Minne`

Path	Written by	Contents
`minne.db`	the app	SQLite FTS5 index over every snapshot. The brain opens it read-only.
`minne.db-wal`, `minne.db-shm`	SQLite	WAL sidecars. The database runs in WAL mode so a reader never blocks a capture.
`sync-state.json`	the brain	Sync watermark, last pass summaries, voice-register and steer counters.
`auth.json`	the brain	Provider credentials. Written atomically, `0600` in a `0700` directory.
`config.json`	the brain	Which provider and model you chose. No secrets.

minne.db indexes the already-masked capture text, the window title, the app name and the URL, plus the source path and section number that reconstruct a citation. Nothing here is memory, and none of it is meant to be edited by hand.

App settings — blacklists, retention days, hotkey choices — are not in either root. They live in UserDefaults under sh.minne.app; see Settings.

#The search index cannot be rebuilt

The code calls the index "rebuildable from the sources", and in principle it is: every row can be derived from the markdown under sources/. No code does it. What actually happens when the file goes missing is that a new, empty index is created, new captures are indexed into it from that moment, and the earlier snapshots stay on disk as markdown that nothing can search.

Your markdown and your wiki are untouched either way. The sync pass also notices that its watermark now sits past the end of the index and resets it to zero, so the surviving backlog is re-read rather than skipped.

#Naming rules

Thing	Rule
Wiki slug	NFKD-folded, lowercased, runs of non-alphanumerics collapsed to `-`, cut at 60 characters.
Source app slug	The same folding, cut at 48 characters. Falls back to the bundle id, then to `app`.
Style page title	`Style — <App>`, or `Style — <App> — <Recipient>`.
Citation	`sources/YYYY-MM-DD/HHmm-<app>.md#N`, `N` 1-based. The only citation form.
Link target	A page's title, its slug, or its path without `.md`, matched case-insensitively.

#Page frontmatter

Flat key: value pairs only. Nesting, indentation and duplicate keys are all parse errors.

Field	Required on	Value
`title`	every page	Unique across the wiki; it is what `[[wikilinks]]` resolve to.
`type`	every page	`person`, `project`, `topic`, `daily` or `style`. `index` and `log` for the two root pages.
`summary`	every page	One or two sentences. Shown by retrieval before the page is opened.
`sources`	every page	List of citations, `[]` when there are none yet.
`last_updated`	every page	`YYYY-MM-DD` or an ISO timestamp. Always stamped from the clock.
`date`	`daily`	`YYYY-MM-DD`.
`aliases`	—	Optional, on a person. Preserved on write; nothing reads it.
`status`	—	Optional, on a project: `active`, `paused`, `done`. Preserved on write; nothing reads it.

Source files carry a different, fixed header: type: source, app, bundle_id, date, hour, started. Each appended snapshot section then carries time, window, and optionally url, truncated and redactions.

#Editing by hand

File	Verdict
`SCHEMA.md`	Yours. Edit freely.
`index.md`	Safe. Only the machine-maintained entry line is touched.
`wiki/**`	Safe, except that an active sync pass may replace a page body wholesale, and the two machine sections on a style page are replaced in place.
`log.md`	Append-only by convention.
`sources/**`	Do not edit. Snapshot numbering derives from the highest `## Snapshot N` heading, so an edit can break citations.
Application Support	Do not edit.

Deleting a wiki page leaves a broken link in index.md for the next lint pass to fix. Deleting SCHEMA.md, index.md or log.md gets a fresh seeded copy.

#Retention

Raw captures older than the retention window are deleted a whole day-directory at a time, together with their rows in minne.db. The default window is 90 days; 0 means forever. The wiki is never pruned. See Settings → Privacy.

#What a wipe removes

Delete All Memory… in Settings → Privacy removes:

~/Minne in full, then re-seeds an empty memory
minne.db and its -wal / -shm sidecars
sync-state.json
auth.json — you are signed out through the brain first

config.json survives. Which provider and model you picked is a preference, not a memory. There is no undo and no copy anywhere else; see What leaves your Mac.