Engram v2.0.0-rc.6: Stability Milestone

Engram v2.0.0-rc.6: Stability Milestone

What's New

This prerelease is 13 commits ahead of v2.0.0-rc.5. It tightens context and memory boundaries, improves store and sync performance, strengthens Claude and Windows compatibility, and fixes several TUI and cross-platform reliability issues.

For supported workflows, RC6 has received more real-world hardening and is considered more reliable than the v1.20.0 stable line. It is still a prerelease intended for validation and feedback: keep a known-good installation available and do not treat this as a declaration of universal production stability.

Changes

Context, memory, and performance

• SessionStart context injection is bounded, reducing oversized startup context while preserving useful project memory. (#1012)
• Session summaries skip conflict-candidate generation, avoiding low-value relation work for lifecycle summaries. (#1023)
• Conflict candidate ranking is batched at page level, with benchmark coverage for the mem_judge latency layers. (#1017, #1021)

Agent and platform reliability

• Claude hook transport supports Unix sockets, restoring compatibility where the integration is exposed through a socket rather than TCP. (#1015)
• Claude MCP fixtures are Windows-compatible, and Windows Store/MCP startup tests no longer hit avoidable startup timeouts. (#1022, #1024)
• Save-nudge gating handles time zones and first-observation state correctly. (#669)

Sync, TUI, and portability

• Versioned cloud-sync chunks use compressed transport, reducing transfer overhead. (#1011)
• The TUI improves light-terminal contrast and bounds observation-detail scrolling. (#1010, #1008)
• Tests handle macOS temporary-path aliases, with additional server coverage for collection project-resolution errors. (#1009, #1014)

Installing It

Use a prebuilt release asset for RC validation. go install builds report dev rather than the release version.

1. Download the asset for your operating system and architecture from this release.
2. Download checksums.txt.
3. Verify the asset checksum before extracting it.
4. Run engram version and confirm 2.0.0-rc.6.

amd64 means Intel/AMD x86_64. Use arm64 where appropriate.

Linux example:

FILE="engram_2.0.0-rc.6_linux_amd64.tar.gz"
BASE="https://github.com/Gentleman-Programming/engram/releases/download/v2.0.0-rc.6"
curl -fLO "$BASE/$FILE"
curl -fLO "$BASE/checksums.txt"
grep -F "  $FILE" checksums.txt | sha256sum -c -
tar -xzf "$FILE"

macOS example:

FILE="engram_2.0.0-rc.6_darwin_arm64.tar.gz"
BASE="https://github.com/Gentleman-Programming/engram/releases/download/v2.0.0-rc.6"
curl -fLO "$BASE/$FILE"
curl -fLO "$BASE/checksums.txt"
grep -F "  $FILE" checksums.txt | shasum -a 256 -c -
tar -xzf "$FILE"

Windows PowerShell example:

$asset = "engram_2.0.0-rc.6_windows_amd64.zip"
$base = "https://github.com/Gentleman-Programming/engram/releases/download/v2.0.0-rc.6"
Invoke-WebRequest "$base/$asset" -OutFile $asset
Invoke-WebRequest "$base/checksums.txt" -OutFile checksums.txt
$expected = ((Get-Content checksums.txt | Where-Object { $_ -match ("  " + [regex]::Escape($asset) + "$") }) -split "\s+")[0]
$actual = (Get-FileHash $asset -Algorithm SHA256).Hash.ToLowerInvariant()
if (-not $expected -or $actual -ne $expected.ToLowerInvariant()) { throw "Checksum verification failed" }
Expand-Archive -Force $asset .

For full installation and upgrade guidance, see the Installation guide.

Community Testing

Please focus feedback on these areas:

1. Restart supported agents and confirm SessionStart provides useful project context without excessive output.
2. Exercise Claude integrations over both TCP and Unix-socket transports where available.
3. Save and judge memory conflicts, then confirm session summaries do not surface irrelevant conflict candidates.
4. Exercise cloud sync with representative larger payloads and confirm versioned chunks remain compatible.
5. Check observation-detail scrolling and readability in both light and dark terminals.
6. On Windows, restart Store and MCP workflows repeatedly and report any startup timeout.

When reporting a problem, include your OS, agent/client, engram version, the exact command, and bounded relevant output: open an issue.

Validation

• Source: 6ff150f6fdc750f4c0b1ca0bc723916423f8cd37, 13 commits after v2.0.0-rc.5.
• CI: run 33995746940 passed Unit Tests, E2E Tests, Plugin Tests, Windows Setup Test, Cloud Sync Wrapper Tests on Windows, and the Performance Ratchet for this exact commit.
• Release workflows: GoReleaser and GHCR publication passed.
• Assets: six platform archives plus checksums.txt are attached to this prerelease.
• Checksum manifest digest: sha256:08d6b536dbbb57e0f5afb53cedcf569724c46d6554305aa2fe71d55767e0c922.

Distribution

This prerelease does not update the Homebrew stable line. Download a platform asset above and verify it against checksums.txt.

Cloud image:

docker pull ghcr.io/gentleman-programming/engram:v2.0.0-rc.6

Multi-architecture image digest: sha256:a974854bc0eb98f320f2e1fd1438ea789d091d88ac5794586ed163e3d2ec8579.

Contributors

Thank you to everyone who has helped harden the v2 release-candidate cycle.

Maintainers: @Alan-TheGentleman, @barbatdev, @dnlrsls.

Community contributors: @Alexter2003, @carolitascl, @CinloDev, @daniel-baf, @danielgap, @goutham80808, @gtrabanco, @jacsdev, @jarl9801, @MarsSall, @mgaldamez, @pablontiv, @pzentenoe, @Reaan06, @yudelsuarez.

What's Next

The next release-candidate work will focus on token efficiency and performance. Feature work can resume after the stabilization goals are met; this is a direction, not a guaranteed schedule.