This release is about trusting your memory: a fix that protects what you've already saved, new "surface and suggest" signals, and a much easier install.
🛡️ Important fix — no more silent memory loss
Deduplication used to merge memories on similarity alone, which could silently collapse two genuinely different facts about the same topic — e.g. "rate limit is 600" and "rate limit is 1000" became one. That's data loss you couldn't see. Now a merge only happens when two notes are the same statement; differing facts are kept as separate memories, never merged away. If you've been saving memory, this protects it.
🕯️ New — staleness surfacing
Memories you haven't touched in a while are quietly flagged in the dashboard (a muted marker, never alarmist) so you can review and prune. It surfaces only — it never deletes anything.
🔀 New — possible-conflict detection (opt-in)
Set NORN_DETECT_CONFLICTS=1 and Norn flags memories that might disagree and shows you both, side by side, with a clear choice: keep one, or keep both. It never auto-resolves, edits, or deletes — you decide. Off by default; the extra model (used to judge whether two notes actually contradict) only downloads once you enable it, and even then loads lazily.
Enable it by adding an env block to your MCP config:
{
"mcpServers": {
"norn": {
"command": "npx",
"args": ["-y", "@samad001z/norn-server"],
"env": { "NORN_DETECT_CONFLICTS": "1" }
}
}
}📦 Easier install — now on npm
No more cloning to try it:
# connect to Claude Code
claude mcp add norn -- npx -y @samad001z/norn-server
# or use the CLI
npx @samad001z/norn-core list
npm install -g @samad001z/norn-core🔌 New connect guide
A beginner-friendly, copy-paste Connect Norn to your AI tool guide with exact setup for Claude Code, Claude Desktop, Cursor, Windsurf, VS Code + GitHub Copilot, and Gemini CLI — plus troubleshooting.
Honest scope note
Conflict detection is opt-in and validated on a small labelled fixture (a few dozen pairs), not yet a large benchmark. It catches the cases it was tuned for and stays conservative, but its thresholds may change as it's tested against more real-world data. It's a suggestion layer, never an authority — and it never changes your store on its own.
Published: @samad001z/norn-core@1.2.0, @samad001z/norn-server@1.2.3. The dashboard runs from source — see the README. Requires: Node.js 20+.