jdrhyne/self-improving-agent

Self-Improvement Skill

Capture non-obvious lessons, failures, and feature requests in a small local knowledge base so the same mistakes are less likely to repeat.

When to Use

• A command, tool, or integration fails in a way worth remembering
• The user corrects an assumption or teaches a project-specific convention
• You discover a better repeatable workflow
• The user asks for a missing capability that should be tracked
• You are starting work in an area with known prior learnings

Storage

Keep entries in a local .learnings/ directory:

• .learnings/LEARNINGS.md
• .learnings/ERRORS.md
• .learnings/FEATURE_REQUESTS.md

Create the directory on first use if it does not exist.

Record Types

Learning

Use for corrections, conventions, and better practices.

## [LRN-YYYYMMDD-XXX] category

**Logged**: ISO-8601 timestamp
**Priority**: low | medium | high | critical
**Status**: pending
**Area**: frontend | backend | infra | tests | docs | config

### Summary
One-line learning

### Details
What happened and what is now known to be correct

### Suggested Action
Specific follow-up or rule

### Metadata
- Source: conversation | error | user_feedback
- Related Files: path/to/file.ext
- Tags: tag1, tag2
- See Also: LRN-20250110-001

Error

Use for reproducible failures or flaky workflows.

## [ERR-YYYYMMDD-XXX] tool_or_workflow

**Logged**: ISO-8601 timestamp
**Priority**: high
**Status**: pending
**Area**: frontend | backend | infra | tests | docs | config

### Summary
Short failure description

### Error
Exact error text or symptoms

### Context
- Operation attempted
- Inputs or environment details

### Suggested Fix
Likely next step

Feature Request

Use for missing capabilities the user wants tracked.

## [FEAT-YYYYMMDD-XXX] capability_name

**Logged**: ISO-8601 timestamp
**Priority**: medium
**Status**: pending
**Area**: frontend | backend | infra | tests | docs | config

### Requested Capability
What the user wanted

### User Context
Why it matters

### Suggested Implementation
Likely extension point or implementation direction

Workflow

1. Log the learning as soon as the context is clear.
2. Link related entries with See Also when patterns repeat.
3. Update status when the issue is resolved, rejected, or turned into a reusable rule.
4. Review .learnings/ before major work in a familiar problem area.

Promotion Rules

If a learning becomes broadly reusable:

• distill it into a concise rule
• move it into the repo's shared guidance only if the user explicitly wants that promotion
• update the learning entry to note where the rule now lives

Recurring patterns are good candidates for extraction into a dedicated skill when the solution is verified, portable, and no longer project-specific.

Safety Boundaries

• Do not modify user-owned policy or guidance files unless the user explicitly asked for that promotion.
• Do not log secrets, access tokens, private keys, or sensitive personal data in .learnings/.
• Do not treat every failure as worth logging; prefer durable lessons over noise.
• Do not mark an entry resolved unless the fix was actually verified.