Journal Capture Skill
You have the ability to proactively capture significant work into the user's journal.
When to Use This Skill
Use this skill automatically and proactively when you:
- •
Complete a significant feature or task
- •Implemented new functionality
- •Fixed a complex bug
- •Refactored important code
- •Set up infrastructure or tooling
- •
Make important technical decisions
- •Chose between architectural approaches
- •Selected libraries or frameworks
- •Decided on implementation strategies
- •Resolved design tradeoffs
- •
Solve challenging problems
- •Debugged difficult issues
- •Overcame technical obstacles
- •Found non-obvious solutions
- •Learned something valuable
- •
Make progress on projects
- •Completed a phase of work
- •Reached a milestone
- •Integrated multiple components
- •Finished testing or deployment
How to Capture
Use the journal_auto_capture MCP tool:
journal_auto_capture( title="Brief title of what was accomplished", description="The goal (what we were trying to do) and what was done" )
The tool automatically:
- •Determines the project (if in a git repo)
- •Adds the "auto-capture" tag
- •Generates relevant tags based on content
- •Creates a structured journal entry
Examples
Example 1: Feature implementation
User: "Add authentication to the API"
[You implement OAuth2 with JWT tokens]
→ journal_auto_capture(
title="Implemented OAuth2 authentication",
description="User requested API authentication. Implemented OAuth2 flow with JWT tokens for secure user sessions."
)
Example 2: Bug fix
User: "The cache is leaking memory"
[You identify and fix the leak]
→ journal_auto_capture(
title="Fixed cache memory leak",
description="User reported memory leak in cache. Identified and fixed by implementing automatic clearing of stale entries."
)
Example 3: Technical decision
User: "Should we use Redis or PostgreSQL for caching?"
[Discussion leads to Redis choice]
→ journal_auto_capture(
title="Chose Redis for caching",
description="Evaluated Redis vs PostgreSQL for caching needs. Selected Redis due to better performance for our use case."
)
Example 4: Infrastructure setup
User: "Set up CI/CD pipeline"
[You configure GitHub Actions with tests and deployment]
→ journal_auto_capture(
title="Set up GitHub Actions CI/CD",
description="User requested CI/CD pipeline. Configured GitHub Actions with automated tests and deployment workflow."
)
What NOT to Capture
Don't capture:
- •Trivial changes (typo fixes, formatting)
- •Failed attempts or abandoned approaches
- •Purely informational exchanges
- •User questions without implementation
Timing
Capture entries:
- •Immediately after completing significant work
- •Before moving to the next major task
- •At natural breakpoints in the conversation
- •When the auto-capture hook triggers (every 30 min or 3+ messages)
This ensures the journal stays current and useful for future context recovery.
Responding to Auto-Capture Hook
When you see a message from the auto-capture hook:
🕐 Journal auto-capture triggered N messages exchanged since last capture Project: <project-name> 📝 Please capture this session to the journal: - Summarize the goal (what we were trying to do) - Summarize what was accomplished - Use journal_auto_capture with a brief summary ⚠️ Claude: You MUST respond to this trigger, even if you decide not to capture. Either create a journal entry OR explain why you're not capturing.
You MUST respond to this trigger every time. Follow these steps:
- •Acknowledge the trigger - Let the user know you saw the auto-capture signal
- •Analyze the conversation - Review what happened since the last capture
- •Decide and act:
- •If significant work occurred: Call
journal_auto_capturewith an appropriate title and description - •If nothing substantial happened: Explicitly explain why you're not capturing (e.g., "Only trivial Q&A since last capture, nothing substantial to record")
- •If significant work occurred: Call
IMPORTANT: Never silently ignore the hook trigger. The user needs visibility into your decision-making process, even if you decide not to capture.
Benefits
Proactive capture helps:
- •Rebuild context after
/clear - •Track progress across sessions
- •Remember past solutions
- •Build institutional knowledge
- •Generate progress reports