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Claude Code

Connect Claude Code to HydraMem so Claude can search and grow a local, verified memory of your project.

Prerequisites

  • HydraMem installed and on $PATH (hydramem --version to verify): 
    uv tool install hydramem    # or: pip install hydramem / pipx install hydramem
hydramem init ~/my-memory && cd ~/my-memory
  • Claude Code installed (claude --version).

Connect (MCP)

The fastest path — register HydraMem's stdio MCP server with one command:

claude mcp add hydramem -- hydramem serve --transport stdio

Restart Claude Code, then run /mcp and confirm hydramem is connected.

Manual config (alternative)

Add to your Claude Code MCP config instead: 

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "hydramem": {
      "command": "hydramem",
      "args": ["serve", "--transport", "stdio"]
    }
  }
}

How it works

With HydraMem connected, Claude Code can:

  • Search before answering — hydra_search_tool / priming_context_tool retrieve verified context from your local graph + vectors.
  • Remember mid-conversation — the remember tool persists a verified fact ("we decided to use JWT for auth") into the knowledge graph.
  • Ingest docs — ingest_directory_tool adds Markdown notes on demand.
  • Self-report savings — hydramem_stats_tool shows token savings.

Just ask: "What did we decide about auth last month?" — Claude searches the palace first.

Keep memory growing

Two complementary options:

  1. Agent-driven (default, zero setup): tell Claude to "remember" key decisions; it calls the remember tool. Everything is verified before storage.
  2. Hooks (auto-save): wire a Stop hook that re-ingests your notes after each turn — see Claude Code retention.

Verify

# In Claude Code:
/mcp                      # hydramem → connected
# From a terminal:
hydramem search "auth decision" --project myproject
hydramem stats --last-7d

Troubleshooting

  • hydramem not found → it isn't on $PATH. Reinstall with uv tool install / pipx, or use the absolute path to the console script in the MCP command.
  • No results → ingest first: hydramem ingest ./kms --project myproject.
  • VoG says n/a → no local LLM reachable. Pull one: ollama pull gemma4:e4b (verification degrades honestly; retrieval still works).

See also