hyperguild/brain/sessions/analysis/intent-interface-findings.md

Brain-MCP Intent↔Interface Findings — Unified (two-column merge)

Status — 2026-06-16

• ✅ Agent column filled from agent-intent-column.jsonl (46 acts, koala).
• ⏳ Human column = PENDING. Drop the Claude.ai-history analysis into human-intent-column.jsonl (same dir, schema below), then fill the PENDING cells and the synthesis blocks marked <<SYNTH>>.
• ⚠️ Canonical brain-intent-extraction.md still absent on koala. Vocab below is the reconstructed lock both columns must share. If the real file surfaces, re-map intent labels in both columns identically before merging.

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Shared schema (LOCKED — both columns conform)

Per-call row, JSONL:

field	values / form	notes
id	a01.. (agent) / h01.. (human)	column prefix kept distinct
session	string	source session/conversation id
ts	ISO-8601	best-effort
tool	brain tool name (+ (HTTP-curl) / (HTTP-staged) suffix for bodges)
intent	closed vocab ↓	the knowledge-act WANTED
intent_tool_match	match | mismatch | partial	does the called tool fit the want
consumer_type	autonomous_agent | human_interactive	fixed per column
workaround	string | null	the bodge when mismatch — primary signal
observed_friction	string | null	reformulation chains, discovery tax, hedging
evidence	string	excerpt anchoring the classification
schema_source	reconstructed	flip to canonical if real vocab lands

Closed intent vocab (LOCKED)

semantic_retrieval, lexical_lookup, check_prior_art, synthesized_answer, store_new_knowledge, update_or_supersede, ingest_raw_source, verify_write_landed, discover_capability, intent_unclear.

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Master comparison — by intent

intent	agent acts	agent mismatch	human acts	human mismatch	shared gap
check_prior_art	10	0%	PENDING	PENDING	—
store_new_knowledge	15	7% (1/15)	PENDING	PENDING	<<SYNTH>>
update_or_supersede	5	100% (5/5)	PENDING	PENDING	<<SYNTH>> no edit verb
synthesized_answer	5	40% (2/5)+1 partial	PENDING	PENDING	<<SYNTH>>
verify_write_landed	4	100% (4/4)	PENDING	PENDING	<<SYNTH>> no read-after-write
semantic_retrieval	3	100% (3/3)	PENDING	PENDING	<<SYNTH>> lexical-only read
ingest_raw_source	2	0%	PENDING	PENDING	—
discover_capability	2	100% (2/2)	PENDING	PENDING	agent-specific (ToolSearch/auth)?
intent_unclear	0	—	PENDING	PENDING	divergence expected ↓
TOTAL	46	37% (17)	PENDING	PENDING

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Per-intent merged findings

update_or_supersede — agent: 5/5 mismatch (highest value)

Agent: no edit/patch/append verb. Agents re-write same slug blind: homelab-security-chains-not-bugs.md (+64m), tapir-rls-identity-bootstrapping, webfetch-readme..., gitea-mcp-per-repo-tools-404..., cannot-move-ingress-host... — 3 of 5 sub-30s ("wanted edit, got overwrite"). Cannot tell if write deduped or forked a contradiction. Human: PENDING — look for: user editing a prior note, asking "update what I saved about X", or expressing frustration that an old fact is stale/duplicated. <> shared verdict once both filled.

verify_write_landed — agent: 4/4 mismatch

Agent: no get-by-id/read-after-write. Agents lexically re-query their own fresh note with reformulated keywords (exit 255 unknown reason → ...SIGKILL containerd; extension build pinned... → pgvector ...compile error bump). Human: PENDING — humans may not exhibit this (they trust the write UI confirmation). If absent in human column, it's an agent-specific gap → flag. <>.

semantic_retrieval — agent: 3/3 mismatch

Agent: meaning known, indexed words unknown → BM25 keyword-stuffing. 4-step chain on one Go bytes.Buffer bug; NL questions shoved into brain_query. Human: PENDING — humans likely hit this HARDER (they phrase conversationally). Compare reformulation-chain length agent vs human. <> — likely the strongest cross-consumer overlap.

synthesized_answer — agent: 2 mismatch + 1 partial

Agent: brain_answer not trusted terminal — 3 answers → 3 same-topic queries 1min later; query+answer fired 8s apart hedging one need. Works for episodic recall, fails for how-do-I / does-X-hold. Human: PENDING — humans may prefer brain_answer as primary (chat-native). If human match-rate >> agent, the tool fits humans not agents → key divergence. <>.

store_new_knowledge — agent: 14/15 match

Agent: healthy, except 1 HTTP-staged bodge when MCP auth lapsed. Also surfaced write-schema confusion: 3 param shapes ({filename,type} / {filename} / {wing,hall,filename}) + ingest{source}. Human: PENDING — humans rarely write directly; expect low volume. <>.

check_prior_art / ingest_raw_source — agent: 0% mismatch

Lexical fits named-entity recall and raw-source capture. Human: PENDING.

discover_capability — agent: 2/2 mismatch (agent-specific)

Brain tools deferred → ToolSearch-load each session; auth lapse → curl bodge. Likely has NO human analog (humans get ambient connectors). Candidate for "agent-only gap" bucket. Human: PENDING to confirm absent.

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Cross-consumer divergence — questions to resolve at merge

1. intent_unclear rate. Agent = 0% (transcripts self-document). Human expected higher (conversational, implicit). Big delta = the columns measure legibility differently, not just intent.
2. Where does each consumer's mismatch concentrate? Agent mismatch is write-side-heavy (supersede + verify-landed = 9/17). Hypothesis: human mismatch is read-side-heavy (semantic + answer). If true → the interface fails the two consumers at opposite ends.
3. Agent-only gaps (discover_capability, verify_write_landed) vs shared gaps (semantic_retrieval, update_or_supersede). Shared gaps = highest-priority evidence; agent-only = harness/auth issues.

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Combined headline — <<SYNTH>> (fill when human column lands)

Agent-side draft (to be reconciled with human-side): Brain = append + keyword-search; agents want a curated, dedup'd, self-verifying KB. Missing update/supersede path + lexical-only reads are the seam. Open question for the merge: do humans hit the same read-side wall, making semantic-retrieval the universal gap — or do agents uniquely suffer the write-side (supersede / verify) wall that humans sidestep via the chat UI?

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Drop-in checklist (when human column arrives)

1. Place human-intent-column.jsonl in this dir; conform to LOCKED schema.
2. Fill every PENDING cell in master table + per-intent blocks.
3. Resolve the 3 divergence questions with evidence.
4. Replace each <<SYNTH>> with the reconciled verdict; write the combined headline.
5. If canonical vocab surfaced: re-map both columns' intent, flip schema_source.
6. Commit as docs(brain): merge human+agent intent columns.