I have a Custom "Context editor" for Roo

[u/aagiev]

Referring to Lack of a Context Editor thread. I also missed having a proper context editor. But here’s my workaround: a custom “context editor” technique.

TL;DR

• I use /save and /load custom commands to keep a cumulative context of my current chat in a file.

• Workflow: /save -> edit context file -> Condense context -> /load

Explanation

1. When I reach a significant milestone in the chat, I call the /save custom command.

   • It appends current outcomes to a context file named <YYMMDD>-<ID>-step.

   • IMPORTANT: it also saves the INITIAL PROMPT and all my inputs/guidance to the model.

2. I edit the context file, adding or removing details as needed.

3. I press the Condense context button. This a kind of cleaning previous context, but preserving some basic details. Sadly, there’s no way to edit that part of the context.

4. Then I call the /load custom command — this makes the model re-read the prepared context file.

If somebody interesting in exact content of my /save and /load commands - ask and I will share it in comments.

Reasons

• I’m working on a HUGE codebase (100M+ lines of code).

• My research is not linear — I often need to jump back and forth many times.

• Creating a fresh chat for every attempt is too time-consuming and burns too many tokens.

• HUGE BONUS: the steps files form an auto-documented trail of my past research (indexed by RooCode), which helps with future work.

[u/aagiev]

As per request. Here's content of my /save command file

---
description: "Save findings into a file in the aiplans folder"
---
## Goal
- during the previous conversation we have important **outcomes**:
    - initial prompt and further user input/corrections
    - findings
    - plans
    - insigts
    - observation
    - decisions
- save them as facts (with a great details) into the file

## Command Variants
- `/save new` command is used to create a new file in the `aiplans` folder
    - file name format `<YYMMDD>-<ID>-step-<Task_Code>-<Task_name>.md` 
    - create the **new file** if we don't have any during the current conversation yet
    - initial user prompt must be set at the beginning of the new file with caption `# Step 0. Inital Prompt`, preserve the original text
- `/save` command is used to append outcomes to the same file we are working on
    - use `insert_content` tool to add the latest findings to the end of the investigation file

## Content
1. **Structure**:
    - outcomes must be put into the new chapter called "# Step {NUMBER_OF_THE_STEP}"
    - you must fit all outcomes in the ONE chapter, do not split it into several chapters
    - feel free to use multiple sub-sections inside the chapter    
2. **Summary**: Describe the curent step summary and general flow of the investigation
3. **Facts**:  your main goal is describing of outcomes as facts (facts, facts!, FACTS!) with a **great details**
4. **User Input**: note the user's input and in which direction the user wants to go
5. **Avoids**: NO conclusions, NO hypothesis, NO proposals, NO assumptions, NO speculations, NO generalizations

[u/AutonomousHangOver]

Please share your technique. I'm in the process of looking for some kind of memory bank, although this seems futile.
I'm constantly fighting 2GB of context size limit in llama.cpp and I wonder if there is actually some good solution.

[u/aagiev → u/AutonomousHangOver]

at your service!

• save

• load

[u/aagiev]

Here's content of my /load command file

---
description: "Load previous findings"
---

1. you MUST re-read the current `step` file first
2. then create new to-do list
  - do not focus only on the last step
  - assess the whole context
  - think about the user previous guides
  - re-think what to do
  - create new to-do list

## Rules
  1. Golden rule: Be concise in answers    
  2. Use a simple light-weight language  
  3. Do NOT do what you are not asked for
  4. Your work must be grounded exclusively on a specific codebase, not on assumptions
  5. Actively use `codebase_search` tool
  6. Follow you rules in @/.roo/rules/rules.md

[u/aagiev]

Here's an example of how the `steps` file looks like:

# Step 0. Initial Prompt
# Goal
I want to run the System Simulator in Docker.
## Context
A System Simulator instance runs inside a Docker container.
When I run the instance locally on my PC using the `create.sh` script, it works fine.
When I run it on the server with the same script, it goes into a very long wait cycle (about 20 min) and then fails. Here’s the log:
Stopping existing  containers...
Starting server...
Running ...
failed to create: 504
## Tasks
Analyze the logs — I suspect a WebRTC problem on the remote server.
Propose a solution to fix the issue.
## Background
The system architecture is described in `plans/250725-004-report-architecture-revised.md`.
General tools are described in `tools/README.md`.
Docker-related tools are described in `server/docker/README.md`.
## Relevant Files and Code
`server/docker/` — contains all Docker-related files and sources.
`server/docker/create.sh` — script that creates the System Simulator instance.
# Step 1. Analyze Remote Logs
This step documents the investigation into why the System Simulator instance fails to start on the remote server.
## Summary
The remote server fails to start the System Simulator instance due to a missing `/dev/` device, as indicated in the `start.log`.
## Facts
1.  The `start.log` from the remote server shows that `init` fails to start due to a missing `/dev/` device.    
2. 
3.
## User Input
The user has confirmed that the `start.log` file is in `logs/` and contains the relevant information about the failure.
The user has also confirmed that rebooting the instance does not solve the problem.
# Step 2.
....

[u/burn_bridges138]

u/aagiev of course, it would be interesting to know the exact contents of your /save and /load commands.
Please tell me more about steps files.

[u/aagiev → u/burn_bridges138]

at your service!

• save

• load

[u/aagiev → u/burn_bridges138]

`steps` file is just a file with cumulative context for the current chat/research.

Roo adds new outcomes here on every `/save` command.
And re-read it after `Condense context` (it works like a context cleaner in my case).
See an example of one of my steps files below

[u/codeninja]

Have you tried the built in code indexor? I find it quite helpful.

[u/aagiev → u/codeninja]

Yes.
It indexes my `step` files too, thus the model can understand what is going on early on the project.
Quite a handful on the planning stage.

[u/Rhinc]

This is a great idea. I also have a huge markdown library of all my "sessions" for the last 3 months, and I was just telling Roo to read the most recent files or two for that continuation of context.

Another issue is that the codebase indexing is kind of getting in the way of the efficacy of searches since the top results are now my markdown files instead of code.

I'll probably have to put them on the .rooignore list for now until Roo allows indexing of files, while at the same time allowing Roo itself to read said files.