399 distinct fingerprints across 912 systems; top 12 cover 43.6% of the catalog. 93 recurring recipes (306 singletons in the long tail — 103 absorb as near-variants of recurring archetypes, leaving 203 genuinely bespoke designs).
Every record's seven taxonomy axes — storage · retrieval · persistence · update · unit · governance · conflict — collapse to a
single fingerprint: the primary value on each axis.
Systems with the same fingerprint share a "recipe". Recipes that
recur many times are the memory landscape's archetypes;
fingerprints with only one member are bespoke designs.
We use the primary value on each axis, never the full
array — multi-value axes legitimately exist (e.g. vector+graph
storage) but hashing the full set would split the canonical
recipe across half a dozen near-duplicates. Two systems are in
the same archetype only when every one of the seven primary axis
values matches; even one-axis disagreement
(graph + traversal vs graph + injection) splits a recipe in two.
The "Hamming distance" clustering takes singletons (recipes with one member) and attaches them to the closest recurring archetype if they differ on a single axis. This collapses 103 of the 306 singletons into "near-variants" of existing recipes.
Non-memory records — frameworks, surveys, infrastructure that the catalog tracks for context but has no memory taxonomy of its own.
None-trivial storage, none retrieval, session-only persistence; agent-controlled updates with opaque governance.
Benchmarks — they measure other systems and have no memory taxonomy of their own.
Kv storage, injection retrieval, session persistence; agent-controlled updates with opaque governance.
Parametric storage, parametric-recall retrieval, parametric-permanent persistence; read-only updates with opaque governance.
Research RAG: build the index, query it, never write back. The retrieval layer is treated as a static substrate.
Weight storage, parametric-recall retrieval, parametric-permanent persistence; agent-controlled updates with opaque governance.
Files are the memory. Versioned in git, edited by humans and agents alike, no database in the loop.
File storage, injection retrieval, cross-session persistence; user-edit updates with inspectable governance.
None-trivial storage, none retrieval, ephemeral persistence; read-only updates with opaque governance.
Index everything, retrieve by similarity, overwrite on re-ingest — the workhorse vector store.
Facts as triples, queries as graph traversals — the knowledge-graph stack, optimised for relationship questions.
Beyond the top 12, 387 further fingerprints cover the remaining 56.4% of the catalog. 306 have only one member.
After Hamming-1 absorption: 103 singletons (33.7%) attach to a recurring archetype as near-variants, leaving 203 genuinely bespoke designs. The long tail collapses from 399 distinct shapes to roughly 296 (recurring archetypes + unattached singletons).
Threshold = 1 because that's the most legible boundary: "this system is the canonical recipe except for one axis" is easy to describe; distance ≥ 2 starts being a genuinely different shape. Anchor set = every archetype with ≥ 2 members, not just the top-12, so distance-1 singletons can attach to small-but-not-tiny recipes further down the list.
Singletons whose individual axis values are common elsewhere — the building blocks exist in the literature, but this specific combination has never been built twice. The min axis popularity is the rarest axis value in the recipe, measured across the whole catalog; high min means every part is mainstream and what's missing is the assembly.
vector|similarity|long-term|extraction|episode|opaque|llm-arbitrate
The vector · similarity · long-term · extraction · episode · opaque · llm-arbitrate fingerprint has 0 members other than Inworld AI; every individual axis value is mainstream but this specific combination has not been built twice. Closest existing: Agent KB at Hamming-1 (differs on governance). Also nearby: AGiXT Adaptive Memory (governance), claude-supermemory (unit). A product filling this gap could be framed as "Agent KB with opaque on the governance axis".
governancegovernanceunitvector|similarity|long-term|read-only|episode|inspectable|llm-arbitrate
The vector · similarity · long-term · read-only · episode · inspectable · llm-arbitrate fingerprint has 0 members other than Generative Semantic Workspace (GSW); every individual axis value is mainstream but this specific combination has not been built twice. Closest existing: Agent KB at Hamming-1 (differs on update). Also nearby: AGiXT Adaptive Memory (update), CrewAI Memory (update). A product filling this gap could be framed as "Agent KB with read-only on the update axis".
updateupdateupdatevector|similarity|session|extraction|episode|inspectable|llm-arbitrate
The vector · similarity · session · extraction · episode · inspectable · llm-arbitrate fingerprint has 0 members other than Lyfe Agents; every individual axis value is mainstream but this specific combination has not been built twice. Closest existing: Agent KB at Hamming-1 (differs on persistence). Also nearby: AGiXT Adaptive Memory (persistence), BrowserAgent (persistence). A product filling this gap could be framed as "Agent KB with session on the persistence axis".
persistencepersistencepersistencevector|similarity|cross-session|extraction|episode|opaque|llm-arbitrate
The vector · similarity · cross-session · extraction · episode · opaque · llm-arbitrate fingerprint has 0 members other than Krutrim Kruti (Ola); every individual axis value is mainstream but this specific combination has not been built twice. Closest existing: BrowserAgent at Hamming-1 (differs on governance). Also nearby: ExpeL (governance), H²R (governance). A product filling this gap could be framed as "BrowserAgent with opaque on the governance axis".
governancegovernancegovernancevector|similarity|cross-session|extraction|document|inspectable|llm-arbitrate
The vector · similarity · cross-session · extraction · document · inspectable · llm-arbitrate fingerprint has 0 members other than Botpress LLMz; every individual axis value is mainstream but this specific combination has not been built twice. Closest existing: BrowserAgent at Hamming-1 (differs on unit). Also nearby: CREATOR (unit), ExpeL (unit). A product filling this gap could be framed as "BrowserAgent with document on the unit axis".
unitunitunitvector|similarity|cross-session|extraction|fact|inspectable|llm-arbitrate
The vector · similarity · cross-session · extraction · fact · inspectable · llm-arbitrate fingerprint has 0 members other than MemGuide; every individual axis value is mainstream but this specific combination has not been built twice. Closest existing: Botpress LLMz at Hamming-1 (differs on unit). Also nearby: BrowserAgent (unit), ChatGPT Study Mode (governance). A product filling this gap could be framed as "Botpress LLMz with fact on the unit axis".
unitunitgovernancekv|similarity|long-term|agent-controlled|episode|inspectable|llm-arbitrate
The kv · similarity · long-term · agent-controlled · episode · inspectable · llm-arbitrate fingerprint has 0 members other than Letta / MemGPT; every individual axis value is mainstream but this specific combination has not been built twice. Closest existing: FLEX at Hamming-1 (differs on storage). Also nearby: MemRL (storage), SCM (storage). A product filling this gap could be framed as "FLEX with kv on the storage axis".
kv|similarity|long-term|agent-controlled|fact|opaque|llm-arbitrate
The kv · similarity · long-term · agent-controlled · fact · opaque · llm-arbitrate fingerprint has 0 members other than Bedrock AgentCore (AWS); every individual axis value is mainstream but this specific combination has not been built twice. No other system in the catalog sits within one axis of this combination — the surrounding region is empty.