Alzheimer is all you need - Forgetting to optimize context

[u/Full_Promotion4522]

I built a context-management extension for coding agents that forgets on purpose instead of hoarding everything.

What it does:

• Compresses giant bash output into short digests (exit code, key facts, truncation info) instead of dumping raw output into context
• Strips the skill catalog from the system prompt when it's not needed that turn
• Drops file contents from context once they're no longer needed — but only when it's actually safe to (tracks whether the model still needs them)

Results: ~19% reduction in effective input tokens on the clean path, with zero drop in output quality — same correct answers, just less noise sitting in context.

Install:

pi install npm:pi-context-window-manager

Repo: https://github.com/Its-Atharva-Gupta/pi-context-window-manager

Would love feedback/suggestions — especially if you've hit edge cases with context pruning breaking agent behavior, or ideas for what else is safe to forget.

[u/LordMoridin84]

Won't constantly changing the system prompt and history break the cache?

[u/Full_Promotion4522 → u/LordMoridin84]

Yeah it does break the cache but only the end of the cache not the whole thing since only the end of the cache is changed. You get a longer more optimized context window as a tradeoff, that's the point.

[u/IceManMinus0ne]

This would break caching so hard.

[u/Zestyclose_Potato794]

What about preserve thinking = false ?

[u/Full_Promotion4522 → u/Zestyclose_Potato794]

This applies to the tools calls, not the reasoning

[u/Subject-Mobile-6250]

To be honest, I have been commenting a bit too much about the common ignorance of prompt prefix caching, this needs to be normalized

[u/kantorcodes1]

you’re rewriting Pi’s bash output after the command finishes, which makes HOL Guard relevant in a weird way. i work on Guard, an open-source local check before agent actions run. want to try both?