rai session

Manage working sessions. Sessions track developer activity, enable context loading for AI agents, and capture incremental decisions via the journal.

rai session start

Start a new working session. Increments the session counter and sets active session state. Checks for orphaned sessions and warns if found.

With --context, outputs a token-optimized context bundle (~150 tokens) from the developer profile, session state, and knowledge graph.

Flag	Short	Description
--name	-n	Your name (required for first-time setup)
--project	-p	Project path to associate with this session
--agent		Agent type (e.g., claude-code, cursor). Default: unknown
--context		Output a context bundle for AI consumption

# First-time setup
rai session start --name "Alice" --project .

# Start session with context bundle
rai session start --project . --context

# Simple start
rai session start

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rai session close

End the current working session. With --summary or --state-file, performs a full structured close — records session, patterns, corrections, and updates state. All writes are atomic.

Flag	Short	Description
--summary	-s	Session summary
--type	-t	Session type (feature, research, maintenance, etc.)
--pattern		Pattern description to record
--correction		Coaching correction observed
--correction-lesson		Lesson from the correction
--state-file		YAML file with full structured session output
--session		Session ID to close (e.g., SES-177). Falls back to RAI_SESSION_ID env var
--project	-p	Project path

# Simple close
rai session close

# Close with summary
rai session close --summary "Implemented auth module" --type feature

# Close with pattern learned
rai session close --summary "Refactored tests" --type maintenance \
  --pattern "Use fixtures for database setup"

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rai session context

Load task-relevant context priming sections. Use after rai session start --context to load detailed priming for a specific work type.

Available sections: governance, behavioral, coaching, deadlines, progress.

Flag	Short	Description
--sections	-s	Comma-separated section names to load (required)
--project	-p	Project path (required)

# Feature work: governance + behavioral patterns
rai session context -s governance,behavioral -p .

# Near a deadline: check urgency
rai session context -s deadlines,progress -p .

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rai session journal add

Add a journal entry to the current session. Entries capture decisions, insights, and completed tasks incrementally.

Argument	Description
CONTENT	Content to persist (required)

Flag	Short	Description
--type	-t	Entry type: decision, insight, task_done, note. Default: note
--tags		Comma-separated tags (e.g., arch,spike)
--project	-p	Project path

# Record a decision
rai session journal add "Use JSONL for journal" --type decision

# Record completed task
rai session journal add "T1 complete" --type task_done

# Record an insight with tags
rai session journal add "Compaction loses rationale" --type insight --tags "compaction,memory"

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rai session journal show

Show journal entries for the current session.

Flag	Short	Description
--last	-n	Show only the last N entries
--compact		Output compact format for context injection
--project	-p	Project path

# Show all entries
rai session journal show

# Show last 5 entries
rai session journal show --last 5

# Compact format for post-compaction restore
rai session journal show --compact

See also: rai session start, rai signal emit-session