5. Memory namespaces and expiry

Memory is scoped to a namespace, not magically to the entire conversation. The right scope depends on the job: a customer correcting a roof needs their intake context; a deterministic rating calculation needs none; an old quote table should not bleed into a freshly re-rated one.

The goal

• Share history only where a conversational task crosses step boundaries.
• Compact the one long-running namespace that benefits from it.
• Erase presentation history when a new quote becomes authoritative.
• Reject an idle durable session rather than quietly continuing it.

One shared intake namespace

The constructor enables summary compaction only for home-quote-intake:

constructor() {
  super();
  this.getMemory()
    .setSummaryModel({ provider: "openai", name: "gpt-4o", retryAttempts: 3 })
    .setSummaryConfig({ minMessages: 12, recentMessages: 6 })
    .enableSummary("home-quote-intake");
}

Qualification, property, and risk all call .useMemory("home-quote-intake"). They form one long interview, and a review correction can send the user back to any of them. After twelve messages, PicoFlow creates a running summary and keeps the newest six raw messages, so the early location and ownership facts remain available without making every later prompt grow indefinitely.

Isolation is a safety property

The remaining conversational stages use distinct namespaces:

RateQuoteStep has no .useMemory(...) because it is a LogicStep. Its input is four typed state records, and its output is one typed result; no model sees or needs a rating conversation.

Start a presentation cleanly

PresentQuoteStep clears its own isolated namespace on entry:

protected async onEnter(): Promise<void> {
  this.eraseMemory();
  const quoteId = this.quoteResult().quoteId;
  if (this.getState<string>("presentedQuoteId") !== quoteId) {
    this.removeState("selectedOption");
    this.saveState({ presentedQuoteId: quoteId });
  }
}

This is safe because the input data is not in that history. The prompt injects the current quoteResult on every turn. The same transition also clears selectedOption if the quote ID changed, so a user cannot select Enhanced from the old deductible’s table after a re-rate.

Do not call eraseMemory() on a shared namespace unless you intend to clear it for every step using it. The intake namespace is shared precisely because its history is useful; the options namespace is isolated precisely because it is not.

Durable session expiry belongs to the flow

The flow decides whether a stored session may be restored:

const SESSION_IDLE_MS = 30 * 60_000;

protected async onRestoreSessionDoc(session: SessionType): Promise<SessionType | null> {
  const restored = await super.onRestoreSessionDoc(session);
  if (!restored) return null;
  return this.sessionIdleMs(restored) >= SESSION_IDLE_MS ? null : restored;
}

Returning null declines restoration. The storage layer loads the durable document, but the flow owns the business policy: an abandoned preliminary application should not reappear indefinitely with old data or a stale quote.

Next

6. Correct, re-rate, and return uses these state owners and namespaces to handle a roof correction and deductible change without duplicating or retaining stale data.