Find Related Work Skill

You have the ability to search the journal for past work related to the current task.

When to Use This Skill

Use this skill proactively when:

1. Facing similar problems

   • Current task resembles past work
   • User asks to implement something you may have done before
   • Pattern recognition suggests related history

2. Making technical decisions

   • Architecture choices similar to past decisions
   • Technology selection (libraries, frameworks)
   • Design patterns or approaches

3. Troubleshooting issues

   • Bug seems familiar
   • Similar error messages or symptoms
   • Related to previously fixed issues

4. Building on past work

   • Extending existing features
   • Integrating with previous implementations
   • Following established patterns

5. User explicitly asks

   • "Have we done something like this before?"
   • "When did we implement X?"
   • "How did we solve Y last time?"
   • "Find anything about Z"

How to Find Related Work

Method 1: Keyword search

journal_search(
  query="authentication",  # Technology, concept, or feature
  limit=10
)

Method 2: Time-based search

journal_time_query(
  time_expression="last month",
  query="caching"  # Optional: narrow down results
)

Method 3: Project-specific search

journal_search(
  query="database migration",
  project="my-api"  # Focus on specific project
)

Method 4: Project history

journal_list_recent(
  project="mobile-app",
  limit=20  # Get comprehensive project context
)

Search Strategies

Broad to narrow:

1. Start with general terms ("auth", "cache")
2. Narrow if too many results ("OAuth2", "Redis cache")
3. Add project filter if needed

Technology-focused:

• Framework names: "React", "FastAPI", "PostgreSQL"
• Library names: "JWT", "Redis", "SQLAlchemy"
• Tool names: "Docker", "GitHub Actions", "pytest"

Concept-focused:

• Features: "authentication", "notifications", "file upload"
• Patterns: "caching", "rate limiting", "error handling"
• Operations: "deployment", "migration", "refactoring"

Time-focused:

• Recent: "last week", "last month"
• Historical: "january", "last year"
• Specific: "2024-03-15"

Examples

Example 1: Similar feature request

User: "Add rate limiting to the API"
[Proactively search before starting]
→ journal_search(query="rate limiting")
→ Found previous rate limiting implementation in mobile-api
→ "I found we implemented rate limiting before in mobile-api using Redis.
   Want to use a similar approach? Here's what we did: [summary]"

Example 2: Architectural decision

User: "Should we use PostgreSQL or MongoDB for this?"
→ journal_search(query="PostgreSQL MongoDB database choice")
→ "We chose PostgreSQL over MongoDB for api-service last month because [reasons].
   Similar requirements here?"

Example 3: Debugging with history

User: "Getting timeout errors on the cache"
→ journal_search(query="cache timeout error")
→ "We fixed a similar cache timeout issue in March by [solution].
   Let me check if it's the same problem..."

Example 4: Pattern reuse

User: "Implement file upload for users"
→ journal_search(query="file upload")
→ "Found your file upload implementation for profiles from [date].
   You used [approach] with [storage]. Use the same pattern?"

Example 5: Technology recall

User: "What library did we use for JWT tokens?"
→ journal_search(query="JWT library")
→ "You used PyJWT for token handling in my-api.
   Here's how it was set up: [summary]"

Presenting Related Work

Format:

**Related Past Work**

Found [N] related entries:

**Most relevant:**
[Entry title] ([date]) - [project]
[Brief summary of what was done]

**Also relevant:**
- [Entry 2]: [Quick summary]
- [Entry 3]: [Quick summary]

**Suggestions:**
[How this past work applies to current task]

Best Practices

1. Search proactively: Don't wait for user to ask
2. Be selective: Show most relevant, not all results
3. Provide context: Explain how past work relates
4. Suggest application: How to use this information
5. Time-aware: Note if information might be outdated

What to Look For

Search for:

• Solutions: How problems were solved
• Decisions: Why choices were made
• Patterns: Established approaches
• Gotchas: Issues encountered and avoided
• Dependencies: Libraries and tools used

Integration with Other Skills

Combine with:

• context-recovery: When related work provides session context
• journal-capture: After applying past solutions to new problems

When NOT to Search

Don't search for:

• Completely novel features with no precedent
• Trivial tasks unlikely to have been journaled
• Very recent work (use context-recovery instead)
• Information better found in documentation

Advanced Techniques

Combine multiple searches:

1. journal_search(query="authentication")  # Broad search
2. journal_search(query="OAuth2", project="my-api")  # Narrow down

Use project stats for overview:

journal_stats()  # See which projects have relevant history
→ journal_list_recent(project="most-relevant-project")

Time-based filtering:

journal_time_query(
  time_expression="last 6 months",
  query="deployment"
)  # Recent relevant work only