GRAPH.md

Your conventions, on one page.

Your assistant writes into your map. Nothing has ever told it how you want that done. GRAPH.md is that missing page. It gets read before the first write.

Why it exists

The same material comes out one shape when Claude files it and another when Cursor does. The same person files it differently two months later. Is this a concept or an episode, is the link a loose relation or a prerequisite, is the topic research or Research. Every session decides again from scratch.

Vinc does not judge meaning. It has no model and no API key, and it stores what it is handed. The assistant does the judging. But your conventions were never written down anywhere it could see. One file closes that gap.

This file does not replace judgment. It fixes vocabulary and shape only. What matters, and why, is still the assistant's call.

Two regions

One file, split in two. That split is most of what there is to know.

Yours to writeWhen to reach for each node kind, how big one concept should be, what not to do. The store cannot know these, so a person writes them.

Copied from the storeThe topics you actually have and the vocabulary you have approved. It sits between markers and is generated from your map.

One rule. Copy what the store knows, and hand write only what the store cannot know. Invent the copied part yourself and the file starts lying.

What the rules cover

This file sets a floor, not a fence. It gives an assistant common ground to stand on: your node kinds, your relation names, the topics you already have. It does not fence off the rest.

Write a type that is not in the vocabulary and it is kept, not rejected. It saves, it is marked as proposed, and it waits for you. A file that punished the unfamiliar would push an assistant into silence, and silence is worse than a name you have not approved yet.

It is a living file too. Your graph grows, you approve new vocabulary, and the copied region is rewritten to match. It is not a config you set once.

Where it lives

If your assistant is connected over MCP, it fetches this itself. vinc_conventions is a read-only tool that hands back your conventions, and vinc_ingest tells it to call that first. Nothing to paste.

Inside VincWrite it from the conventions button in the app. The tool serves it to your assistant as is.

A file in your repoSimplest if you work next to code. Claude Code takes @GRAPH.md, Cursor keeps it beside the rule files.

At the top of the chatWith no connector, paste it into the first message. Seventy lines is cheap.

Whichever you pick, it only counts if it is read before the writing. Read afterwards, it is too late. This machine and your account are different graphs, and each keeps its own conventions.

What this file does not do

It does not judge for you. What counts as a concept, and what matters, stays with the assistant.
It does not enforce. A type outside the vocabulary is not thrown away. It is kept as proposed, and a person approves it.
The assistant cannot approve its own proposal. Proposing and approving are split on purpose.
It does not check whether your conventions are good. Validation only looks at shape.

Next: Generate it, and fill it from your own map.