Memo
A work queue for you and your agents

Your agents do the work. You get the part that needs you.

Memo is one inbox between you and your AI agents. An agent books, sorts, drafts, researches and builds. When it needs a choice, a signature or a click that only you can make, it sends you a memo. The memos are ranked by how much they matter for each minute of your time.

Get it on GitHub See what it did
Inbox5 open · sorted by impact for each minute
newimpact 4 · under 2 minfrom main
Pick a time for the barber.
I compared three places near you and recommend the first. I cannot book: the site needs your sign-in. Reply with a time and I add it to your calendar.
ReplyNoteMoreLess
impact 3 · under 2 minfrom main
21 reply drafts are in your Drafts folder.
Open each one and press Send. I sent nothing.
impact 3 · 2–15 mindue Friday
Packing list for the trip, from the forecast for both cities.
✓Rain jacket
✓Chargers and adapter
Boots for the second city
impact 2 · no answer neededfrom main
Your spending this week, by category.
535memos in its first 11 days of use
6 of 10memos to the owner took less than 2 minutes of the owner's time
95%took less than 15 minutes
305notes back and forth on open memos, so a memo can change without a new one

An inbox, not a list of conversations

A chat with an agent is a thread that you must keep up with. You scroll back to find the question, you check whether it finished, and you hold the open threads in your head. Memo turns that around. A memo shows up only when there is something for you to do or to decide. Everything else happens out of sight.

1

The work is invisible until it needs you. Research, drafts, comparisons, code, deploys and hand-offs between agents happen in the background. When a task finishes with nothing for you to do, you see one short line, or nothing.

2

The agents keep watch so you do not have to. A return window, a charge that should stop next month, a reply you are waiting for, a reminder for a date: the agent tracks it and brings a memo back only when that day or that event comes.

3

Each memo stands alone. One topic, with the action or the question in bold on the first line, and the options as a list. You never reread a thread to know what is being asked.

4

An empty inbox means that nothing needs you. The order is impact for each minute of your time, not time of arrival, so the quick and important choices come first.

A chat with an agent

  • Every step of the work is a message you read.
  • The question you must answer is somewhere in the thread.
  • You check back to see whether it is done.
  • Ten tasks are ten threads to remember.
  • Newest first, whatever it is.

Memo

  • You see the result and the one step that needs you.
  • The question is the first line, in bold.
  • The memo comes to you when it is done, or when it is blocked.
  • Ten tasks are, at most, a few memos, and often none.
  • Most important for each minute first.

Real requests, word for word

These are messages the owner really typed into Memo, word for word, with a few details changed for privacy. Under each one: what the agents did, and how little the owner had to do.

I need to pack for the trip. It involves a few days of hiking and the rest are just me in the city. Can you look at the weather and prepare a packing list for me?

Behind the scenes

The agent already knew the dates and both stops of the trip from the owner's mail. It read the forecast for each day in each place, made a table of rain and temperature, and wrote one list that covers the hiking days and the city days. The owner asked for an interactive checklist, so the agent added check boxes to Memo itself and sent the list again with them.

The owner's part:two sentences, then ticks on the phone
i need to plan my birthday party

Behind the scenes

The agent read the calendar for free evenings, left out a holiday weekend, and offered three kinds of party. The owner chose one and gave a number of guests. The agent found the one place that takes group requests by email and wrote the inquiry. It sent nothing until the owner wrote “send”.

The owner's part:a letter, a number, and “send”
Please find a trustworthy barber near my hotel who can do beards.

Behind the scenes

The agent knew the hotel from the booking mail. It compared three shops, measured the walk from the hotel to each one, and then read the reviews to find which barbers in the best shop are good with beards. The owner booked the next day.

The owner's part:one question about which barber to book
can you plot me a route to the car rental place near the airport from my hotel? unclear if i need to take an uber to get there or not

Behind the scenes

Without being asked, the agent took the pickup time and the booking details from the owner's mail, and answered in one line: take a car straight to the lot, 15 to 20 minutes, and you are on time.

The owner's part:“ty”
what other messaging services, apps, etc could i give you access to? can you look at my applications directory and see which ones i use that i can set you up with?

Behind the scenes

The agent read the Applications folder and the date each app was last used. It recommended two and kept work apps and password managers out. In about 20 minutes, Contacts, Calendar, Reminders, Notes, Signal, Discord and X were readable, and none of them could send. When one of its own setup steps failed, it said so and sent corrected steps.

The owner's part:a few ticks, two pastes, and “done”
can you make a list of every single paid subscription i have that seems to be active?

Behind the scenes

The agent read the owner's budget app and the receipts in the mail, and found 45 active subscriptions. The owner named the ones to drop. The agent made a cancel checklist for 23 of them, with a direct link to each cancel page and the iPhone ones together, and set a check one month later that the charges really stopped.

The owner's part:one list of names, then ticks
a photo of a warm-up routine
add this to my couch to 5k app please. a warmup section before a run

Behind the scenes

The agent read the five drills from the photo and built them into the owner's iPhone running app, with a timer and a voice cue for each. It tested the app in the simulator, sent a screenshot, and installed it on the phone. The next request, “add watch support”, gave the owner an Apple Watch app the next day.

The owner's part:a photo, and one unlock of the phone
please uninstall inyourface. then look at hammerspoon and see what features we'd need to copy into kea for it to replace hammerspoon for the usecases i care about

Behind the scenes

The agent quit the app and listed exactly what a removal deletes, then asked first, as its rules say. It read the owner's automation config and wrote a feature comparison with an order to build in. In the next days the owner's launcher got the missing parts: full-screen meeting alerts, a Hyper key, and an autoclicker.

The owner's part:“delete”, and a review of the plan
i have like ~10 hours to get stuff done today. i gotta figure out what's most pressing. i think i want to:
- go to arcteryx
- go to the hoka store
- go for a short run
- update the couch25k app
- plan the wine party
- do my laundry
- pick a way of organizing my photos
- switch to lightcraft
- list my blundstones
- get stuff out of dropbox
- start my home server up on my old m2 air

Behind the scenes

The agent made a timed plan from 11:00 to 20:30 around a fixed evening plan. It put first what had to happen before an upcoming trip, grouped the two stores into one outing, and moved three items to another day. Each step had a box to tick.

The owner's part:the list, then ticks through the day

What it did in its first two weeks

These are the kinds of work that really went through one person's Memo. The examples are rewritten so they are general and private details are out, but each one stands for real memos.

Errands and personal admin

about 60 memos

The agent finds the deadline, does each step it can, and gives the owner only the step that needs the owner: a sign-in, a signature, a time.

"The return window for your order closes on the 27th. You are home on three days before then. Take it to the drop-off on one of them."
MailCalendarContactsThe web

Mail, sorted and drafted

about 30 memos

A read-only sort of thousands of unread messages, a daily "nothing needs you today" check, and reply drafts saved for the owner to send.

"Daily mail check: nothing needs you today. One item can wait until you are home. I only read; I changed nothing."
Mail, read onlyDrafts

Trips and events

about 40 memos

A week-long trip, a birthday party, a tasting party, a gift. The agent watches confirmations in mail, plans around the weather, and sends lists that the owner ticks on a phone.

"Your pickup is at 2 PM. Take a car straight to the rental lot, about 15 to 20 minutes."
CalendarWeatherMailChecklists

Money and subscriptions

about 35 memos

A weekly spending summary as a chart, an audit of subscriptions with a cancel list, and a check a month later that each cancelled charge really stopped.

"Cancel the subscriptions you do not use. Tick each box when it is done. I check next month that the charges stopped."
A local budget appCharts

The computers in the house

about 45 memos

Set up a spare Mac as a home server, clean up a Windows PC, find duplicate files, remove apps that are no longer needed. Each deletion waits for a yes.

"I found about 295 GB of duplicates. Reply yes to run this delete plan. Nothing is deleted before your yes."
ShellSSHFilesA second agent on another Mac

Code in the owner's projects

about 110 memos

The owner asks for a change in plain words. The agent builds it, attaches screenshots, opens a pull request, and asks for one click: merge. It built much of Memo itself this way.

"You sent a photo of a warm-up routine. The warm-up is in the app now. Unlock your phone near the Mac and I install it."
GitHubDeploysScreenshotsCode review bots

Research and choices

about 30 memos

Compare options for the owner's real needs, not in general. Password managers, gear for a store visit, gifts, a dinner near the hotel, how to save wet books.

"For your two needs, I recommend option A or B. A comparison table is below."
The webTables

People and messages

about 20 memos

A list of the conversations that wait for a reply, with drafts on request. Over Discord, a second agent agreed on a meeting time with a friend's agent and kept the owner's calendar private.

"A friend's agent offered three Thursday evenings. Which one is free for you?"
Messages, read onlyChat apps, read onlyDiscord

Rules it keeps

An agent that can read your mail and run commands must be easy to trust. These rules come from the charters the agents follow, and from what the memos show they did.

Draft first, send never

Messages are drafts until the owner says yes to that one message. Many memos end with "I sent nothing."

Ask before each deletion

Apps, files and drafts are removed only after a yes, also when the owner asked for the cleanup.

Stop at the line

At a purchase, a sign-in or a blocked permission, the agent stops and gives the owner the exact step or command.

Respect the owner's minutes

Each memo has an impact (1 to 5) and the owner's effort. The Inbox sorts by impact for each unit of effort, so a quick, important choice comes first.

One topic for each memo

A memo stands alone. The question or the action is in bold on the first line, and options are a list.

Say what changed

When an agent is wrong, it says so: "This memo replaces the earlier one", "a correction to my estimate". It also reports risks it notices.

How it works

Memo has one idea: the memo, a message from one party to another, with an optional reply.

UseFromToEnds when
A questionan agentthe ownerthe owner replies
A task only the owner can doan agentthe ownerthe owner closes it
Work for an agentthe owneran agentthe agent closes it
A chat messageDiscordthe liaisonthe liaison closes it

Connected to the Mac and its apps

Memo itself is small. The reach comes from the agent's tools: the shell, the browser, and read-only hooks into the Mac's own apps. In this setup the hooks come from the Kea launcher.

MailCalendarContactsRemindersNotesMessages, read onlyChat apps, read onlyDiscordFind MyWeatherGitHubDeploy toolsA budget appFiles and the shellOther computers over SSH

Run your own Memo.

Memo is open source under the MIT license. The setup guide is written so that a Claude agent can set it up for a person who does not write code.

github.com/cameronblandford/memo Setup guide
Read this first. Memo starts Claude Code sessions on your computer. An agent runs commands and changes files with the permissions of your user account. Read the charters before you start an agent, and give an agent only the folders and tools it needs.