---
name: session-manager
description: Set the current session's name, project, tags, or summary on its session note. Use when the user names, tags, or summarizes this session, sets its project, or mentions in passing what this session has been about.
---

# Session Manager

You **own** four properties on the current session's note: `session_name`, `project`, `tags` and
`summary`. The hooks seed a note when the session starts and never overwrite a value that is already
there; from then on you are the only writer. Everything else on the note is theirs.

| Property | Type | Holds |
|----------|------|-------|
| `session_name` | text | The session's name, kept in step with `/rename` |
| `project` | text | The knowledge-bank domain the work belongs to, one of the vault's `projects/` folders, empty when it belongs to none |
| `tags` | list | Categorization, drawn from the vault's existing tags |
| `summary` | text | One line on what the session accomplished |

`project` names a domain, never a repository or directory: those are tags. A value outside the domain
set is unresolved, which is what a note written before this rule holds, so treat it as empty and set it
properly rather than leaving it to be read as a domain.

When the start hook's injected instruction names **automatic mode**, it is asking you to derive tags
for a session it could name but not describe. Run the preflight, then set tags in the automatic mode of
[tag-canonicalization.md](tag-canonicalization.md), which writes without prompting. Do it after you
have answered the user's first request, never instead of it.

## Preflight

Run all five steps on every invocation, before the user's request and whatever they asked for.

**1. Locate the note.** The SessionStart hook injects a docs path into your system prompt:

```
Session docs path: {KB_PATH}/_sessions/2026-03-04/abc123-def456/docs/
```

Everything from `_sessions/` onward is vault-relative. Drop the trailing `docs/` and append
`session.md`, giving `_sessions/2026-03-04/abc123-def456/session.md`. Read it:

```bash
obsidian vault="knowledge-bank" read path="<vault-relative-path>"
```

If no docs path was injected, ask the user for the session folder.

**2. Sync the name.** `/rename` writes a `customTitle` to the transcript, which the note does not see:

```bash
source skills/common/obsidian_helpers.sh
read_custom_title "<cwd from the note>" "<session_id from the note>"
```

When that title differs from `session_name`, adopt it:

```bash
obsidian vault="knowledge-bank" property:set name="session_name" value="<title>" path="<vault-relative-path>"
```

**3. Name the terminal.** Give the enclosing container the session's name, as a real Bash call. The
helper detects tmux or Herdr from `$TMUX_PANE` and `$HERDR_PANE_ID` itself, and under Herdr it also
names the agent so other agents can reach this session by name:

```bash
source skills/common/obsidian_helpers.sh
rename_terminal_window "<session_name>"
```

The helper is best-effort and reports nothing, so confirm the result yourself rather than assuming it:

```bash
[ -n "$HERDR_PANE_ID" ] && herdr pane list | grep -o "\"label\":\"[^\"]*\"" | grep -c "<session_name>"
[ -n "$TMUX_PANE" ] && tmux display-message -p '#W'
```

**Done when:** the container's label reads back as the session name, or `session_name` is empty and
there was nothing to apply.

**4. Report the four properties.**

```
**Current Session**
- session_name: <value or empty>
- project: <value or empty>
- tags: <value or empty>
- summary: <value or empty>
```

Add one more line when `forked_from` or `delegated_by` is set, naming where the session came from, so a
copied project and copied tags are visibly inherited rather than looking chosen:

```
- lineage: forked from <name or id> | delegated by <name or id>
```

**5. Dispatch.** Carry out the user's request. When the request names no property, ask with the
**AskUserQuestion** tool which of the four to update.

## Writing a property

```bash
obsidian vault="knowledge-bank" property:set name="<property>" value="<value>" [type="list"] path="<vault-relative-path>"
```

Tags take an extra step: they are canonicalized against the vault's existing tags and confirmed
before anything is written. Read [tag-canonicalization.md](tag-canonicalization.md) when the request
involves tags.

Confirm every write back to the user, and use the **AskUserQuestion** tool for confirmations so the
user gets a real prompt. This skill acts on the current session alone.