Bug: Algorithm uses relative MEMORY/WORK/ paths, creates stray directories in project repos

[infinitelyloopy-bt]

Bug Description

The Algorithm documentation (v3.5.0.md and v3.7.0.md) instructs Claude to create PRD directories using relative paths:

mkdir -p MEMORY/WORK/{slug}/

Since Claude Code resolves paths from the current working directory (the project root), this creates MEMORY/WORK/ inside whatever project the user is working in, rather than in ~/.claude/MEMORY/WORK/.

Related: plansDirectory in settings.json

The default settings.json template ships with:

"plansDirectory": "Plans/"

This is also a relative path. Previous issues (#672, #699, #712) fixed the tilde expansion problem (~/Plans/ creating literal ~ directories), but the current default Plans/ is still relative and creates Plans/ in whatever project directory Claude Code is running from.

Impact

• MEMORY/ and Plans/ directories appear as untracked files in every project's git status
• Users accumulate stray directories across all their project repos
• PRDs and plans are scattered across project directories instead of centralized in ~/.claude/

Affected Files

1. Algorithm/v3.7.0.md (line 128-129): mkdir -p MEMORY/WORK/{slug}/ and Write MEMORY/WORK/{slug}/PRD.md
2. Algorithm/v3.5.0.md (line 148): mkdir -p MEMORY/WORK/{slug}/
3. settings.json template: "plansDirectory": "Plans/" should be absolute

Suggested Fix

Replace relative paths with absolute paths in Algorithm docs:

# Before
mkdir -p MEMORY/WORK/{slug}/

# After  
mkdir -p ~/.claude/MEMORY/WORK/{slug}/

And in settings.json template, use the expanded absolute path:

"plansDirectory": "/Users/<username>/.claude/Plans/"

Or document that plansDirectory must be an absolute path.

Environment

• PAI v4.0.3
• Claude Code on macOS
• Multiple projects under ~/XXXXX/Personal/ all had stray MEMORY/ and Plans/ directories

[danielmiessler]

Thanks for this — we appreciate the detailed report. This is being addressed as part of the next major PAI release, which includes significant architectural changes to this area. Closing for now since the fix would conflict with those incoming changes. If you believe this hasn't actually been fixed in the next release, please reopen or file a new issue explaining what's still broken, and we'll take another look.