Code graph

Graphify builds an AST graph of your repo. Install it alongside Strata and the vault becomes code-aware. Notes verify their symbol references. Recall returns ranked structure projections. Claude answers “what does this aggregate emit” from a 500-token compressed view, not by grepping 200 files.

This is where the token economy pays off, not just documentation.

Install Graphify

brew install graphifylabs/tap/graphify
# or the official installer

Strata doesn’t depend on Graphify’s Python. We parse the JSON it emits.

Build the graph

/strata:graphify

Wraps graphify update .. AST-only path. No LLM key needed. Output lands at <repo>/graphify-out/graph.json. Rebuild after material code changes; the SessionStart primer tells you when it’s stale.

What Strata does with the graph

Nine integration points.

Build and refresh

/strata:graphify builds or refreshes the graph.

Session start

The primer surfaces top god nodes plus graph age. When stale, it leads with a directive rebuild prompt. code_map and freshness scores both read the graph, so outdated cascades.

Bootstrap

bootstrap-scan --verify extracts backtick symbols from each candidate, resolves them against the graph, contributes to the freshness percentage.
plan_correlate checks every symbol in a planning subdir against the graph. Resolution count drives the completion estimate.
bootstrap-worker has no MCP grant. It shells the bundled Strata scripts via bin/run-python.sh to project top symbols in its group before classifying. Informs wikilink choices.

On-demand

code_map (MCP tool): aider-style token-budgeted projection. Top tier carries file and line and refs count. Middle tier carries file only. Bottom tier carries label only. The focus parameter promotes one-hop neighbours of named symbols into the top tier.
Wikilink-to-code bridging (internal, surfaced via recall layer 2): when a vault wikilink doesn’t resolve to another note, Strata attempts to bridge to a graph node. Surfaces as graphify:NodeName.

Write protection

new-decision.py --strict-symbols refuses to write an ADR when backtick identifiers don’t resolve. Catches typos and stale references before they enter the vault.

Durable cross-reference

code_refs: frontmatter convention. Each note lists the verified symbols it touches. Names only, no projection embedded. Future queries call code_map(focus=code_refs) fresh so the projection stays current as code moves.

Health check

/strata:review flags 🔴 STALE when graph.json is more than 7 days old or 20 commits behind HEAD.

`code_map` in practice

The dynamic projection is what Claude actually calls during a conversation. From any session:

code_map(focus=["OrderAggregate"], budget=1500)

→ # Code map — focus: OrderAggregate
  _★ = focus symbol; neighbours of focus promoted into top tier._

  - `OrderAggregate`   — services/orders/OrderAggregate.cs:L7  (refs:14) ★
  - `.Place()`         — services/orders/OrderAggregate.cs:L42 (refs:3) ★
  - `.Confirm()`       — services/orders/OrderAggregate.cs:L67 (refs:3) ★
  - `.Cancel()`        — services/orders/OrderAggregate.cs:L91 (refs:2) ★
  - `OrderPlaced`      — services/orders/Events.cs:L8          (refs:9) ★
  - `OrderConfirmed`   — services/orders/Events.cs:L12         (refs:7) ★
  - `OrderRouter`      — services/orders/OrderRouter.cs:L18    (refs:4)
  - `IOrderRepository` — services/orders/Storage.cs:L11        (refs:6)
  ...

About 1.5KB of compressed structure. Without it, Claude greps every .cs file mentioning OrderAggregate: easily 5 to 10KB of source. With it, the answer fits in one tool call.

Ranking

In-degree (how many things reference a node) as the PageRank proxy. Cheap. As effective as full PageRank at the find the hubs job, per aider’s empirical results. When focus is set, matched nodes and their one-hop neighbours rank into the top tier regardless of global degree.

Tier budget

Top 10% of ranked nodes: full detail (file:line, refs count).
Next 20%: file only.
Bottom: label only.
Cut at the token budget. Default 1000 tokens, roughly 4KB.

Pass budget=2000 to widen or budget=500 to tighten.

Focus matching

Exact label match wins. Substring-on-id is the fallback. Only triggers when nothing matched exactly. Without that gating, a focus on OrderAggregate would drown in OrderAggregateTests and every test fixture sharing the substring.

When focus matches nothing, output leads with _no nodes matched focus: ..._ and falls back to global hubs. You’ll see the warning and can retry with a different spelling.

Staleness is a first-class signal

The code map is only as good as the graph it reads. When the graph drifts behind HEAD:

### Code graph (Graphify)
**⚠ graph is stale (47 commits since last build).**
Run `/strata:graphify` to refresh.
code_map / symbol resolution / freshness scores all read this graph.

Appears in the SessionStart primer before the regular stats. The Stop hook also appends the staleness signal when relevant. Rebuild is one command. Typically takes seconds.

Next: Correcting the vault. Fix notes, mark them invalidated, supersede ADRs.