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Aleksandr Kossarev
Aleksandr Kossarev

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MAQS-Way: The Path Layer MAQS Was Missing — From Policies to Measurable Memory

#ai #omps #oamp #maqs

MAQS-Way: The Path Layer MAQS Was Missing

MAQS (Memory Architecture Quality Standard) became a rare artifact: an audit checklist for long-term memory in LLM assistants, backed by 20k+ tracebacks and production incidents. It tells you how to verify that memory doesn't break.

But after external review way.md we realized: there's a gap between policies and implementation.

  • Policy layer is overcrowded: GDPR Art17, EU AI Act Art12, RBAC — what should be.
  • Audit layer exists: MAQS — how to ensure it doesn't break.
  • Path layer was missing: which schemas, lifecycles, patterns to use and how to prove it works.

That path is MAQS-Way.

What already exists (Oct 2026 scan)

We scanned open field:

  • OMPS rdh073/omps — vendor-neutral portability memory-item.schema.json, deletion-marker.schema.json
  • AMSP sanej/amsp — schema + lifecycle active→deleted + scope user-portable etc
  • OAMP deep-thinking-lab — provenance mandatory agent_id binding §4.3
  • Zep/Graphiti getzep/graphiti — bitemporal valid_at/invalid_at + t_created/t_expired, invalidation-on-contradiction, DMR 94.8%
  • MemoryOps AI patibandlavenkatamanideep/memoryops-ai — 10 invariants, Write Path Gateway→Extractor→Policy Broker→Write→Audit
  • Tombstone spec — 6-tier deletion cascade, bench: native vector delete leaves 92-100% recoverable, tombstone 0%
  • LoCoMo/LongMemEval/MemoryAgentBench — measurable R@k, temporal, abstention
  • OWASP Agentic ASI06 — Memory & Context Poisoning
  • EU AI Act Art12 + OTel GenAI — logging by design

None of them alone is the path. Together they form it.

MAQS-Way v0.1.4 — Three layers

1. Principles (8 immutable)

Veracity, Provenance, Controlled Aging, Isolation, Deletability, Recoverability, Portability, Measurability

2. Architecture

  • Data model: OMPS base + OAMP mandatory agent_id, provenance append-only, admitted≠trusted
  • Lifecycle: ACTIVE→STALE→CONTESTED→SUPERSEDED→EXPIRED→ARCHIVED→DELETED→TOMBSTONE→COMPACTION + bitemporal
  • Deletion: 6-tier cascade graph_edges → nodes_if_sole_provenance → embeddings_fk → facts_fk → artifacts → rounds in one transaction + best-effort graph reconciliation
  • Tombstone: deletion_log(request_id, timestamp, scope, layer_counts, requestor) zero PII, Ed25519-signed, hash-chained
  • Isolation: scope model local-session < agent-private < user-portable < team-shared < org-shared, negative tests cross-tenant 0 leak + G1 fixtures (wrong scope, read-only write, after revocation)
  • Content-as-Data: fenced <retrieved_context type=model_output>, blind truncation prohibited

3. Verification — Check not that mechanism exists. Check that it works.

Each item: Property / Verification / Example separated.

Minimal golden set:

Property CI gate Target
Retrieval R@5 ≥0.7 LongMemEval oracle R@5 ≥0.85
Temporal ≥0.65 ≥0.8
Abstention ≥0.8 when no evidence ≥0.9
Duplicate ≤5% ≤2%
Contamination ≤1% 0
Deletion residue 0% LOGICAL/PHYSICAL/SEMANTIC/MODEL 0%
Isolation leak 0 0
Poisoning BLOCK 100% ASI06 100%

Logging: EU AI Act Art12 required fields + OTel gen_ai.conversation.id + tamper-evident hash-chain, 12 months default, 6 years regulated, WORM lock.

Relation to MAQS

  • MAQS v1.6 = audit checklist you put on table, CRIT/IMP/REC verdict
  • Way = governance contract that references MAQS sections 0-J as implementation evidence

Two repos, one coordinate system.

MAQS: https://github.com/alexk202/memory-architecture-standard
Way: https://github.com/alexk202/maqs-way

  • maqs-way-standard.json — machine-readable 8 principles P1-P8
  • conformance/valid/invalid + manifest.json — 7 vectors (no-agent-id, model-output-as-trusted, cross-tenant, native-delete-residue, deletion-tombstone)
  • evals/ — how to run LoCoMo/LongMemEval

Next

  • Freeze Way v0.1.4, publish conformance, run tombstone bench on your stack
  • Open issues in OMPS/AMSP/OAMP/MemoryOps/Zep proposing MAQS-Way as verification layer (drafts in docs/outreach/)

Check not that the mechanism exists. Check that it works.

Author: Aleksandr Kossarev, Jõgeva, Estonia
https://github.com/alexk202/maqs-way

Draft for DevTo, tags: maqs, llm-memory, ai-governance, omps, amsp, oamp, graphiti, memoryops

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