Vault Structure

A Context Nest vault is a directory containing Markdown documents, configuration, and version history.

Structured layout (default)


my-vault/
├── CONTEXT.md              # Vault-level system prompt for AI agents
├── context.yaml            # Machine-readable index (auto-generated)
├── nodes/                  # Knowledge documents
│   ├── INDEX.md            # Auto-generated folder index
│   ├── architecture.md
│   └── api-reference.md
├── sources/                # Source nodes (live data instructions)
│   ├── INDEX.md
│   └── current-sprint.md
├── packs/                  # Context packs (YAML)
│   └── engineering-essentials.yml
├── .context/               # Configuration
│   └── config.yaml
└── .versions/              # Version history (auto-managed)
    ├── context_history.yaml
    └── nodes/
        └── architecture/
            └── history.yaml

Key files

CONTEXT.md

The vault-level system prompt. AI agents read this first to understand the vault’s purpose, structure, and how to interact with it.

context.yaml

Machine-readable index auto-generated by the CLI. Contains:

List of all published documents with metadata
Relationship graph (context links, backlinks, dependencies)
Hub documents (highest inbound reference count)
External dependencies (MCP servers, tools required by source nodes)

config.yaml

Vault configuration in .context/config.yaml:


name: "My Project"
namespace: "my-project"
layout: structured
federation: none

Obsidian layout

For Obsidian users, vaults can use a flat structure without the nodes/ / sources/ separation:


my-vault/
├── CONTEXT.md
├── context.yaml
├── architecture.md
├── api-reference.md
├── .context/
│   └── config.yaml
└── .versions/