# PFES-ENG-041 — Knowledge Management

**Status:** Core project function  
**Knowledge Cycle Stages:** Preserve Knowledge

## Purpose

Preserve, organize, validate, and communicate engineering understanding.

## Engineering Problem

Knowledge scattered across chats, reports, code, logs, and individual memory cannot reliably guide future engineers.

## Historical Engineering Evolution

PFES emerged because tools documented payloads and behavior, but not the engineering judgment behind them.

## Engineering Discoveries

- Engineering knowledge is the primary product.
- Reports explain investigations; PFES explains engineering.
- Knowledge should be consolidated, not duplicated.

## Architectural Decisions

- PFES is canonical.
- Historical reports remain supporting evidence.
- Preserve negative knowledge and rationale.

## Knowledge Produced

- Institutional memory
- Discoveries
- Decisions
- Handoffs

## Knowledge Consumed

- Every project subsystem
- Migration sources
- Validation

## Current Engineering State

PFES is under construction as the central reference. It should eventually replace dependence on many standalone summaries without erasing the history behind them.

## Engineering Lessons

- A new engineer should read PFES first and old reports only for evidence or detail.

## Negative Knowledge

Project Frankenstein no longer assumes:

- Source code preserves intent.
- Important reasoning remains obvious over time.

## Current Implementations

- PFES Markdown repository
- Handoff documents
- Migration reports

## Future Implementations

- Searchable knowledge base
- Automated cross-reference and traceability

## Open Questions

To be expanded during engineering review.

## Why This Chapter Exists

The project cannot outlive its engineering memory without a canonical home.
