Configuration

mememory is configured through environment variables. There are three configuration contexts: Docker stack, server processes, and the CLI.

Docker Stack Variables

These variables are used in docker/docker-compose.yml and control the Docker infrastructure:

Variable	Default	Description
DATA_DIR	OS-standard path (auto-resolved by CLI)	Host directory for persistent data (PostgreSQL data, Ollama models). Bind-mounted into containers.
POSTGRES_PORT	5432	Host port for PostgreSQL
POSTGRES_PASSWORD	mememory	PostgreSQL password for the mememory user
OLLAMA_PORT	11434	Host port for the Ollama API
ADMIN_PORT	4200	Host port for the Admin API and web UI

Example: Custom ports

# .env file in the project root
DATA_DIR=/data/mememory
POSTGRES_PORT=15432
POSTGRES_PASSWORD=s3cret
OLLAMA_PORT=21434
ADMIN_PORT=9200

Data directory structure

$DATA_DIR/
├── postgres/       # PostgreSQL data files
└── ollama/         # Ollama model files (nomic-embed-text, etc.)

If DATA_DIR is unset, the mememory CLI auto-resolves it:

Platform	Default
Linux	~/.local/share/mememory (or $XDG_DATA_HOME/mememory)
macOS	~/Library/Application Support/mememory
Windows	%LOCALAPPDATA%\mememory

WARNING

Changing DATA_DIR after initial setup means the new directory starts empty. Move the existing data or use backup/restore to migrate.

Server Variables

These variables configure the server (MCP server) and admin (Admin API) processes inside the container:

Variable	Default	Description
DATABASE_URL	required, no default	PostgreSQL connection string. The server fails fast on missing value. Example: postgres://mememory:mememory@localhost:5432/mememory?sslmode=disable. Requires PostgreSQL >= 14 with the pgvector extension.
OLLAMA_URL	http://localhost:11434	Ollama API URL (used when EMBEDDING_PROVIDER is ollama or unset)
ADMIN_PORT	4200	Port for the Admin API server
EMBEDDING_PROVIDER	ollama	Embedding provider: ollama or openai
EMBEDDING_URL	(provider-specific)	Custom embedding API URL
EMBEDDING_API_KEY	—	API key for cloud embedding providers
EMBEDDING_MODEL	(provider-specific)	Override the default embedding model

DATABASE_URL

Standard PostgreSQL connection string. The database must have the vector extension enabled (included in the pgvector/pgvector:pg17 Docker image).

# Bundled Docker stack
DATABASE_URL=postgres://mememory:mememory@localhost:5432/mememory?sslmode=disable

# Remote server (BYO Postgres)
DATABASE_URL=postgres://user:pass@db.example.com:5432/mememory?sslmode=require

The connecting user needs CREATE privilege so the server can run CREATE EXTENSION IF NOT EXISTS vector on first start. Otherwise have your DBA install pgvector beforehand.

Embedding Provider Configuration

See Embedding Providers for detailed configuration of each provider.

Ollama (default, local):

EMBEDDING_PROVIDER=ollama
OLLAMA_URL=http://localhost:11434
# EMBEDDING_MODEL defaults to nomic-embed-text

OpenAI:

EMBEDDING_PROVIDER=openai
EMBEDDING_API_KEY=sk-...
# EMBEDDING_MODEL defaults to text-embedding-3-small

OpenAI-compatible API (e.g., Azure, Mistral):

EMBEDDING_PROVIDER=openai
EMBEDDING_URL=https://my-endpoint.openai.azure.com/openai/deployments/my-embedding/embeddings?api-version=2024-02-01
EMBEDDING_API_KEY=your-api-key
EMBEDDING_MODEL=text-embedding-3-small

CLI Variables

The mememory CLI binary uses a single variable:

Variable	Default	Description
MEMORY_URL	http://localhost:4200	Admin API URL for bootstrap and status commands

Example

# Default — connects to local Docker stack
mememory bootstrap

# Custom URL
MEMORY_URL=http://my-server:4200 mememory bootstrap

# Or use the --url flag
mememory bootstrap --url http://my-server:4200

Complete Example

A full .env file for a custom setup:

# Data storage
DATA_DIR=/opt/mememory/data

# Ports
POSTGRES_PORT=5432
OLLAMA_PORT=11434
ADMIN_PORT=4200

# Security
POSTGRES_PASSWORD=strong-password-here

# Embedding provider (cloud)
EMBEDDING_PROVIDER=openai
EMBEDDING_API_KEY=sk-your-key-here
EMBEDDING_MODEL=text-embedding-3-small

Docker Compose Override

For advanced customization, create a docker-compose.override.yml:

services:
  postgres:
    ports:
      - "15432:5432"
    environment:
      POSTGRES_PASSWORD: my-secure-password

  admin:
    environment:
      EMBEDDING_PROVIDER: openai
      EMBEDDING_API_KEY: sk-your-key

This merges with the base docker-compose.yml when running docker compose up.

Precedence

1. CLI flags (--url, --project, etc.) override everything
2. Environment variables override defaults
3. Default values are used when nothing else is set

Inside Docker, the docker-compose.yml sets internal service URLs (e.g., DATABASE_URL=postgres://mememory:mememory@postgres:5432/mememory) for container-to-container communication.