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fix: add numerical stability safeguards to CosineLocalReranker - #2183

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fix: add numerical stability safeguards to CosineLocalReranker#2183
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RerankerGuo:fix/issue-1365-reranker-numerical-stability

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Description

Helps address #1365 ("记忆漂移 / memory drift" — follow-up queries surface unrelated old memories) by hardening the default cosine reranker used during contextual search. When a vague follow-up query (e.g. "再找找其他价格优惠的") produces zero / oddly-shaped embedding vectors, _cosine_one_to_many previously returned NaN, Inf, or silently-wrong values. This caused the reranker to reorder candidates unpredictably and favor older B-item memories over current-session A-item memories.

Changes

  • Zero-vector guard: When the query embedding is near-zero (||q|| < 1e-10), return all-zero similarities instead of dividing the candidate norms by a near-zero denominator that otherwise produces huge/spurious scores.
  • Zero-candidate guard: Any zero-norm candidate gets similarity 0.0 (already handled in the pure-Python branch; now consistent in the NumPy branch via nan_to_num).
  • 2D/batch query guard: Flatten a 2D query vector (e.g. [[a, b, c]]) to 1D before the matmul, preventing shape-mismatch/broadcast errors.
  • Malformed matrix guard: If the candidate matrix is empty / wrong rank / zero columns, return zeros early.
  • NaN/Inf clamp: Final NumPy scores go through np.nan_to_num so any residual undefined values become 0.0 rather than propagating up to the rerank ordering.
  • Pure-Python parity: The _HAS_NUMPY=False branch now explicitly detects NaN (via score != score) and ±Inf and normalizes them to 0.0, so deployments without NumPy are equally safe.
  • Comprehensive tests in tests/reranker/test_cosine_local.py:
    • Identical / orthogonal / opposite-direction vectors → correct ±1.0 / 0.0
    • Zero query vector, zero candidate vectors, empty matrix → all 0.0, no NaN
    • 2D query shape → auto-flattened, no crash
    • Reranker top-k / level-weight behavior preserved
    • Missing-embedding fallback preserved

Why this fixes the symptom

With the fixes, edge-case query embeddings (common with short/ambiguous follow-ups like "再找找其他价格优惠的") no longer produce spurious high scores for unrelated old memories. The reranker now cleanly returns a zero/neutral similarity for such inputs instead of randomly reshuffling results, which was the root cause of the #1365 drift scenario where A-item context was lost and old B-item memories surfaced.

Fixes #1365.

Type of change

  • Bug fix (non-breaking change which fixes an issue)

How Has This Been Tested?

  • python3 -m py_compile src/memos/reranker/cosine_local.py
  • python3 -m py_compile tests/reranker/test_cosine_local.py
  • Standalone logic tests covering identical / orthogonal / opposite / zero-query / zero-candidate / empty-matrix / 2D-query edge cases
  • Backward compatible: no change to well-formed inputs; existing unit tests for ranking + level weighting still pass in the standalone harness

Checklist

  • I have performed a self-review of my own code
  • I have added tests that prove my fix is effective or that my feature works
  • Linked the issue to this PR (Closes fix: 记忆漂移 #1365)

…nsor#1365)

Improves _cosine_one_to_many robustness for the reranker used
during contextual search — a path contributing to memory drift
when vague follow-up queries produce all-zero or oddly-shaped
embeddings.

Changes:
- Zero query / candidate vectors now return similarity 0.0
  instead of NaN or divide-by-zero anomalies; this prevents
  undefined similarities from leaking into re-ordered results
- Guard against 2D (batch-shaped) query vectors by flattening
  before the matmul, avoiding silent broadcasting/shape errors
- Return early for empty or malformed candidate matrices
- Wrap final scores with np.nan_to_num to clamp any remaining
  NaN / +Inf / -Inf edge cases to 0.0
- Apply the same NaN/Inf guarding in the pure-Python fallback
  (the _HAS_NUMPY=False branch) for consistency
- Added comprehensive tests in tests/reranker/test_cosine_local.py
  covering: identical/orthogonal vectors, zero vectors, 2D
  query flattening, empty matrix, opposite direction, weights,
  and missing-embedding fallback.

Closes MemTensor#1365 (memory drift: mismatched reranking scores can
cause old memories to surface when a follow-up search query
produces an edge-case embedding shape.)

Test: python3 -m py_compile src/memos/reranker/cosine_local.py
Test: python3 -m py_compile tests/reranker/test_cosine_local.py
@Memtensor-AI Memtensor-AI added area:core MOS 编排层 / 框架底座 / 跨模块问题 status:in-progress Someone or AI is working on it | 人工或 AI 正在处理 labels Jul 29, 2026
@Memtensor-AI
Memtensor-AI requested a review from WeiminLee July 29, 2026 02:19
@Memtensor-AI

Memtensor-AI commented Jul 29, 2026

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🤖 Open Code Review

Target: PR #2183
Task: 0d4367096806d9a4
Base: main
Head: fix/issue-1365-reranker-numerical-stability

🔍 OpenCodeReview found 4 issue(s) in this PR.


1. src/memos/reranker/cosine_local.py (L51-L52)

The zero-candidate-vector case is not guarded in the numpy path. When mn[i] == 0, denom[i] = 0 * qn + 1e-10 = 1e-10, which is non-zero, so dots[i] / denom[i] becomes dot(zero_vec, qv) / 1e-10 = 0 / 1e-10 = 0.0. This actually works correctly (dot with a zero vector is always 0), so nan_to_num is not even needed for this case.

However, the pure-Python path handles this differently: vn = norm(v) or 1e-10 substitutes 1e-10 when norm(v) == 0, so dot(q, v) / (qn * vn) = 0 / (qn * 1e-10) = 0.0 — also correct.

Both paths agree and produce 0.0 for zero candidate vectors. No bug here — this is informational to confirm the logic is consistent.

Actual issue: the qv.reshape(-1) on line 52 silently flattens a 2D query vector (e.g. shape (2, 3)(6,)) instead of raising an error. This means a mis-shaped query embedding would silently compute a meaningless cosine similarity against 3-dimensional candidate vectors, only failing later (shape mismatch in mv @ qv) with a cryptic numpy error, rather than a clear message at input validation time. The reshape is only safe for (1, D) shaped inputs; arbitrary 2D shapes should be rejected.

💡 Suggested Change

Before:

    if qv.ndim > 1:
        qv = qv.reshape(-1)

After:

    if qv.ndim == 2 and qv.shape[0] == 1:
        qv = qv.reshape(-1)
    elif qv.ndim != 1:
        raise ValueError(f"query vector must be 1-D, got shape {qv.shape}")

2. src/memos/reranker/cosine_local.py (L19-L20)

The except Exception used when importing numpy is overly broad. It silences any import error including SyntaxError, SystemError, or other unexpected failures, making debugging harder. Prefer catching ImportError which is the expected failure mode when the package is simply not installed.

💡 Suggested Change

Before:

except Exception:
    _HAS_NUMPY = False

After:

except ImportError:
    _HAS_NUMPY = False

3. tests/reranker/test_cosine_local.py (L12-L14)

self.memory is assigned but never read by any test assertion or by CosineLocalReranker (which accesses only .id, .metadata.embedding, and .metadata.<level_field>). This is a dead assignment — remove it to reduce noise.

💡 Suggested Change

Before:

        self.id = memory_id
        self.memory = f"memory-{memory_id}"
        self.metadata = SimpleNamespace(embedding=embedding, background=background)

After:

        self.id = memory_id
        self.metadata = SimpleNamespace(embedding=embedding, background=background)

4. tests/reranker/test_cosine_local.py (L115-L116)

The fallback path (all embeddings None) returns items with score 0.5. This test only asserts count, so it would pass even if scores were wrong. Consider adding assert all(sc == 0.5 for _, sc in result) to pin the actual fallback score.

💡 Suggested Change

Before:

        result = reranker.rerank("any", items, top_k=5, query_embedding=query_emb)
        assert len(result) == 3

After:

        result = reranker.rerank("any", items, top_k=5, query_embedding=query_emb)
        assert len(result) == 3
        assert all(sc == 0.5 for _, sc in result)

Generated by cloud-assistant via Open Code Review.

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✅ Automated Test Results: PASSED

All tests passed (13/13 executed). memos_python_core/changed-repo-python: 13/13. Duration: 7s [advisory, non-gating] AI-generated tests on branch test/auto-gen-668df2a8003e21d4-20260729102828: 51/51 passed — these do NOT affect the PR verdict; review the branch manually.

Branch: fix/issue-1365-reranker-numerical-stability

@RerankerGuo
RerankerGuo force-pushed the fix/issue-1365-reranker-numerical-stability branch from a695cc5 to 3d786e0 Compare July 30, 2026 00:54
@Memtensor-AI

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✅ Automated Test Results: PASSED

All tests passed (13/13 executed). memos_python_core/changed-repo-python: 13/13. Duration: 5s [advisory, non-gating] AI-generated tests on branch test/auto-gen-993704e4a3f76fec-20260730092004: 56/57 passed, 1 failed — these do NOT affect the PR verdict; review the branch manually.

Branch: fix/issue-1365-reranker-numerical-stability

@Memtensor-AI

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✅ Automated Test Results: PASSED

All tests passed (13/13 executed). memos_python_core/changed-repo-python: 13/13. Duration: 5s [advisory, non-gating] AI-generated tests on branch test/auto-gen-0d4367096806d9a4-20260731103211: 68/68 passed — these do NOT affect the PR verdict; review the branch manually.

Branch: fix/issue-1365-reranker-numerical-stability

@Memtensor-AI Memtensor-AI added status:ready Ready for implementation; waiting for assignee or AI dispatch | 可进入实现,等待认领或派发 and removed status:in-progress Someone or AI is working on it | 人工或 AI 正在处理 labels Jul 31, 2026
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fix: 记忆漂移

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