[BUG] Prose list items still mint typed relations: a capitalized word before a wikilink becomes the relation type

[sammywachtel]

Bug Description

A list item that is ordinary prose still mints a typed relation, taking its type
from the last word before the wikilink.

- Added [[Target Note]] to the roster

files that as a kind of relationship called Added. Nobody wrote a
relationship there — it is a sentence from a log.

This is the sibling of #1219 (timestamp-prefixed transcript lines) and #1241
(extended checkbox markers) on the relation side rather than the observation
side: a recognizer whose shape is broad enough to eat ordinary writing.

Steps To Reproduce

1. main at a7a8bfb679be04e6f84d93b79dd4ee20bb5bc6eb (2026-08-14).
2. Parse:

from markdown_it import MarkdownIt
from basic_memory.markdown.plugins import observation_plugin, relation_plugin

md = MarkdownIt().use(observation_plugin).use(relation_plugin)
for src in [
    "- Added [[Target Note]] to the roster",
    "- Mother [[Target Note]]",
    "- Calls [[Target Note]] every Sunday",
    "- spouse_of [[Target Note]]",
]:
    rels = [r for t in md.parse(src) if t.meta for r in t.meta.get("relations", [])]
    print(f"{src!r} -> {rels}")

Actual Behavior

'- Added [[Target Note]] to the roster' -> [{'type': 'Added',     'target': 'Target Note', 'context': None}]
'- Mother [[Target Note]]'              -> [{'type': 'Mother',    'target': 'Target Note', 'context': None}]
'- Calls [[Target Note]] every Sunday'  -> [{'type': 'Calls',     'target': 'Target Note', 'context': None}]
'- spouse_of [[Target Note]]'           -> [{'type': 'spouse_of', 'target': 'Target Note', 'context': None}]

The first three are prose. Only the fourth was written as a relation.

Note the trailing text is discarded silently: to the roster and
every Sunday do not survive anywhere. The line is read as a relation and the
rest of the sentence is dropped.

Expected Behavior

Prose bullets should keep their links_to edge and produce no typed relation.
- spouse_of [[Target Note]] must keep working.

Why this survived #824

#824 established the current grammar deliberately, and correctly: unquoted
labels must be a single token, multi-word labels must be quoted, and
- some other thing [[Target]] falls through to inline handling. That closed
the case where a whole sentence became a relation type.

A single capitalized English word passes that test. Added is one token
with no whitespace, so by shape alone it is indistinguishable from a
hand-authored spouse_of. The surviving pattern is narrower and more specific
than the original: a sentence-initial capitalized word immediately before a
wikilink, inside a list item.

I don't think this was an oversight — #824's own scope note says the
explicit/inline distinction is ambiguous under the current syntax. This report is
about how much of that ambiguous middle zone is load-bearing in practice, which
turns out to be more than it looks.

Measured impact in a live vault

One real vault, indexed continuously for months, on a build carrying #824 plus a
local tightening that already rejects non-identifier types (dates, **, arrows):

• 457 edges, 63 distinct relation types, 162 typed (the rest links_to)
• 20 of the typed edges are parse artifacts — 12.3%
• Nine of those survive fix(core): parse prose wikilinks as inline links #824's grammar, all of the form above:
  Added, Created, Rewrote, Updated, Links:, Calls, Mother, On, see

The everyday writing that produces them is a dated log bullet mentioning a person
by wikilink — which is the shape most note-taking conventions actively encourage.
The more disciplined the logging, the more artifacts.

Mother is the instructive one. Somebody genuinely meant a relationship on that
line. The parser just had no business inventing its type out of the sentence.

Possible directions

Not prescribing, and each has a real cost:

1. Reject a type that is followed by more text after the wikilink. A genuine
   relation line usually ends at the target or a (context). - Added [[X]] to the roster has a prose tail; - spouse_of [[X]] does not. Cheap and catches
   most of the nine — but legitimately typed lines with trailing prose lose their
   type.
2. Require lowercase for unquoted types. Kills Added/Mother/Calls, keeps
   spouse_of/relates_to/使用, and gives authors a quoted escape hatch that
   already exists. Backward-incompatible for anyone using Requires [[X]] today.
3. Anchor to structure — only parse typed relations under a ## Relations
   heading or behind an explicit marker. The only truly decidable option, and the
   most disruptive.
4. Leave the grammar alone and document it, so downstream tools know a typed
   edge is only as trustworthy as the vocabulary behind it.

Happy to open a PR for whichever direction you'd want, or none — the grammar call
is yours, and I'd rather you make it than have me guess.

[ahmedaminebouchmal]

I reproduced the ambiguity described here. Before preparing a PR, can maintainers confirm the intended grammar policy: reject trailing prose after the wikilink, require lowercase unquoted relation types, or require an explicit relation marker? I can then add regression tests for Added, Mother, and Calls while preserving spouse_of.