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+# `mem_cache/`
+
+Everything that owns KV / SSM-state memory: who hands out slots, who holds the bytes on
+the device, who mirrors them to host and disk, and which radix cache decides what
+to keep. The layout is specified in
+[#25371](https://github.com/sgl-project/sglang/issues/25371).
+
+## Layers
+
+```
+        scheduler / model_runner / attention backend
+                          |
+                          v
+        allocation.py                  per-batch allocation policy
+                          |
+                          v
+        hybrid_cache/                  multi-pool router (layer_id -> pool)
+                          |
+                          v
+        allocator/                     "give me N slots"  (need_size -> indices)
+                          | holds a reference to
+                          v
+        pool/ (device, L1)  --hicache-->  pool_host/ (host, L2)  -->  storage/ (L3)
+        (layer_id, indices)               device_indices <->
+             <-> tensor                   host_indices
+```
+
+| Layer | Cares about | In -> Out |
+|---|---|---|
+| `allocation.py` | per-batch allocation policy | `batch` -> `out_cache_loc` |
+| `hybrid_cache/` | per-layer routing across pools | `layer_id` -> pool |
+| `allocator/` | which slots are free | `need_size` -> `indices` |
+| `pool/` | physical KV / SSM state layout | `(layer_id, indices)` <-> tensor |
+| `pool_host/` | host mirror + H2D/D2H | `device_indices` <-> `host_indices` |
+| `storage/` | L3 backends (file, NIXL, HF3FS, Mooncake, ...) | hash -> bytes |
+| radix cache | what to keep and what to evict | token prefix -> node |
+
+Two groups sit outside that stack:
+
+- **Radix cache** is its own axis. The per-model variants (`radix_cache.py`,
+  `swa_radix_cache.py`, `mamba_radix_cache.py`, `hiradix_cache.py`, `chunk_cache.py`)
+  are converging onto the **Unified Radix Cache** (`unified_cache/`,
+  [#20415](https://github.com/sgl-project/sglang/issues/20415)), whose Full/SWA/Mamba
+  component model is documented in
+  [`unified_cache/components/README.md`](unified_cache/components/README.md).
+- **Construction** cuts across every layer rather than sitting in it:
+  `kv_cache_configurator.py`, `kv_cache_builder.py`, `cache_init_params.py`,
+  `allocation_sizing.py`, `kv_cache_dtype.py`, `kv_vmm_backing.py`, and
+  `hybrid_cache/hybrid_pool_assembler.py` decide the shapes and build the objects above.
+
+## Where does my class go?
+
+By base class, never by name:
+
+| Inherits from | Home |
+|---|---|
+| `BaseTokenToKVPoolAllocator` | `allocator/<family>.py` |
+| `KVCache`, `BaseSWAKVPool`, `ReqToTokenPool`, `MambaPool` | `pool/<family>.py` |
+| `HostKVCache` | `pool_host/<family>.py` |
+| `HiCacheStorage` | `storage/<backend>/` |
+| `BasePrefixCache` | one module at the `mem_cache/` root |
+
+`<family>` is the attention or state family: `mha`, `mla`, `dsa`, `mamba`, `swa`,
+`hisparse`, `deepseek_v4`. A new quantization or layout variant of an existing family is
+a new file in that family's module, not a new class in a catch-all one.
+
+`Allocator` means two different things and they do not share a directory:
+
+- **slot allocator** -- a `BaseTokenToKVPoolAllocator` subclass, hands out KV slots,
+  lives in `allocator/`.
+- **host tensor allocator** -- `HostTensorAllocator` and its subclasses, hands out pinned
+  host memory, lives in `pool_host/common.py` and `storage/`.
+
+## Conventions
+
+- **Names drop affixes that do not differentiate.** If every file in a directory shares
+  the role the directory already names, the affix carries nothing: `pool_host/mha.py`,
+  not `pool_host/mha_pool_host.py`. Keep a role affix only where same-directory siblings
+  have different roles.
+- **A family is a module; a module may be a package.** One file per family by default;
+  past ~1500 lines the family becomes a package.
+- **Layers do not import upwards.** `pool/` and `pool_host/` must not import
+  `allocator/`, `hybrid_cache/`, or `allocation.py`; `allocator/` may hold the pool it
+  allocates into, not the reverse; none of the three may import the construction layer.