4 ms·

I believe the correct static instructions are about getting it at the right starting point for whatever class of projects you're working on; not as a continued

I believe the correct static instructions are about getting it at the right starting point for whatever class of projects you're working on; not as a continued referencable or "HOWTO" of what it's doing. They're all just "grooming" the LLM for future instructions. The coding harness is what's getting it to continually align to your current instructions. This is very obvious with local models.

spIrr 3mo ago
As a hobbyist, I find it difficult to figure out how to make Claude stick with some repeating things I want it to do after every major action, like re-evaluate the completeness of tests, update the documentation, etc. And CLAUDE.md/AGENTS.md definitely did NOT help there, sadly.
- Muromec 3mo ago
  Don't use the default harness, write your own instead.
  - Supermancho 3mo ago
    This is the way. Making your own agent to have a sticky memory context that is prepended to every execution is necessary to ensure each task is bounded by those precepts.
    - Muromec 3mo ago
      The trick I'm doing -- the model is given a tool that runs a prompt in the current thread to consolidate it's working memory and identity (it has a memory tool bound to the agent persona). When the prompt ends, the parts of memory that are marked as identity are merged together into a new system prompt, then the context restarts with only system prompt and this tool call surviving. Then it just keeps going.
      - mblangie 3mo ago
        [flagged]
    - drob518 3mo ago
      Doesn’t that blow your token cache hit rate and balloon your costs (essentially everything is billed at the input token rate, not the cached rate)?
      - haus20xx 3mo ago
        If it moved a block like <system_prompt> <tools_etc> <project_prompts> <user_call> <llm_response> => <system_prompt> <tools_etc> //Removed project_prompts <user_call> <llm_response> <user_call> <project_prompts> //reinserted <llm_response> Cache would break but if you did instead <system_prompt> <tools_etc> <project_prompts> <user_call> <llm_response> <user_call> <project_prompts> //Duplicated with new user messsage <llm_response> It wouldn't bust cache, it would just make your input prompts slightly larger. Technically inefficient as you're duplicating the same rules over and over but I imagine for a smallish checklist/principles that it is tremendously more efficient than a cache break every message
        cyanydeez 3mo ago
        so first, we treat context like a stack. Things are popped onto the stack; if we try to remove anything but the top of the stack, we'll break the cache. So a good harness should be popping tool prompts, user hints after every return from the top so the context of tools and user hints never repeats and are allways prefixed to the current user prompt. I've never inspected any harness, but opencode with the dynamic context compaction plugin appears to do this well.
        Muromec 3mo ago
        By the time it does 10 turns of tool calls it forgets about the nagging again. It can and does ignore direct instruction from the user prompt too, sometimes repeatedly
  - TeMPOraL 3mo ago
    Any way to do that AND use subscription instead of per-token pricing from SOTA providers?
    - Muromec 3mo ago
      If the harness runs on your localhost, but the inference doesn't, it usually means it's calling some API. Whether you want to break TOS of your provider like that or simply buy tokens from our friends from UTC+8 timezone is an open question.
- victorbjorklund 3mo ago
  Hooks can be pretty useful for that. A hook when it is finished ”run tests suite and check coverage” ”check if your changes require updating the docs”
  - georgesequeira 3mo ago
    [dead]
- cyanydeez 3mo ago
  What I'm currently doing in a large refactor, is I created a super-run script; the super run script is devided into super-dev (Setup dev), super-test (run all tests), super-build (build artificats), super-e2e (test all artifacts), super-deploy (deploy finished). Each super's sub functions should _fail hard_, and each script should be highly detailed; of course I'm not doing it myself, but in small increments of directed work, it can build up the necessary harness. What I get is a CI that just starts with "run super-run.sh" and that gives it context, then each sub script provides context depending on if it succeeds or fails. If it fails, the agent is provided what it needs. It's basically, you have to design the products of the AI to give itself the context. Another technique I'm testing out is a parallel set of files like <subject-module>.js, <subject-module>.test.js, <subject-module>.md which get pulled up if the Agent is looking for a file.
ratmeadow 3mo ago
Ok so what is the correct way to tell it "I don't care what is happening, you must uphold these rules at all times"? If it's not any configuration of .md files?
- mwigdahl 3mo ago
  Subagents whose only job is to review the actions of your other agents for rule compliance? It works reasonably well for me in complex workflows using Claude Code.
  - carljungslabtek 3mo ago
    Can I ask how you set this up? Like is there some way to have that run automatically, similar to “auto mode” for approvals, or do you have to invoke it regularly?
    - drooby 3mo ago
      Hooks.. CI runs. Local Git hooks. Cursor also has hooks built into their agent. Other agent APIs probably have something similar.
    - mwigdahl 3mo ago
      Sure! I use an orchestrator main agent whose only job is to run subagents through the workflow process I've defined. Part of that workflow is to invoke a review subagent at particular points to check the spec, the implementation plan, and the code for rule conformance. The review subagent has its own definition and gets invoked with a specific target, so the context is very focused on just rule enforcement and I don't have problems with it skipping rules. The whole workflow is packaged up as a plugin, but you don't need that to get this approach to work. It should be sufficient to have the rules you want enforced written out somewhere, and to either kick off a focused review agent manually referencing them, or do something like I did and have it be a defined part of your workflow (depending on the automation level you want).
- Muromec 3mo ago

spIrr 3mo ago

As a hobbyist, I find it difficult to figure out how to make Claude stick with some repeating things I want it to do after every major action, like re-evaluate the completeness of tests, update the documentation, etc. And CLAUDE.md/AGENTS.md definitely did NOT help there, sadly.

Muromec 3mo ago
Don't use the default harness, write your own instead.
- Supermancho 3mo ago
  This is the way. Making your own agent to have a sticky memory context that is prepended to every execution is necessary to ensure each task is bounded by those precepts.
  - Muromec 3mo ago
    The trick I'm doing -- the model is given a tool that runs a prompt in the current thread to consolidate it's working memory and identity (it has a memory tool bound to the agent persona). When the prompt ends, the parts of memory that are marked as identity are merged together into a new system prompt, then the context restarts with only system prompt and this tool call surviving. Then it just keeps going.
    - mblangie 3mo ago
      [flagged]
  - drob518 3mo ago
    Doesn’t that blow your token cache hit rate and balloon your costs (essentially everything is billed at the input token rate, not the cached rate)?
    - haus20xx 3mo ago
      If it moved a block like <system_prompt> <tools_etc> <project_prompts> <user_call> <llm_response> => <system_prompt> <tools_etc> //Removed project_prompts <user_call> <llm_response> <user_call> <project_prompts> //reinserted <llm_response> Cache would break but if you did instead <system_prompt> <tools_etc> <project_prompts> <user_call> <llm_response> <user_call> <project_prompts> //Duplicated with new user messsage <llm_response> It wouldn't bust cache, it would just make your input prompts slightly larger. Technically inefficient as you're duplicating the same rules over and over but I imagine for a smallish checklist/principles that it is tremendously more efficient than a cache break every message
      - cyanydeez 3mo ago
        so first, we treat context like a stack. Things are popped onto the stack; if we try to remove anything but the top of the stack, we'll break the cache. So a good harness should be popping tool prompts, user hints after every return from the top so the context of tools and user hints never repeats and are allways prefixed to the current user prompt. I've never inspected any harness, but opencode with the dynamic context compaction plugin appears to do this well.
      - Muromec 3mo ago
        By the time it does 10 turns of tool calls it forgets about the nagging again. It can and does ignore direct instruction from the user prompt too, sometimes repeatedly
- TeMPOraL 3mo ago
  Any way to do that AND use subscription instead of per-token pricing from SOTA providers?
  - Muromec 3mo ago
    If the harness runs on your localhost, but the inference doesn't, it usually means it's calling some API. Whether you want to break TOS of your provider like that or simply buy tokens from our friends from UTC+8 timezone is an open question.
victorbjorklund 3mo ago
Hooks can be pretty useful for that. A hook when it is finished ”run tests suite and check coverage” ”check if your changes require updating the docs”
- georgesequeira 3mo ago
  [dead]
cyanydeez 3mo ago
What I'm currently doing in a large refactor, is I created a super-run script; the super run script is devided into super-dev (Setup dev), super-test (run all tests), super-build (build artificats), super-e2e (test all artifacts), super-deploy (deploy finished). Each super's sub functions should _fail hard_, and each script should be highly detailed; of course I'm not doing it myself, but in small increments of directed work, it can build up the necessary harness. What I get is a CI that just starts with "run super-run.sh" and that gives it context, then each sub script provides context depending on if it succeeds or fails. If it fails, the agent is provided what it needs. It's basically, you have to design the products of the AI to give itself the context. Another technique I'm testing out is a parallel set of files like <subject-module>.js, <subject-module>.test.js, <subject-module>.md which get pulled up if the Agent is looking for a file.

ratmeadow 3mo ago

Ok so what is the correct way to tell it "I don't care what is happening, you must uphold these rules at all times"? If it's not any configuration of .md files?

mwigdahl 3mo ago
Subagents whose only job is to review the actions of your other agents for rule compliance? It works reasonably well for me in complex workflows using Claude Code.
- carljungslabtek 3mo ago
  Can I ask how you set this up? Like is there some way to have that run automatically, similar to “auto mode” for approvals, or do you have to invoke it regularly?
  - drooby 3mo ago
    Hooks.. CI runs. Local Git hooks. Cursor also has hooks built into their agent. Other agent APIs probably have something similar.
  - mwigdahl 3mo ago
    Sure! I use an orchestrator main agent whose only job is to run subagents through the workflow process I've defined. Part of that workflow is to invoke a review subagent at particular points to check the spec, the implementation plan, and the code for rule conformance. The review subagent has its own definition and gets invoked with a specific target, so the context is very focused on just rule enforcement and I don't have problems with it skipping rules. The whole workflow is packaged up as a plugin, but you don't need that to get this approach to work. It should be sufficient to have the rules you want enforced written out somewhere, and to either kick off a focused review agent manually referencing them, or do something like I did and have it be a defined part of your workflow (depending on the automation level you want).
Muromec 3mo ago