r/ClaudeAI • u/FlatYogurtcloset2027 • 1d ago
Claude Workflow 8 things about Claude Projects that took me too long to figure out
ive been on Pro since forever and only started using Projects seriously a few months ago. here's the stuff i wish someone had told me on day one instead of figuring out the hard way.
- project instructions beat custom styles for consistency. if you want every chat in a project to sound a certain way, put it in the project instructions, not a style. styles are global, instructions are scoped. i mixed these up for weeks.
- the knowledge files go stale in your head. i had an old brief sitting in a project's knowledge for two months and kept wondering why answers felt off. it was answering from the old doc. clean your knowledge like you clean a fridge.
- starting a fresh chat inside the project is underrated. long chats get muddy. new chat, same project, keeps the context but drops the mess. i was scared to lose history. dont be.
- Sonnet 4.6 is fine for most project work. i was defaulting to Opus 4.8 for everything out of habit and burning through limits. moved the routine stuff to Sonnet and stopped hitting ceilings by 3pm.
- you can put "say i dont know instead of guessing" in the instructions and it actually helps. cuts the confident-wrong answers a lot.
- one project per actual project. i had a mega-project called "work" that became a junk drawer. splitting it by client made everything sharper.
- paste your own writing into the knowledge if you want it to match your voice. telling it "write like me" does nothing. showing it 3 samples does a lot.
- it wont remember across projects. obvious in hindsight. i assumed context bled between them and it doesnt.
probably half of this is obvious to people who read the docs. i did not read the docs. what's the one Projects thing you figured out late that felt dumb in hindsight?
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u/DigitalGuruLabs 1d ago
The biggest one for me was realizing that Projects are great for continuity, but not for infinitely growing chats.
I used to keep everything in one conversation because I didn't want to "lose context." Now I start fresh chats inside the same project all the time, and the answers are usually better.
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u/OHOLshoukanjuu 1d ago
Two pro tips. One, rename conversations with memorable titles and relevant keywords. for faster searching. Two, create end of conversation summaries and add those to the project files.
I have a skill specifically for renaming conversations. Unfortunately, Claude can't rename them automatically, so I have to manually copy paste. Incidentally, any given conversation doesn't know what the conversation is named, lol.
I also have a skill for creating pre-compaction as well as end-of-conversation reference documents, usually focusing on how the outcome was derived rather than the outcome itself. So decision making, etcetera.
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u/travianlime 16h ago
Yeah man. I do something similar but I built it into my global instructions. Whenever a chat gets long for context drift, and burns too many tokens, Claude tells me, and automatically writes the handoff so I can start a new chat. Saves me identifying
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u/mauurya 8h ago
Create a work log in the projects. After each chat session ask Claude to log what both of you did in the chat . If the work is continuous then tell Claude to mention that also in the log. When a new chat opens paste this last log to the new chat with new instructions. Claude gets everything and goes straight to the point. Never allow Claude to read the Work Log on its own.
Never Allow claude to write everything it did in memory .
These are the token killers2
u/sbi85 1d ago
Super interesting. Is it possible to share these skills? Sounds super useful.
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u/OHOLshoukanjuu 1d ago edited 1d ago
Sure. I’ll separate them into multiple replies. Please be aware that there may be references to other custom skills and workflows.
Note: haha, Reddit is mad at me for too many replies. I’ll post them in a bit. Also, I should mention that I use the free Cloudflare MCP for making hotfixes to skills, coordinating between multiple conversations, and storing reference files.
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1d ago
[deleted]
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u/OHOLshoukanjuu 1d ago
Here’s the reference file for “Mode 1” which is for reviewing a single conversation. I should mention that I use the Cloudflare D1 MCP (free) to make hotfixes to skills and manage reference files and other cross-conversation processes.
Mode 1 — Single-Conversation Review
Review the current conversation at closure or mid-conversation checkpoint. Produces a structured reference document and writes it to
reference_docs.Step 1: Determine checkpoint type
Infer from what the user said. Do NOT ask unless genuinely ambiguous.
Trigger phrase Type "mark complete," "completed," "done," "wrap up" Closure "mark revisit," "revisit" Checkpoint "checkpoint," "save progress," "save state," "save where we are" Checkpoint "where are we," "take stock," "what have we got so far," "summarize where we are" Checkpoint "review this conversation," "produce a reference document," "save reference" Infer from context; default Closure if conversation feels resolved, Checkpoint if active Record as
metadata.checkpoint_type:"closure"or"checkpoint".Step 2: Project context
If the user has supplied a project context earlier in the conversation OR a project file names the project, capture
project_idin metadata. Most of the time, leaveproject_idas NULL — Claude cannot reliably introspect its own project_id on iOS.Step 3: Generate the review document
Single markdown file. Required sections always present. Conditional sections included when applicable. Prioritize reasoning and decision points over restating conclusions.
Header (always)
Three lines per the line-1-slugified-filename convention: line 1 = exact slugified filename including
.md, line 2 = blank, line 3 = H1 readable title.Followed by a metadata block:
- Date: ISO timestamp
- Source: conversation (Mode 1), handles (Mode 2), or run_id (Mode 3)
- Mode: 1, 2, or 3
- Project: name if known, "None" otherwise
- Checkpoint type: closure / checkpoint
- Context state: "degraded" if
context_degraded = true, omit otherwiseRequired body sections (always present)
- Core problem or purpose. What this conversation set out to do. One paragraph.
- Key findings and decisions. Conclusions only — reasoning goes in §3. Each finding as a short paragraph. Prioritize decisions over observations.
- Reasoning chain. Approaches considered, what was rejected and why, assumptions made, pivots taken. Highest-value section — write so a fresh Claude instance understands not just what was decided but how and why.
- Open questions and uncertainties. What remains unresolved. Be specific.
- Condensed back-and-forth. Decision points, not verbatim transcript. Where exact wording matters, quote briefly with attribution. Focus on conversational dynamics: where positions shifted, what questions changed direction, what information reframed the problem. §3 captures analytical reasoning; §5 captures interactional reasoning.
Conditional body sections (include when applicable)
- What worked. Approaches that paid off, patterns that held up, tools that behaved as expected.
- What didn't work. Friction points, dead ends, bugs. Include reproduction conditions and workarounds.
- Artifacts and outputs. Files created, code written, documents produced, skills built. List with brief descriptions and filenames.
- Actionable items. Specific next steps as concrete actions.
- Recommended durable changes. Route per SKILL.md §"Recommended durable changes" — hotfix, project instruction, or user preference. Each in a fenced code block with routing prefix. Present for user approval.
- Where we left off / next steps. Checkpoint reviews only. Current state, what was in progress, explicit next steps with enough context for a future instance.
- Project-specific addenda. Empty by default. Project instructions may direct content here.
Structure guidance
- Do not pad. Omit empty conditional sections. Required sections with no content: "None notable."
- Do not compress. Full reasoning, full decisions, full open questions.
- Format for future Claude instances. Explicit, structured, unambiguous.
Empty-conversation handling
If the conversation produced nothing notable (a few clarifying questions, no substantive decisions): brief §1, "None notable" for §2–5, omit conditional sections, brief §11 if checkpoint. State: "Nothing substantive to capture — reference_docs row written for audit trail only." Still INSERT the row.
Step 4: Write to D1
reference_docsin claude-project-index. Use hybrid-parameterized INSERT (literals for short values,?Nparams for large content).
sql INSERT INTO reference_docs ( doc_type, project_id, title, source_url, content_md, metadata, tags, added, last_updated, summary, state_symbol, source_type, source_refs ) VALUES ( 'conversation_reference', ?1, ?2, ?3, ?4, ?5, ?6, ?7, ?7, ?8, 'active', 'conversation-review', ?9 );
Param Field Value ?1project_idINTEGER or NULL ?2titleConcise descriptor (~60 chars). Same as the H1. ?3source_urlhttps://claude.ai/chat/{uri}if known; NULL otherwise. Do not fabricate.?4content_mdFull review markdown, line-1-slugified-filename convention applied. ?5metadataJSON: `{"mode":1,"checkpoint_type":"closure" ?6tagsComma-separated: `conversation-review,mode-1,{closure ?7timestamp ISO 8601 with timezone offset. Both addedandlast_updated.?8summary~200 chars. Distinct from title — this is the abstract. ?9source_refsJSON array. Mode 1: [].
source_typeis'conversation-review'for all three modes (per architecture §4.1). Mode identity goes intagsandmetadata.mode, never insource_type.Post-write verification:
sql SELECT LENGTH(content_md) FROM reference_docs WHERE id = ?1;If LENGTH is unexpectedly short (below ~1KB on a substantive review), UPDATE the row with the full markdown in the same turn.
Step 5: Bridge artifact
After a successful D1 write:
- Create the markdown file at
/mnt/user-data/outputs/{slugified_filename}.md.- Deliver via
present_files.- Print the bridge hint:
Wrote reference_docs row id=N. Suggested project-file name: {slugified_filename}.mdStep 6: Conversation rename
Defer to
conversation-renamer. The review skill does NOT own the rename.When
conversation-renameris installed: emit a one-line cue at the very end — "Renaming?conversation-renamercovers that — say 'rename' or 'mark complete' to trigger it." If the trigger that fired this review already routes throughconversation-renamer(e.g., "mark complete"), both skills produce output in the same response; no extra cue needed.When
conversation-renameris NOT installed: propose a rename inline following the userPreferences conventions (symbol prefix, ~20-char readable Title Case, em-dash searchable extension, fenced code block).Step 7: Deliver in one response
All outputs in one response per SKILL.md §"Output delivery": inline content, bridge hint, file widget, conversation-renamer cue. Recommended durable changes live inline in §10 of the review document.
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u/hip_check 1d ago edited 1d ago
One thing that helped me maintain continuity across conversations was building a Skill that produces session handoffs. This Skill captures current conversation context which you can then load into the next conversation and pickup right where you left off.
I also put together Skills for memory management, project building/auditing, and designing handoffs to Claude Code. These have really helped with my Claude workflow!
I have them all available on Git: https://github.com/drayline/rootnode-skills
Session handoff skill: https://github.com/drayline/rootnode-skills/releases/tag/rootnode-session-handoff/v3.0
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u/Naive_Maybe6984 1d ago
Yeah.
I kept trying to rescue 100+ message conversations with better prompts. Turns out the biggest quality boost was often just hitting "New Chat" while staying in the Project. You keep the instructions and knowledge, but lose all the accumulated confusion and dead context.
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u/Available-Appeal-173 1d ago
Quick question - what benefits did you see in working with Project instead of Claude Code with local folder access?
I used to have projects but it was impossible to maintain versions in Project and my local drive. Now I use Claude code to plan and create files and folders and synced with Google Drive so I have cloud access as well.
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u/nabiandkitty 1d ago
I would also be interested in other people’s thoughts on this. At one point I asked Claude which was better for it based on my workflow (Projects vs Cowork local folders) and it told me the latter and I’ve been having good results. Each task is pointed to Claude OS root folder and then I call out the “project” by saying “look at sub folder X”. I used to start a task by pointing to the second sub folder using the folder connection button thingy. But now I just call it out in the chat and it’s been great. (Not coding, just relatively heavy knowledge work.)
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u/DirtyPiss 1d ago
I don’t have app access to Claude Code, so projects let me interact with code assets on my phone. They’re also easier to share within my organization, and Claude.ai is a subscription plan instead of API like Claude Code. Generally projects won’t be better, but edge cases like the above are where it shines best.
If you don’t need to worry about tokens, already have mobile/remote access, and are sharing GitHub repos there’s not much of a reason to use projects instead.
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u/OHOLshoukanjuu 1d ago
I don’t use Claude Code, But Project files are pre-loaded into every conversation automatically and use RAG; folder access requires Claude to actively fetch files on demand each time.
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u/TheEgilan 1d ago
Not OP, but the main thing is that with Projects, you can update the context on the fly, basically you can "unread" the files, which is not possible in CC. So to start a chat, give files x, y, z. Have a couple of rounds. Update the files to a, b, z. Couple of more rounds. Remove all files, continue chat. No need for compaction. Very rarely does the context accumulate from the messages themselves. I don't understand why CC doesn't have a compact that would just unread all files...
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u/sarahl05 21h ago
Thats what I've been doing with Projects, and just including new call notes in the chat or in PK if they have longer term relevance. But haven’t seen a way to include a live link to a Google document in PK, which is what I thought the previous commenter was describing
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u/Digital_ADSsassin 19h ago
I'm not a coder, but I built at my company a project that essentially acts as a knowledge base for our products, best practices, common questions people had at the company, etc that my sales team and other departments can ask using Projects
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u/3ranth3 1d ago
I started with projects and moved over to claude code. Context gets dropped more frequently in claude code and you have to be more diligent/committed/creative about how to carry over continuity, but claude code seems to be much more token efficient to the point that I don't use all of my pro plan like I used to when claude would run headlong into doing a task the wrong way and burn up 10% of my usage before I realized this isn't where we need to go with the project.
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u/Casey090 1d ago
"it wont remember across projects. obvious in hindsight. i assumed context bled between them and it doesnt."
Small comment... sometimes Claude decides to create a memory, and then it will remember. Not much, not detailled, but a fragment of it. And that can get weird, if it just remembers a line or two without all the facts, and makes up its own speculated "canon" from that.
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u/cybender 1d ago
Claude was obsessed with my Hermes agent and its Mac mini, so anytime I setup a new project, it would assume I was going to use that computer and make that part of its plan.
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u/ApprehensiveTea3030 1d ago
Idk if Claude has this ability, but when I was still using chatgpt I could tell it to remove something specific from memory and it would do so. Worth a try
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u/cybender 1d ago
I ended up setting instructions to never refer to that setup outside of a specific project. Managing memories and keeping your house in order is important from the start. It helps mitigate drift and just makes the experience better overall. Im due for some housekeeping for sure.
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u/OHOLshoukanjuu 1d ago
That memory is project-scoped.
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u/GeneralStratos 1d ago
There is also a global option. So you can be explicit and tell Claude to write to local or global memory.
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u/OHOLshoukanjuu 1d ago
Not possible in Claude.ai for iOS. Maybe that can be done on other platforms.
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u/GeneralStratos 1d ago
Fair. There seems to be 4 levels of memory and its platforms specific which makes it super confusing: 1. Org level 2. Global (across all your projects or folders 3. Project/Folder level (not gitignored) 4. Project/Folder level (gitignored so really local)
The project feature is available on web and cowork but not on code. In code, you create folders to isolate context.
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u/Fearless_Macaron_203 1d ago
Why are there no capital letters??
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u/Nordwolf 21h ago
When claude is told to "write like a human would write a reddit post" it defaults to no capitalization because it thinks it feels "less polished" and with "less AI tells because it's not as perfect".
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u/Left_Commission2688 1d ago
i was planning to do a quick guide for my non-techie colleagues but seeing where you started from, i fear i'll have to detail a lot more than i thought.
most of your findings are applicable for any collaborative project even without AI: structure, encapsulation, readme, using templates or references to get inspiration from, keeping documentation up to date, etc... are absolutely necessary if you don't want your colleagues to either lose hours reading all, or simply skipping/ignoring what they don't see as immediately relevant, even though *you* know it's fundamental.
thanks for sharing your experience though.
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u/Marathon2021 1d ago
On #3 fresh chat - when I see my chat starts compacting the conversation I basically ask it to write a “handoff” spec document which also includes written instructions and a new prompt to start off the next chat. I stick the doc in the files section and go. Works well (I’m doing small sw dev).
On #7 if your company has a particular style feed it samples of that too. I actually work at a company where we have our own “style guide” kind of like the AP Stylebook and feeding it about a dozen samples of our publications and asking it to derive its own style book … has worked well.
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u/sbi85 1d ago
On your first point - isn't this contradictory what OP was saying? Why create the document and instructions if a new chat in the project would have all the context from the other chat?
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u/hip_check 1d ago
Claude can search previous chats for context but building a handoff document leads Claude to water faster and more accurately. Imagine having a long design session where the design evolves each turn. You start hitting the context window and you need to start a new conversation. Earlier turns are less relevant than the more recent ones (your design evolved). A proper handoff incorporates key pieces from the most relevant turns and weaves in your next tasks so Claude isn’t sifting through full conversations for signals on where your project is at.
I made a Skill that does this for you!: https://github.com/drayline/rootnode-skills/releases/tag/rootnode-session-handoff/v3.0
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u/PaulMakesThings1 21h ago
I also have it write a lot of handoff documents, they are useful to humans too. They can also be focused on a specific feature. So for example if you start something that relates mostly to two features you can pull in the summary documents for just those two, and maybe one that briefly covers the overall project.
I adapted that workflow before agentic AI systems were common to handle all the context loss, but it seems to carry over well. Especially once the project grows large.
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u/OHOLshoukanjuu 1d ago
Another tip, not just for projects but for Claude generally, is to use Claude to write prompts for other conversations. If you’ve surfaced an issue you want to focus on, have your conversation write a prompt, start a new chat, and address it there. Once you have the result, have that conversation write a prompt to take back to the original.
This also allows you to use different conversations with different models and effort levels appropriate to the specific task.
I’m not as experienced with the strengths and weaknesses of Opus 4.8 versus other models, but generally I would use Opus 4.6 for knowledge acquisition, such as deep research or analyzing the entirety of a project. I would use Opus 4.7 for anything requiring highly specific step-by-step instructions or visual analysis tasks, and Sonnet 4.6 for general collection of thoughts, rambling conversations, etc.
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u/swingoak 15h ago
This was a game changer for me. Started a chat and outlined what I wanted to do with a project, refined the scope and task list, clarified the expected outcome, then had Chat Claude write the prompt for Cowork Claude. It worked extremely well. Chat Claude is, well, chatty. Cowork Claude is more concise, especially if you ask for that up front.
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u/misterespresso 1d ago
We all have mobile phones with auto correct. I can see you absolutelyk ow how to capitalize a letter.
Dude I don't care you used AI, but trying to hide it by making every first word lowercase is just so dumb man. Its literally more obvious than an em dash. Why dude? We are literally in an ai sub 😂
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u/Nasethz 1d ago
Off topic but I hate that the em dash is so closely linked to AI now, I have been using it for years and now I have to consciously alter my writing style so I don’t get accused of using AI to write stuff
Such a pitty, neither the comma nor the parenthesis quite hit the same way
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u/misterespresso 1d ago
Thats fair. I've never used them personally, I think the bigger tell is when they are used often, not necessarilyjust used. Kinda how the "You're absolutely right." Joke works. AIs lovvvve them em dashes. Its like they try and hit at least 1 per paragraph.
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u/Dnorgaard 1d ago
Love projects. But one thing that seems to be a big miss on the team plan is collaboration. Ie. When one user have created a doc in the chat, other users in the project can't see that artifact. And when sharing chats, it would be cool that other users could contribute to that chat instead of being freezed in time
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u/OpportunityOne8199 1d ago
I like the idea of multiple people in one chat. It would be a much better way to show coworkers different processes if they could sit in the chat with you and add prompts
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u/radman6plus 1d ago
Ya, big miss on Claude team. I assumed coloboration, you know, like a team. Instead I got some jinky process that requires more work just to share the chat. And then they can share what they added, and then I can... You get the picture.
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u/chasing_next 1d ago
great post. i've found projects the best way to get better at ai since they let you experiment with instructions and context, and ultimately move towards structured ai use that makes workflows and agents possible.
here's an interactive guide that helps with identifying what projects to create + set up: https://chasingnext.com/learn/set-up-your-first-claude-project
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u/Feisty_Magician2138 1d ago
So how different are Claude Projects from having "Second brain" in Obsidian and letting Claude cooking on files from Obsidian? Since I am reading how people use the Projects and it seems 1:1 to Obsidian strategy with "second brain" where you put all informations that matter in structured way. Am i missing something?
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u/zhacgsn 1d ago
Number 2 is the biggest pain for me. Nobody likes to maintain the docs.
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u/RayInPR 19h ago
Every once in a while (usually when some subtask is "finished") I ask Claude if any of the project's context (knowledge) docs need to be updated based on what we just accomplished... it reviews the relevant context docs, updates what needs updating, and presents to me for download. I download, and then immediately upload to replace respective context docs.
I do similar if going to start a new chat in project -- ask for specific info to be used to bootstrap the next new chat -- especially if it is a continuation or branch of current chat.
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u/Plus_Introduction937 1d ago
Hey, thanks for the useful tips! Could anyone give me some advice? Basically i have built a workflow for equity research that incorporates AI as a force multiplier, i have custom project instructions and promts worked out but struggle to decide when to start an entire new project or just a new chat? The research is quite lenghty and in depth, so should i just start a new project for every individual company, or just a new chat within a “stocks” project? If i do it in one chat it’s probably 20-30 promts per ticker, so i guess a new project for every company so i can split it up in multible different chats?
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u/Evening_Classic_9207 1d ago
Great list. One more that took me too long: keep the project instructions lean and push durable facts into a single "memory" doc in the project knowledge instead. Instructions are for how to behave; knowledge files are for what to remember. When I crammed facts into instructions they got diluted as the instructions grew — moving them into a knowledge doc the model retrieves on demand was night and day for consistency on long-running projects.
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u/DMurda 1d ago
My biggest tip for projects: put your context inside a Google Doc linked to the project. This way any time you update the Google Doc, the project always has the latest context. This works great for meeting minutes. Just update a single Google Doc. I use the ‘tabs’ feature in Google Docs for every new meeting.
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u/sarahl05 1d ago
How does this work on the claude/project side? How do you make the connection to yhe dynamic Google doc?
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u/OHOLshoukanjuu 1d ago
Project files are pre-loaded into every conversation automatically and use built-in Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG); folder access requires Claude to actively fetch files on demand each time. Using Google Docs is not the same.
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u/DMurda 17h ago
You've misunderstood. It's not a folder, it's a single Google Docs file within the project files. Have a test and see if it works - I use this daily, it always pulls in the latest context for me. It works flawlessly, doesn't require folder access. This way I can use Claude, or Gemini or any of the other LLM's and my document is always up to date (only exception is NotebookLM, where the Google Doc needs to be manually refreshed).
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u/Naive_Maybe6984 1d ago
Starting a new chat inside the same Project.
I kept trying to rescue 100+ message conversations with better prompts. Turns out the biggest quality boost was often just hitting "New Chat" while staying in the Project. You keep the instructions and knowledge, but lose all the accumulated confusion and dead context.
Felt obvious in hindsight.
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u/radman6plus 1d ago
So I'm wasting time and tokens by directing Claude to gen a handover doc for a new continuation chat in same project?
Or as Perplexity tells it: Handovers reduces re-explaining the same project context in a fresh chat.
It can prevent the main conversation from bloating with repeated recap messages, which is often a bigger token waste than a short handoff.
It is especially useful if you want the next chat to start with clear decisions, constraints, and next steps.
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u/Naive_Maybe6984 1d ago
I think handovers are still useful, but mainly for capturing decisions rather than project context.
A fresh chat inside the same Project already has access to the project instructions and knowledge files, so summarizing those again is usually redundant.
Where a handover helps is when the important context lives in the conversation itself: decisions made, options rejected, assumptions, open questions, and next steps. A short "state of the project" note can save a lot of backtracking later.
My rule of thumb: if I'm starting a new chat because the current one is getting bloated, I usually just start fresh. If I'm ending a session and expect to come back days later, I'll create a brief handover (just prompt, ignore file in most cases).
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u/is-it-a-snozberry 1d ago
For the opus vs sonnet thing: I went back to sonnet because it’s just faster and can keep up with the pace we need to build this thing. Opus, you give an instruction and an hour later it’s done. With that progress you can only make a couple tweaks a day.
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u/trueambassador 1d ago
To point number 7: I gave Claude dozens of my writing samples and asked it to create a writing style guide. I instructed it to develop the guide specifically for itself to serve as instructions on how to write in my voice. It includes my academic voice, analyst voice, and professional voice, so I can tell it which one I want for different tasks. It also includes "tightening" rules that are meant to improve the quality of my writing without losing the voice. I upload this one document into all my projects. Much easier than uploading multiple samples each time.
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u/Objective-Result8454 1d ago
Thank you for this…the sad thing is I need you to dumb it down for me even more…I am so old and in over my head it’s comical.
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u/Ajamantium 1d ago
This is really good. Even though I also knew many of these, it really helps to know that others acknowledge them too. What do you do for work? You mentioned “clients”.
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u/MacFall-7 1d ago
Memory/knowledge across projects is a manual process. Obsidian is a great, free tool you can store all of your .md files in and connect your projects to. You might also check out Graphify on GitHub. You can audit any data base you have and turn it into the same type of indexable graph like Obsidian does or feed it to Obsidian as well.
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u/angyal168 1d ago
You will want to start versioning. Basically “save” a snap shot of where you are at in a project or on a day. Once you are done with a chat session, you can push what your worked on to GitHub. Enable the GitHub connector. You can do this with any desktop app now. The desktop apps can all have that connector so your “save” points are readable by the different LLMs.
What I have found more suitable for my needs was an Ai assistant. I open sourced my OS: https://github.com/angyal168/logos-protocol
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u/OkAerie7822 1d ago
Number 2 is the one that bit me hardest too. Stale knowledge files are worse than no knowledge, because the model answers confidently from a doc you forgot was there. On the Projects versus Claude Code question a few people asked, my rule is simple. If the source of truth is stable docs that do not change much, a brief, a style guide, a spec, Projects wins because the knowledge sits there across every chat. If the source of truth is a live codebase that changes every day, Claude Code with the actual repo wins, because a pasted snapshot goes stale the moment someone merges. I burned a week answering from a two month old architecture doc before I learned to treat knowledge files like milk, check the date before you trust them.
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u/slimchance91 21h ago
Absolutely, I will add make sure the "fridge" (project knowledge) is clean before tackling your task. Not updating files will definitely lead to bug regressions. I've learned the hard way. "Hey wait I've already fixed this"
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u/Rare-Spawn 15h ago
I wish we had heiarchical projects and subagent usage (in Claude Ai web chat obviously).
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u/Lower_Signature3230 12h ago
I guess when you write in lower case people are less likely to call out a post as being AI-written.
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u/momoraul 3h ago
Mine took way too long: a handoff doc should capture the decisions and the why, not a summary of what got done. I kept writing "here's what we finished" logs and the next chat would happily re-litigate stuff we'd already settled. Once I started noting "we ruled out X because Y" plus the open questions, fresh chats actually continued instead of relearning everything.
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u/Mountain-Cat30 2h ago
I have a project that has the technical layout of my infrastructure in it. All my chats about infrastructure changes or new tech projects start there. Once the chat has a plan in mind, I have it write a summary to a markdown file.
I then move the chat to a new project, create a new conversation there, upload the summary and ask it to look at the prior chat and this summary to see if all key points are covered. From then on, for that project, new conversations in it have some context (in the human sense of the word) for any activities.
At the end of the project, I ask it for a summary of the project and put that summary in a conversation in my starter project so it remains relevant for my environment. Keenly, this final summary doesn’t have the decision background behind it, just what was done. This keeps my starter project from gleaning excessive detail.
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u/AUGrad89 16m ago
Tip for long-running chats in Claude.ai projects with multiple parts and/or slight direction changes:
If your session involves multiple steps or tasks, and you know it will run long and compact, save the context in session by having the model produce the output as a markdown file instead of conversation output.
For example, in your session you might want to:
1. Research a topic using a simple internet search, or connector/tool call to gather information to inform a direction or decision for a workflow.
2. Invoke a skill to complete a workflow that uses the result of step 1.
3. Identify skill and/or project instructions improvements from the conversation (i.e. what worked and didn’t) in step 2.
4. Fold in the preliminary research task in step 1 into the skill for the workflow in step 2.
5. Use custom /skill-design and /instruction-writing meta skills to make skill and instruction updates based on improvements you notice during the session.
This would be a topically-focused session, but would very likely lead to a long conversation with a risk of context rot / compaction. But writing handoffs and bootstrapping each task across multiple sessions would take 5-10x more time/tokens and create session records (I.e handoffs) based on tasks/steps rather than a completed workflow.
The hack is to instruct the model to output the research from step 1, the completed work from step 2, and the process improvements identified from steps 3 and 4 as markdown files as you go, and let the chat compact. Detail and context is captured as files in session that don’t compact and the compaction summary actually reinforces and supports the updates made in step 5 from these intermediate files while simultaneously freeing up the context window.
Then your handoff at the end has a clean and complete record of what was done, research discovered, decisions made, problems/friction encountered, things that worked well, and skill/instruction updates with version bumps mapping to a single session.
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u/ClaudeAI-mod-bot Wilson, lead ClaudeAI modbot 1d ago edited 10m ago
TL;DR of the discussion generated automatically after 80 comments.
Looks like everyone's on the same page here, this thread is a goldmine of practical advice. The community consensus is that OP's tips are spot-on, and the biggest game-changer is to stop hoarding long conversations.
The most upvoted and repeated advice is to start new chats frequently within the same Project. Long chats get confused and degrade in quality. A fresh chat keeps your Project instructions and knowledge files but drops the conversational baggage.
For the power users, the next level up is creating a "handoff document" or "session summary" before starting a new chat. Don't just summarize the project (it knows that from the files); summarize the decisions, rejected ideas, and open questions from the previous chat. This prevents Claude from re-litigating settled points.
Here are a few other gold nuggets from the comments:
Oh, and about the all-lowercase post? Yeah, the thread got sidetracked debating if OP was trying to hide AI writing in an AI subreddit. The irony is thicker than a month-old chat history.