From 64a736b0bbbfa4e7c331bf113adc2582c1ecf9e4 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001 From: Claude Date: Tue, 25 Aug 2026 21:55:39 +0000 Subject: [PATCH] docs(agents): make the concise chat register the session default Chat replies default to concise on every harness (Claude Code CLI, web, mobile; Codex; Cursor): answer first, a few lines, no narration of the work, link instead of paste. Plans awaiting approval, decision surfaces, failures and explicitly requested explanations are exempt, and 'expand' drops the register for one reply. Agent output (a *Decision, a ReviewSurface, the board digest) keeps its defined shape. Lives once in PyAutoBrain's auto-loaded AGENTS.md, which is present in every session, so no per-organ copy is needed. Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5 Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_01MkXgwKmgWpRB5rJzt6rQ3G --- AGENTS.md | 31 +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ 1 file changed, 31 insertions(+) diff --git a/AGENTS.md b/AGENTS.md index 703acec6..9ce4f1ea 100644 --- a/AGENTS.md +++ b/AGENTS.md @@ -188,6 +188,37 @@ make the same canonical workflows discoverable to skill-aware harnesses. architecture prose is in [`skills/COMMANDS.md`](skills/COMMANDS.md); the work-type taxonomy the router uses is `PyAutoMind/ROUTING.md`. +## Chat register: concise by default + +The default register for **chat replies** is concise — every harness and every +session (Claude Code CLI, web, mobile; Codex; Cursor). A reply is the smallest +thing that answers the question and says what changed. It is not a report on the +work. + +- **Answer first.** Lead with the answer, the verdict, or what you did. No + preamble, no restatement of the request, no summary of the summary. +- **A few lines is the default length.** One line is a good answer. Prose + paragraphs, file-by-file inventories and "what I did / why / next steps" + scaffolding are opt-in, not the baseline. +- **Don't narrate the work.** Skip the tool-by-tool commentary, the list of + files read, and any recap of a diff the human can read on the branch or PR. +- **Link, don't paste.** Point at the file, the issue, the PR, the prompt under + `PyAutoMind/draft/`; quote only the lines being discussed. + +Four things are never compressed: a **plan awaiting approval**, a **decision +surface** a human must judge, a **failure or blocker** (say exactly what broke +and where), and anything the human **asked to have explained**. Brevity is not a +licence to drop the detail a decision needs. + +The escape hatch is a word — "expand", "in full", "explain" — and it applies to +that reply, not the session; the register comes back on the next turn. + +Agent output is not chat and keeps its defined shape: a `*Decision`, a +`ReviewSurface`, a vitals verdict, the board digest are structured artefacts +this register does not trim. It governs the prose around them. On Claude Code +the same default can also be pinned per-tool with an output style, but the +register above is the portable one — it travels with the repo to every harness. + ## Never rewrite history