| ▲ | kaizenb 11 hours ago |
| Thanks for the video. His fix for "the dumb zone" is the RPI Framework: ● RESEARCH. Don't code yet. Let the agent scan the files first. Docs lie. Code doesn't. ● PLAN. The agent writes a detailed step-by-step plan. You review and approve the plan, not just the output. Dex calls this avoiding "outsourcing your thinking." The plan is where intent gets compressed before execution starts. ● IMPLEMENT. Execute in a fresh context window.
The meta-principle he calls Frequent Intentional Compaction: don't let the chat run long. Ask the agent to summarize state, open a new chat with that summary, keep the model in the smart zone. |
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| ▲ | Huppie 4 hours ago | parent | next [-] |
| More recently I've been doing the implement phase without resetting the whole context when context is still < 60% full and must say I find it to be a better workflow in many cases (depends a bit on the size of the plan I suppose.) It's faster because it has already read most relevant files, still has the caveats / discussion from the research phase in its context window, etc. With the context clear the plan may be good / thorough but I've had one too many times that key choices from the research phase didn't persist because halfway through implementation Opus runs into an issue and says "You know what? I know a simpler solution." and continues down a path I explicitly voted down. |
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| ▲ | iamacyborg 7 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| > RESEARCH. Don't code yet. Let the agent scan the files first. Docs lie. Code doesn't. I find myself often running validity checks between docs and code and addressing gaps as they appear to ensure the docs don’t actually lie. |
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| ▲ | silverlake 6 hours ago | parent [-] | | I have Codex and Gemini critique the plan and generate their plans. Then I have Claude review the other plans and add their good ideas. It frequently improves the plan. I then do my careful review. | | |
| ▲ | ArtRichards 3 hours ago | parent [-] | | This is exactly how I've found leads to most consistent high quality results as well. I don't use gemini yet (except for deep research, where it pulls WAY ahead of either of the other 'grounding' methods) But Codex to plan big features and Claude to review the feature plan (often finds overlooked discrepancies) then review the milestones and plan implementation of them in planning mode, then clear context and code. Works great. |
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| ▲ | girvo 11 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| That's fascinating: that is identical to the workflow I've landed on myself. |
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| ▲ | hedora 11 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | It's also identical to what Claude Code does if you put it in plan mode (bound to <tab> key), at least in my experience. | | |
| ▲ | girvo 10 hours ago | parent [-] | | My annoyance with plan mode is where it sticks the .md file, kind of hides it away which makes it annoying to clear context and start up a new phase from the PLAN file. But that might just be a skill issue on my end | | |
| ▲ | hedora 10 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | Even worse, it just randomly blows away the plan file without asking for permission. No idea what they were thinking when they designed this feature. The plan file names are randomly generated, so it could just keep making new ones forever for free (it would take a LONG time for the disk space to matter), but instead, for long plans, I have to back the plan file up if it gets stuck. Otherwise, I say "You should take approach X to fix this bug", it drops into plan mode, says "This is a completely unrelated plan", then deletes all record of what it was doing before getting stuck. | | |
| ▲ | girvo 9 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | It’s not just me then! Hah good to know. It’s why I’ve started ignoring plan modes in most agent harnesses, and managing it myself through prompting and keeping it in the code base (but not committed) | |
| ▲ | toddmerrill 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | My experience also. The claude code document feature is a real missed opportunity. As you can see in this discussion, we all have to do it manually if we want it to work. |
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| ▲ | kaizenb 8 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | After creating the plan in Plan mode (+Thinking) I ask Claude to move the plan .md file to /docs/plans folder inside the repo. Open a new chat with Opus, thinking mode is off. Because no need when we have detailed plan. Now the plan file is always reachable, so when the context limit is narrowing, mostly around 50%, I ask Claude to update the plan with the progress, and move to a new chat @pointing the plan file and it continue executing without any issue. |
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| ▲ | cortesoft 10 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | It’s the style spec-kit uses: https://github.com/github/spec-kit Working on my first project with it… so far so good. |
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| ▲ | greenchair 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-] |
| How is that Plan strategy not "outsourcing your thinking" because that's exactly what it sounds like. AI does the heavy lifting and you are the editor. |
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| ▲ | brookst 3 hours ago | parent [-] | | Is a VP of engineering “outsourcing their thinking” by having an org that can plan and write software? | | |
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