It's cool that they did some measurements, but unfortunately there's not much to learn from the article unless you're using really outdated files that you wrote by hand. The agent should know how to write a good file.

For existing files, the agent will carry on a bad structure unless you specifically ask it to refactor and think about what's actually helpful.

In general, it should be a lean file that tells the agent how to work with the project (short description, table of commands, index of key docs, supporting infra, handful of high-level rules and conventions that apply to everything). Occasionally ask the agent to review and optimize the file, particularly after model upgrades.

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acgourley 7 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Everytime I've asked a model to write it's Agents/Claude file it's been pretty bad actually, are you sure writing these files is actually in distribution right now?

	▲	chickensong 2 hours ago \| parent [-]
		[dead]

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kajman 6 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

I don't have a ton of experience with this, but every attempt I've made to quickly get an LLM to one-shot an AGENTS file has been too verbose in all the wrong areas. I'm not convinced LLMs are actually good at summarizing anything complex. Maybe some "blessed" prompts will bubble up in time that change my mind.

	▲	chickensong 2 hours ago \| parent [-]
		LLMs don't one-shot anything very well IMHO, but if you make several passes and work through each section it should end up ok. The key word I use is "optimize", but I also press it on what's actually effective. The goal is a small file, so just ruthlessly cut anything that doesn't have high value across the entire project. Again, the goal is to let the agent know how to work with the project at a high level, not much else. Skills and docs cover the rest.