The Longer I Wrote, the Less the Bot Read
At first I wrote everything into CLAUDE.md out of nerves: tone of voice, folder locations, things never to do, even a log of past mistakes. That came to 130 lines. Yet every morning Claude Code asked again about things I had clearly written down, like 「Where does this folder go?」 About 7 times a day on average.
A rulebook is won not by length but by the density of its first 40 lines.
A One-Week Experiment
I ran the same kind of work in two versions: the long file on the Windows device, a short one on the Mac mini. Here is how I built the short one.
1. Sort rules into three boxes: 「always」, 「sometimes」, and 「record only」.
2. Keep only the 「always」 rules, within 40 lines.
3. Move the rest into separate files in a docs folder, and leave just one line in the main file pointing to each.
Results
• Re-asked questions: from 7 a day to 2 on average
• Repeat of the same mistake: clearly fewer (the record files are opened only when needed)
• Time spent editing the rulebook: shorter file, faster edits
Try It Today
# Project rules (40 lines or fewer)
Always
• Answer in Korean
• Ask before deleting any file
Details live here
• Tone guide: docs/voice.md
• Past mistakes log: docs/incidents.md
One More Thing
It is better not to put current status or progress in the rulebook. Status goes stale fast, and once stale sentences mix in, the bot trusts old information. Keep only structure and rules in the file, and tell the bot today's tasks in the conversation.