🧱 The Foundation

A file Claude reads in EVERY session to learn about your project, your rules, and the way you work.

Without it, the experience isn't good. It's the "groundwork," the bare minimum—not flashy, but essential.

Very important to configure well; start simple and refine over time.

The trio for managing the conversation: /clear clears, /compact compacts and /resume resumes.

Basic, but useful every day: manages the session's scarcest resource, context.

Clear starts from scratch; compact summarizes and continues; resume picks up where you left off.

Native web search that CITES its sources, plus web fetch that launches a search on the spot from a link.

Basic, but still useful: brings in current information without leaving the terminal, with verifiable references.

Search scans the web; fetch starts from a URL and retrieves its content.

Control over what Claude can do without asking for confirmation — commands, edits, tools.

It’s the foundation of Auto Mode (Tier A): adjusting permissions now unlocks autonomous workflows later.

Allow/ask/deny by default; start restrictive and allow what you trust.

Drop images, PDFs, and documents directly into the conversation; and change how Claude formats its responses.

Brings in visual and document context without copying and pasting; output styles let you tailor the output.

Uploads = rich input; output styles = output in the format you prefer.

A package of small plumbing pieces: Fast Mode, Custom Themes, IDE Extension, Mobile Apps, Code Review, Sandboxed Bash, Headless, Transcript Viewer, History Search, Shell Mode, and Voice Dictation.

Each one is small, but together they make your day more comfortable — shortcuts, visual comfort, and access from anywhere.

/fast, /theme, Ctrl+O, Ctrl+R, prefix ! e /voice are the shortcuts to memorize.

Full spoken conversations with Claude, hands-free; it also transcribes your speech.

Great for brainstorming without a keyboard. External tools like Wispr Flow make it even faster.

Trigger with /voice; works for both chatting and dictation.

Anthropic's agentic desktop app WITHOUT a terminal, built for knowledge work.

A great product, but almost everything it does can be done in Claude Code (with more capabilities).

A good entry point for nontechnical users who feel overwhelmed.

Add and manage MCP connectors INSIDE the CLI — log in to a service and have its tool calls available right away.

Avoids setting up MCP manually in the terminal; it’s interactive and automatic after login.

Once you log in, the connector's tools appear for Claude to use.

Connect a folder for Claude to read and organize your files.

It’s a major benefit of local terminal agents: they work on your actual files.

Point it to a folder; the agent reads, organizes, and edits its contents.

Citations anchors answers in your documents with exact citations (API); Chat Search searches all past conversations.

Citations provides confidence and traceability; Chat Search retrieves what you've discussed before.

Citations = where the answer came from; Chat Search = where we've discussed it before.

The web and collaboration layer: Claude in Slack, Incognito Chats, /teleport, Cowork Plugins, and Cowork Projects.

Brings Claude to where your team already works and gives you privacy when you need it.

In Slack, mention @Claude; Incognito doesn’t save, remember, or train; /teleport pulls a web session into the terminal.