The Best Agent Architecture Is Already in Your Terminal

The Best Agent Architecture Is Already in Your Terminal My project’s CLAUDE.md file had grown to 55KB—242 learnings crammed into one massive file. The problem? Claude prepends this file to every single prompt. A 55KB context file means less room for thinking and acting. Sessions hit context limits faster. Compaction happens sooner. I noticed the degradation: sessions became noticeably shorter, context compaction triggered more frequently, and the agent seemed to lose track of longer conversations. ...

January 12, 2026 · 3 min · Eugene Oleinik