CLAUDE.md Preserve

What it does

When your agent uses it

• Finishing a work session that changed the project's status or key decisions
• Recording blockers and next steps so future sessions start informed
• Trimming a CLAUDE.md file that has grown too long

Example prompts

• “/cpr:preserve quick”
• “Preserve this session's decisions and next steps in CLAUDE.md.”
• “Update CLAUDE.md with the new project phase and trim it back under the line limit.”
• “We changed the build setup today, so record it for future sessions.”

Requirements

• Python 3, used by the plugin's path helper
• Pre-approved tools (allowed-tools): Read, Edit, Write, Glob, AskUserQuestion, Bash(python3 *), Bash(wc *)

Workflow steps

4 steps, taken from the first numbered list in SKILL.md.

1. 1Find archivable content: ## Session Notes (DATE) sections older than 7 days, ## Completed Projects, and any section whose heading contains…
2. 2Show the user what archiving those would remove and the resulting line count, and ask with AskUserQuestion: archive now, or keep everything.
3. 3If it is still over 200 after that, list the remaining non-core sections and ask which to archive.
4. 4Never propose archiving a section whose heading contains (PROTECTED), or the core sections: Approach, Philosophy, Paths, Structure, Key…

What it can do on your machine

Read from SKILL.md and the folder at commit cfd1e77. It shows what the files ask for, not the result of running them.

• Tool permissions

  Pre-approves these tools, so the agent can use them without asking each time:

  • Read
  • Edit
  • Write
  • Glob
  • AskUserQuestion
  • Bash(python3 *)
  • Bash(wc *)

  From allowed-tools in the SKILL.md frontmatter.

• Runs code

  Shell commands in SKILL.md call:

  • python3

  From the folder's file list and the shell code blocks in SKILL.md.

• Network

  No URLs in SKILL.md.

  From URLs in SKILL.md, links to its own repository left out.

• Credentials

  Names no API keys, tokens, secrets or passwords.

  From names ending in _API_KEY, _TOKEN, _SECRET, _KEY or _PASSWORD in SKILL.md.

Context cost

CLAUDE.md Preserve loads about 889 tokens when it runs. Until then it costs about 48 tokens; SKILL.md has 451 words of instructions outside code blocks.

Always · name and description, kept in context so the agent knows when to use it

~48

When it runs · the whole SKILL.md, loaded when a task matches

~889

Estimates: characters ÷ 4, the usual rule of thumb; real counts depend on the model's tokenizer. Scripts and assets cost tokens only if the agent reads them.

Safety

Automated static check — not a guarantee. Review scripts before installing. It scans the text of SKILL.md for risky patterns (piping downloads into a shell, reading credential files, hidden Unicode, destructive commands); files beside SKILL.md are not scanned.

SKILL.md

The full file from EliaAlberti/cpr-compress-preserve-resume at commit cfd1e77, republished under its MIT licence (© EliaAlberti). 451 words, ~889 tokens.

name

preserve

description

Write this session's durable learnings into the project's CLAUDE.md, keeping it short and archiving stale sections. Run after important decisions or when the project's status changes.

allowed-tools

Read, Edit, Write, Glob, AskUserQuestion, Bash(python3 *), Bash(wc *)

argument-hint

[quick]

disable-model-invocation

true

CLAUDE.md updated

Preserved:
- {what changed}

CLAUDE.md is now {X} lines (target: under 200)

© EliaAlberti, MIT. Rendered from Markdown: HTML in the file is shown as text, images as links, and headings moved down two levels. Raw file

Files

Just SKILL.md in skills/preserve of EliaAlberti/cpr-compress-preserve-resume.

Open the folder on GitHubat commit cfd1e77