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Claude Code Tips and Tricks

Power user features and lesser-known capabilities.

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Session Management​

Resume Previous Conversations​

claude --continue          # Resume last conversation
claude --resume            # Same as --continue

Your context is preserved, so you can pick up exactly where you left off.

Check Running Tasks​

/tasks

Shows all background tasks, their status, and IDs.

View Token Usage​

/cost

See how many tokens you've used and estimated cost.

Compact Long Conversations​

/compact

Summarizes and compresses the conversation while preserving important context. Useful for very long sessions.

Hidden Superpowers​

1. I Can Read Images​

"Look at the screenshot at ~/Desktop/error.png and help me debug"
"Review this wireframe image and suggest improvements"
"What does this diagram show?"

I'm multimodal - I can see and analyze images, screenshots, diagrams, and more.

claude

   ╭─────────────────────────────────╮
   │                                 │
   │   ██████╗██╗      █████╗ ██╗   │
   │  ██╔════╝██║     ██╔══██╗██║   │
   │  ██║     ██║     ███████║██║   │
   │  ██║     ██║     ██╔══██║██║   │
   │  ╚██████╗███████╗██║  ██║██║   │
   │   ╚═════╝╚══════╝╚═╝  ╚═╝╚═╝   │
   │                                 │
   │         claude code             │
   │                                 │
   ╰─────────────────────────────────╯

2. I Can Read PDFs​

"Read the spec document at docs/api-spec.pdf"
"Summarize the PDF report"

I extract both text and visual content from PDFs.

3. I Can Read Jupyter Notebooks​

"Review the data analysis in analysis.ipynb"
"What does the ML model notebook do?"

I see all cells, code, outputs, and visualizations.

4. I Can Run Commands in Background​

"Start the dev server in the background"
"Run the full test suite in the background while we continue"

You can keep working while long-running commands execute.

5. I Can Search the Web​

"Search for the latest Next.js 15 features"
"Find documentation for [obscure library]"
"What's the current best practice for X?"

I can find up-to-date information beyond my training data.

Efficient Exploration​

Use Explore Agents for Codebase Understanding​

"Use the Explore agent to map out the authentication system"
"Have an agent investigate how payments are processed"

Explore agents do deep-dives without cluttering your main conversation.

Pattern Searching​

"Find all files that export a default class"
"Search for components using useState"
"Find functions longer than 50 lines"

Architecture Discovery​

"What's the directory structure?"
"How are modules organized?"
"Show me the dependency graph"

Git Workflow Integration​

Smart Commits​

"Show me what changed, then create a well-formatted commit"

I'll:

  1. Analyze all staged and unstaged changes
  2. Look at recent commit messages for style
  3. Write a descriptive commit message
  4. Create the commit with proper attribution

Pull Request Creation​

"Create a pull request for these changes"

I'll:

  1. Analyze all commits on the branch
  2. Write a comprehensive PR description
  3. Create the PR with gh cli

Code Review​

"Review the changes in this PR"
"What could be improved in the last commit?"

Development Acceleration​

Generate Boilerplate​

"Create a new React component with TypeScript, tests, and stories"
"Generate a CRUD API for the Product model"
"Create a new Express router with error handling"

Instant Refactoring​

"Convert all var declarations to const/let"
"Add TypeScript types to this JavaScript file"
"Convert callbacks to async/await"

Pattern Application​

"Apply the same error handling pattern from UserService to ProductService"
"Make this component match the style of the other components"

Debugging Acceleration​

Error Analysis​

"Here's the error: [paste error]"
"Debug why this test is flaky"
"Find the root cause of this memory leak"

Tracing Issues​

"Trace how data flows from the form to the database"
"Find where this value is getting mutated"
"What could cause this race condition?"

Fix Verification​

"Fix the bug and add a test that would have caught it"
"Fix this and make sure we didn't break anything else"

Multi-File Operations​

Bulk Updates​

"Update all API endpoints to return consistent error formats"
"Add logging to all service methods"
"Update all imports from old path to new path"

Coordinated Changes​

"Rename the User model to Account and update all references"
"Move authentication to a new module and update imports"

Testing Tricks​

Test Generation​

"Generate unit tests for this service"
"Add integration tests for the API endpoints"
"Create edge case tests for this function"

Test Debugging​

"Why is this test failing?"
"Make this flaky test reliable"
"The test passes locally but fails in CI - help me debug"

Test Coverage​

"What code paths aren't covered by tests?"
"Add tests for the uncovered branches"

Documentation Tricks​

Auto-Documentation​

"Add JSDoc to all exported functions in this file"
"Generate API documentation from the routes"
"Create a README explaining this module"

Documentation from Code​

"Document the expected request/response format based on the types"
"What environment variables does this app need?"

Performance Tricks​

Parallel Tool Execution​

I automatically parallelize when possible, but you can be explicit:

"Read all three config files at once"
"Search for these five patterns in parallel"

Efficient Searching​

Instead of browsing manually:

"Find files that match X and contain Y"

Scoped Operations​

"Only look in the src directory"
"Search TypeScript files only"
"Ignore test files"

Context Optimization​

Reference Earlier Work​

"Using the same approach as before..."
"Apply that fix to the other files too"
"Continue implementing the feature we discussed"

Establish Conventions Early​

In your CLAUDE.md or early in the conversation:

"We use Prettier for formatting, ESLint for linting,
Jest for tests, and we prefer functional components."

Then later I'll follow these automatically.

Checkpoint Complex Work​

"Let's stop here and review before continuing"
"Summarize what we've done so far"
"What's left to implement?"

Safety Tips​

Preview Before Apply​

"Show me what you're going to change before doing it"
"Explain the approach first"

Incremental Verification​

"After each change, run the tests"
"Build after modifications"
"Check for TypeScript errors frequently"

Backup Important Work​

"Create a backup of this file before major changes"
"Let's commit the current state before refactoring"

Recovery Patterns​

If Something Goes Wrong​

"Undo the last change"
"Revert to the previous version"
"Show me git diff to see what changed"
"Reset this file to its original state"

If I Get Stuck​

"Let's try a different approach"
"Start over with this task"
"What other options do we have?"

If Context Gets Lost​

"Here's a summary of what we're working on: [context]"
"Let me re-explain the goal..."

Interactive: Commit Workflow​

See how the /commit command works with pre-commit checks:

Commit Workflow
beginner
📁 my-app/
📄 ├── CLAUDE.md✓
📁 └── .claude/commands/✓
*Initialized. Found CLAUDE.md, 3 commands.*
>
💡Use /commit when you're ready to save your work. It runs checks first.

Interactive: Initialize a Project​

Watch Claude generate a CLAUDE.md from your codebase:

Initialize Project
beginner
📁 new-project/
📁 ├── src/
📄 ├── package.json
📄 └── tsconfig.json
*Initialized. No CLAUDE.md found.*
>
💡The /init command scans your project and generates a starter CLAUDE.md.