All 35 Claude Code Concepts Explained for Non Coders

CChase AI
컴퓨터/소프트웨어창업/스타트업AI/미래기술

Transcript

00:00:00Every single day it feels like there's a new Cloud Code feature, a new tutorial, another thing
00:00:04that you're falling behind on. And this is extremely overwhelming if you're just getting
00:00:09started, especially if you don't come from a technical background. But today I'm going to help
00:00:13you fix that problem and show you what concepts I would start with if I was starting brand new,
00:00:19completely fresh today. We are going to cover 35 concepts across four different sections,
00:00:25starting with the things you have to know at the beginning and ending with super advanced
00:00:30power user type stuff that you don't need to know right now, but you should know that they at least
00:00:34exist. And by the end, you're going to have a clear roadmap that you can get started with right away
00:00:39and start making some real progress. And the first concept we're going to cover is what is the actual
00:00:45difference between the cloud.ai web app, you know, this chat GPT type interface in cloud code itself?
00:00:53Well, it's relatively simple. These two systems use the same brain. So I have Opus 4.6 running inside
00:01:00a cloud code. And right here in the chat menu, I have Opus 4.6. The difference is when I'm using
00:01:06cloud code, this brain has a body. It has hands. It can actually do things on my behalf, whether
00:01:11that's write code, whether that's access my emails, whether that's the interact with my computer itself.
00:01:16That's the biggest difference. Cloud code can actually do things for me by and large. Now,
00:01:22concept number two is about installing cloud code. And luckily for us, this is relatively simple.
00:01:26If you just Google cloud code install, it will bring you to the cloud code documentation.
00:01:31And all we have to do is copy and paste a single line of code into the terminal or if you're on
00:01:37Windows, something like PowerShell. Now, the one you're going to choose is depending on your
00:01:42operating system. So if you're using Mac OS, Linux or WSL, you will just copy this. And if you're
00:01:47using Windows PowerShell, you will copy this to find your terminal or to find PowerShell. You're
00:01:52just going to go to the search menu. Same thing in Mac. I'm on Windows type in PowerShell. It will
00:01:57give you a scary interface like this. You're just going to paste it, run this command, and then it
00:02:02will run you through the setup wizard. It's very simple. It's going to ask you to log in and you
00:02:06will use your actual subscription plan. And after you run through the setup to actually launch cloud
00:02:11code, you can just type in cloud. And you will see something like this. But now we move on to concept
00:02:17three, which is where do we actually use cloud code? Because there's actually a lot of options.
00:02:22Because while I can use cloud code in the terminal like this, I can also use the cloud desktop app
00:02:27as well. This is also cloud code. And then we have co-work here as well. What about co-work?
00:02:32And what about chat? Or what about something like VS code and IDE and integrated development
00:02:38environment where I do have the terminal up right here, same as this PowerShell situation,
00:02:44but I have the ability to look at my files and I have another window here, right? It's all very,
00:02:48very confusing. Again, especially if you aren't used to any of this. Well, the truth is it doesn't
00:02:53really matter all that much. At the end of the day, the most powerful version is the version that lets
00:02:58you work in the terminal, whether that's using something like VS code, which I will show you how
00:03:01to do today, or you're just using the terminal raw, like in PowerShell or something like that.
00:03:06But when you get started, if that's all too much for you and you're like, Hey, I just want the
00:03:11easy to understand interface inside the cloud code desktop app, or even co-work for most users,
00:03:1999% of the things they are going to do can be done in any of these spaces. You're not going to
00:03:23be losing out. That being said, I do implore you to try out the terminal, at least for the good
00:03:29beginning, give it a week or two. And if at the end of that time period, you're still like, ah,
00:03:34this is too much. It's just not for me, go ahead and move to these other ones, whether that's
00:03:38cloud code or even cowork, because you can always go from the terminal to these.
00:03:43It's a little harder if you get used to something that kind of has, you know, the bumper rails on it.
00:03:47And then you try to move to something more powerful. And as easy as it is for me to say, the terminal
00:03:53isn't as scary as it looks because at the end of the day, it's just a prompt window. We're just going
00:03:58to be prompting cloud code inside of the terminal in the same way that you would chat GPT on the web
00:04:03app. And like I said, we will use VS code for today because I think it's an easy stepping stone into
00:04:08the terminal environment. This is what is called an IDE, an integrated development environment.
00:04:13It's still the terminal, but it's just a more friendly way to view it because you can see over
00:04:18here I have this Explorer tab. So when we start working inside of a file, everything I create
00:04:22inside of the file, I can see here and I can actually open up over here and I'll be more obvious
00:04:27later in the video. Now using VS code visual studio code is totally free. If you search up VS code in
00:04:32Google and click the first link you will be brought here. The open source AI code editor. You're just
00:04:37going to download it, run through the install wizard. And that's kind of all you have to do
00:04:41from there. Just search for VS code, click on it, and you'll be brought to a page like this.
00:04:46You're going to go up to file, go to open folder, and then we're going to create a new folder today.
00:04:52This folder is where we're going to work. And just like you would work with any other project on your
00:04:56computer. So I'm going to go to new folder. I'm going to call mine 35 dash test. Click on it. It's
00:05:02select folder. And you'll see a page like this. Next, I want you to go up to the top where there's
00:05:08the three buttons hit terminal, go to new terminal. And now our terminal is open right here at the
00:05:13bottom, just like it was when we did PowerShell. And now to open Clod, I can just type Clod.
00:05:18And there we go. Clod code is up and running. So let's talk about concept number four,
00:05:25which is permissions. So right now you will notice it should be blank at the bottom. But if I hit
00:05:30shift tab, you will see some options pop up. What do all these things mean? Well, these are the
00:05:35different permissions. These are like almost think of it as security settings for what Clod can and
00:05:40cannot do to your computer, to the files on your computer without your permission. Now, when it is
00:05:46blank, we are on the default permission setting. That means it's going to ask your permission
00:05:50explicitly to edit files. If I want to accept edits on, it will automatically edit files without asking
00:05:56for permission. So it's a little bit quicker. But if it's going to use any bash commands, that means
00:06:00terminal commands, that means changes to your computer, think downloading a certain dependency
00:06:05or program and installing it, it's going to ask for your permission to do so. Then we have plan mode,
00:06:09which we'll talk about in a second. Now there's actually a third permission. But to do that,
00:06:14you need to open Clod in a specific way. So if we do slash exit, that gets us out of Clod code.
00:06:20And now if I do Clod and I do dash dash dangerously skip permissions,
00:06:26it's going to open up Clod normally, but you will see a new setting here called bypass permissions
00:06:33on. That means it can edit files, delete files, download things all without my permission. Kind of
00:06:38scary at first, but over time understand this is where most people end up sitting on because it's
00:06:44just quicker. I will say I've never had an issue with Clod code deleting any files that I didn't
00:06:49tell it to. Although, you know, there's always those theoretical stories in the aggregate though,
00:06:54this will save you so much time once you get comfortable. But if you're not comfortable with
00:06:57that yet, you don't want it to go crazy. Just keep it on accept edits on. Now, if you shift tab a
00:07:01couple of times, that will bring us to plan mode, which is the last concept we will cover in this core
00:07:06essentials section. So plan mode means that when I tell Clod code to do something like let's build a
00:07:11website, it's not just going to go out and do it on its own. It's actually going to think about it.
00:07:18It's going to come up with a series of steps we need to execute first. And what you will probably
00:07:23see here is just going to come back with some questions for us. It's essentially prompting us
00:07:28to get a better idea of what we want to build. So plan mode is the number one way for you to get
00:07:35better outputs from Clod code because it's going to make sure your prompt doesn't suck. The prompt
00:07:39you're going to come up with is going to have a number of holes in plan mode. Let's just kind of
00:07:44fill those in because Clod will ask us questions to do exactly that. So it's asking for our type
00:07:49of website. We'll say a landing page. It's asking for our stack. If I don't know, we'll just go with
00:07:56number one. And for our purpose, we'll say this is for a personal project and then we'll submit it.
00:08:04So just wanted to take a moment to talk about my Clod code masterclass because it is the number one
00:08:08way to go from zero to AI Dev, especially if you don't come from a technical background.
00:08:13Everything in this course is for the beginner and we focus on real use cases to help you learn how
00:08:20to master this amazing AI tool. I put out new updates every single week. And if you want to
00:08:25get it, just head to chase AI plus there is a link in the pinned comment. So now is the perfect time
00:08:30to talk about concept number six, which is your mindset when using Clod code in the planning page
00:08:35is a great time to discuss this. Now, right now it's asking me a few more questions about our
00:08:40website. And we're saying we want to make it about this fake online app called Argus, the social media
00:08:46intelligence app. And it's going to create this landing page for us. But when it comes to mindset,
00:08:51you need to start thinking of Clod code as a collaborator. And it's very easy to do so in
00:08:57the planning stage, because you have this back and forth, but where people get tripped up is in this
00:09:01back and forth. They're going to just do whatever Clod code says, and they're not going to ask it
00:09:06questions. And one example of us doing it the wrong way was when it asked us what
00:09:11tech stack did we want to use? We just said, Hey, we're going to use Next.js and Tailwind.
00:09:15Do you know what Next.js and Tailwind is? Probably not. If you've never done something like this
00:09:20before now, oftentimes Clod code will give you a recommendation and it's your best bet to go with it.
00:09:26But if you really want to learn Clod code and understand the fundamentals of building with AI,
00:09:31that is when you need to stop and tell Clod code to explain these concepts to you. And that is how
00:09:37you actually going to learn and not just be a caricature of a vibe coder, because you have to
00:09:42ask yourself if it's this easy to build things, what's the difference between you and the guy
00:09:48down the street who I can replace you with? Because he can ask those same questions too and just hit
00:09:51accept, accept, accept, build me a landing page. What's going to separate you from the pack and
00:09:55actually build your skills at a foundational level is asking Clod code these questions to explain
00:10:00things to you. It is the infinitely patient tutor and we need to treat it as such. So here's the plan
00:10:06Clod code came back with for our landing page. And this is what you can expect when you use plan mode.
00:10:10It's going to give you a pretty detailed outline of what it's planning to do before it actually
00:10:15executes. And you'll see some options here. You'll see yes, and bypass permissions, which means it's
00:10:20going to run what it planned and it's not going to ask for permission. Yes, manually approve edits.
00:10:25So it will begin creating things, but it's going to ask for your permission every time it wants like
00:10:29create or edit a file, which is very annoying. And then we have this one, no refine with ultra plan.
00:10:34Now ultra plan will be in section four when we go into some of the power user stuff, some of these
00:10:39like high level features inside of Clod code. But for now, we're just going to say yes,
00:10:43bypass permissions. And just like that, it's going to start building our website for us.
00:10:46And what you see over here on the left are all the files it's building. So this is what's nice
00:10:50about VS code, especially when you first get started. All the stuff that's being built is
00:10:55right here. So it's the same as if I actually went into my file explorer, opened up 35 dash test and
00:11:01looked what was inside. I'd see the same things. Now, one of the files Clod code created was the
00:11:05clod.md file you see over here on the left. And this is what we're going to talk about for concept
00:11:10number seven. So what is the clod.md file? Well, this is going to be inside of every single Clod
00:11:16code created project and think of it as the instruction manual, so to speak for Clod code
00:11:21regarding that particular project. This is something that's telling Clod code certain
00:11:26conventions and certain rules. You want it to always follow all the time when working inside
00:11:32this particular folder. Now Clod code will automatically create this when it's building
00:11:36your project. So you don't have to touch this too much and do understand there are a lot of techniques
00:11:41regarding clod.md. Some people like me will say less is more. Other people say put as much
00:11:46information here as possible that you think is relevant and are kind of like outside the box
00:11:50rules. All you need to understand at the beginning is that this exists and whatever you put in here,
00:11:56Clod code is going to reference every single time you tell it to do anything. So it's a very powerful
00:12:02tool, but you want to make sure what you do put in here, if you do edit it actually is important and
00:12:07it applies to virtually every single prompt. So Clod code created our web page. It said a dev server
00:12:12is started here on localhost. Localhost is like an internal web page. If you click on this, it will
00:12:18take you to the web page and I'm inside of Chrome right now, but it's not connected to the internet.
00:12:22This is all local. So this is what it built for us. Extremely ugly. And throughout this video,
00:12:27I'll give you different tips and techniques to actually making this better, but just understand
00:12:31this is where it's living right now. And we can actually interact with it just like we would a
00:12:34normal webpage. But before we get into that, let's talk about one of the most important concepts of
00:12:40Clod code and really large language models in general. And that is concept number eight,
00:12:44the context window. So the context window can be seen if we do forward slash context. And what we
00:12:51see right here is how much of the context window we have used. In this case, we've used 48,000 tokens
00:12:57out of 1 million tokens. And you're probably like, "Chase, what the heck does that mean? I don't even
00:13:01understand what tokens are, let alone what that really means. 50,000 of a million. Okay, what are
00:13:06you talking about?" So tokens are the currency of large language models and Clod code. Every single
00:13:12word is a token. So every single word here that we've given Clod code inside of prompt and every
00:13:17word it spit back out at us equals one token. One word, one token. A little bit different in reality,
00:13:23but just let that be your mental model. All the tool calls it uses cost tokens. All the code it
00:13:28generated cost tokens. Everything it does costs tokens. And the context window is our budget.
00:13:34For Clod code, that is 1 million tokens. It differs for each and every AI system. Now, why do we need
00:13:42to care about this? Well, first of all, if we fill it up, our session kind of ends and you've probably
00:13:47run into this with chatbots throughout the years where all of a sudden it says, "Hey, I don't have
00:13:50enough room." The session is ending. That occurs when you fill up the entire context window. But
00:13:55what's important isn't just filling up the context window. It's the idea of concept number nine,
00:14:01which is context rot. And that's the idea. As I fill up the context window with more conversations,
00:14:07more tasks for Clod code, the actual effectiveness of Clod code goes down. So the more I use it,
00:14:15the worse it gets, which means we want to keep an eye of where we're at on our context window.
00:14:22Especially since we can reset it at any time. I can pretty much start back at zero whenever I want.
00:14:27Now, this comes at a cost, right? When I'm using a normal chatbot, say I'm inside clod.ai and I
00:14:33start a new chat, that's kind of painful because everything we've been talking about, I want it to
00:14:38remember. I want it to remember my conversation. I don't want to start all over again. That sucks.
00:14:42But if I start all over again, Clod code works better. So what am I supposed to do? Well,
00:14:47luckily starting over inside of Clod code isn't like starting over inside of a chatbot. It's
00:14:51actually much better because Clod code, even if I start all over and I can start over by simply
00:14:57doing slash clear, my session is now reset. Clod code is living inside this folder. It's on my
00:15:03computer. It's on a chatbot in the cloud. Whenever I talk to it again and ask it questions about my
00:15:08website, it doesn't matter that we started a new chat for all intents and purposes because it can
00:15:13just look inside the code base. It can look at all these files. It has clod.md. It has the ability,
00:15:18almost like a human being, to go inside the folder and see what is what. And therefore, because of
00:15:25that, I always want to be resetting my context window if I can. Because why do I want to be
00:15:30working with a worst Clod code at 500,000 tokens for the sake of keeping a conversation going
00:15:35that I can just have it remember anyways, right? So there's few downside to constantly resetting.
00:15:42On top of that, as you fill up the context window, your prompts are essentially more expensive. You
00:15:48are using more of your usage because every single prompt is essentially sending everything that came
00:15:53before it. Now there's a caching system, which kind of alleviates some of that problems. But the point
00:15:58remains, if I'm down here at token number 800,000, that's really costing me more per prompt than if I'm
00:16:04at token number 50K or 100K. And you see a lot of people complain about Clod code usage. And this
00:16:10isn't the only reason they complain about it. But in large part, it's because a lot of people don't
00:16:13know how to manage their context window properly. So they're using more usage and Clod code isn't
00:16:18working very well. So you can see the importance of A, always having your eye on the context and B,
00:16:25always resetting it whenever it makes sense. As a rule of thumb, you don't really want to go past
00:16:30200,000 tokens if you can help it. There are going to be instances where, you know, hey, I just need
00:16:36to have a longer window for whatever reason. But if you're hitting 20%, you need to ask yourself,
00:16:42do I need to stay in the session? If you don't have a very good reason, you need to reset it. And by
00:16:47reset, all you have to do is what you saw here, which is forward slash clear. And if there is
00:16:52something in the conversation you want to bring forward, just ask Clod code to have a quick write
00:16:56up about what you were talking about, and you can copy paste it in the next session. Now, what you
00:17:00can see here for me, and this is going to be concept number nine, is my status line. So right here,
00:17:06you can see it says 35 dash test. You can see the actual model I'm using, and I can see my context
00:17:11window at all times, which says 2% here, and yours probably doesn't say that right now. But you can
00:17:16create that yourself so you don't have to constantly do forward slash context. You can just look right
00:17:20down here and see where you're at, which keeps you kind of on top of it. So to do that, you're just
00:17:26going to do forward slash status line. And you're going to write a prompt that says something like,
00:17:31hey, I want you to create a status line for me. That's totally persistent. That includes,
00:17:37you know, the folder I'm in the model I'm using in my current context window usage. Once you do that,
00:17:44it will create that for you, and you're just going to have to reset cloud code, and you'll have a
00:17:48status line of your own. So we just had a ton of concepts right there. Context, context window,
00:17:53the ability to clear, context rot, and the status line. Take those all together, and frankly, you
00:17:59will be well ahead of people who've been using cloud code for a while because people do not adhere
00:18:03to this principle nearly as dogmatically as they should. Now let's talk about some other slash
00:18:08commands while we're here, and this is our next concept, and that is rewind. So let's say you did
00:18:13do slash clear. You've been really on top of making sure that context window is as clean as possible,
00:18:17but you realized, oops, I really shouldn't have done that. I had something else I wanted to do.
00:18:22Well, if I do forward slash rewind, I can actually go back to previous sessions inside of cloud code.
00:18:30So I could go back to before I did forward slash clear and essentially bring that conversation
00:18:35back to where I was or the conversation where I said, hi. This will also include code changes.
00:18:41So if we were talking to cloud code and we made some changes to our actual website,
00:18:45and let's say I didn't like them, I can do forward slash rewind. It's an easy way to essentially go
00:18:49back to where you were because it has these almost auto save points. Concept number 14 is another one
00:18:54you're going to want to know, and that is forward slash model. So forward slash model lets me switch
00:18:59between all the different cloud code models. So we have Opus 4.6, Sonnet 4.6, Sonnet with a 1 million
00:19:06context as well as Haiku. So what you're going to want to do here kind of just depends on what plan
00:19:10you're on. If you're on the pro plan, 20 bucks a month, you're probably going to want to stick
00:19:14with Sonnet all the time. If you're on max 5x, you can get away with Opus a lot. Depends how much
00:19:20you're actually using it. If you're on 20x, you can go crazy with Opus all the time. The model is just
00:19:25going to depend on your users. That's just kind of what it comes down to. How much money are you paying
00:19:29in enthropic? When it comes to Haiku, you probably don't need to be using this at all. It is an
00:19:34extremely cheap, damn near free model. And its use cases are very specific and niche. So unless you
00:19:41know what you're doing, you don't need to play around with Haiku. And you'll also notice some
00:19:44other model related commands like effort. This is how much thinking cloud code was doing. It's going
00:19:48to default to auto. And again, this is kind of usage based because the higher the thinking level,
00:19:53the more tokens, the more usage. So just depends on your task. Now, the last core concept I want
00:19:58to talk to you about is Git. So we talked about rewind, right? The ability to have these sort of
00:20:05built-in save points with cloud code. Well, there is another sort of save point and that is Git. So
00:20:11Git essentially is another type of save point, but it's going to be on your computer. And it's pretty
00:20:16much saving your exact spot in terms of the code you've built. So I highly suggest you use this
00:20:22whenever possible. Cloud code is very spun up and intelligent when it comes to Git. So you can just
00:20:28say something like let's Git commit this. And if I say Git commit, it's saving it. This will come in
00:20:36handy later because when we start using things like Git hub, well, we want to take whatever save point
00:20:41we have with our code and push it to the cloud on GitHub. And to do that, you need to have committed
00:20:48the code. So think of Git commit as a save point. Rewind is great, right? Rewind is great in the
00:20:54context of cloud code, but as we become more mature and as we like to think about, hey, how am I
00:20:59eventually going to get this code out into the world? We need to start using Git. And that is a
00:21:04great stepping stone. And it's almost a secondary save point next to rewind. So you can feel a little
00:21:09bit more confident that your code is not just going to vanish or disappear. So now we're in section
00:21:15three, which is the toolkit. This is where we're going to start bringing in some outside tools,
00:21:19things like CLIs and MCPs, as well as introduce skills, which are one of the most powerful
00:21:25features of cloud code. And it couldn't happen at a better time because our website is ugly. I mean,
00:21:31just look at this thing. This is the definition of AI slop, boring, flat, purple gradients. How
00:21:37can we fix this? I mean, obviously we could have given it a better prompt, but there are some tools
00:21:42that can help us specifically with something like front end design. So the next three concepts are
00:21:46going to be skills, the skill marketplace and the skill creator skill. So skills are just text
00:21:52prompts. They're just a way to tell cloud code to do a specific thing in a specific manner. What
00:21:57we're looking at right here is the official anthropic front end design skill. And like you see,
00:22:02it's just text, no fancy code, nothing crazy going on, just a text prompt. So the front end design
00:22:10skill is the exact same thing as me taking this whole thing, copying it, pacing it into cloud code
00:22:15and saying, Hey, create a better front end design than what you just did and use these sort of
00:22:20guidelines, but I don't want to copy and paste it every single time. So instead I would just use
00:22:25something like the front end design skill by either doing forward slash front end design, or just saying
00:22:31in plain natural language, use the front end design skill. And then I give it my prompt. So let me show
00:22:36you how to do that. Now, the first thing you need to do is install the front end design skill. Now
00:22:40there's a number of ways you can do this. The first way is just to do slash plugin slash plugin will
00:22:46bring up the plugin design marketplace. And I can go to discover plugins, which you see right here.
00:22:52And I can just search for front end design skill. Once you see that you just select it and then you
00:22:57install it and you can confirm you installed it by just tabbing over to the installed section.
00:23:02And you can see right here, front end design plugin. Now, once you install the plugin, it will give you
00:23:07some sort of message saying to do something like reload plugins. You just run that and it will get
00:23:12the plugin installed. But at that point, the skill is installed in Claude code. Claude code knows the
00:23:19skill exists. You just have to invoke it. Like I said, a couple of different ways to do that. You can
00:23:24always invoke it by using forward slash whatever that skill is called in this case, front end design.
00:23:30I can say something like use the front end design skill and it will use it. Or it's smart enough.
00:23:38If I say something like, Hey, we're working on the front end for this webpage, let's do X, Y, and Z.
00:23:43It's smart enough to pick up on that sentence and say, Oh, we're working on front end design. Oh,
00:23:46I have a skill for that. Let me go invoke it. Lastly, Claude code is smart enough to install
00:23:51these skills. If you were to just copy this URL from GitHub, I, this is on the Claude code official
00:23:58GitHub. So I could copy this URL, paste into Claude code and say, Hey, I want to install the skill.
00:24:05Can you do it for me? And it will edit its settings on its own to add that. The last thing I'll talk
00:24:10about skills before we see this in action and then go into the skill creator skill is that skills can
00:24:15be both at the user level and the project level. Right now we are in the 35 test project, but what
00:24:21if I created another project and it was for, you know, my emails, it was my email project.
00:24:27Will that project have access to the Claude code skill? It depends. Normally. Yes. When I install
00:24:33something like the front end design skill, it's going to install it at the user level.
00:24:37You are the user, which means any project you, the user creates has access to these skills.
00:24:42We have the ability to have project level skills. So I could create or use a specific skill just for
00:24:48this project, just for our website, right? Maybe you don't want it to ever be used anywhere else.
00:24:53So just understand you have that flexibility. So let's actually put this to work. So I did
00:24:57forward slash front end design. I said, recreate the front end aesthetic, use the anthropics color
00:25:02palette, terracotta, et cetera, and give the card some visual weight, drop shadows, et cetera.
00:25:07Stay away from standard AI slop design. So let's see what it does this time with the skill.
00:25:14So here's what we got. And this is a huge leap forward from the first iteration. Now,
00:25:19is this perfect? Absolutely not. Does it still look AI generated? Yes. But look at the gap between the
00:25:26first iteration and the second iteration. And that's really thanks to one of the most simple
00:25:30tools out there. One of the most simple skills, which is the front end design skill. Now let's
00:25:34talk about the most powerful skill available to you inside of Cloud Code. And that is the skill
00:25:38creator skill, which is our next concept. The skill creator skill is not only good because it is
00:25:44trained to create high quality skills, but it allows us to modify and improve existing skills
00:25:49and measure skill performance. Over time, as you use cloud code more and more, you are going to find
00:25:55yourself doing the same things over and over. We all have a particular workflow. Anytime you identify
00:26:01some sort of workflow, some sort of repeated task, you want to turn it into a skill. And when we turn
00:26:06something into a skill and create a custom skill, we always want to use the skill creator tool,
00:26:11because it's actually going to tell us if it's even worth creating a skill in the first place.
00:26:16Its ability to measure skill performance is huge. It will automatically run AB test to see,
00:26:22is this skill even better than doing nothing at all? And it allows us to test skill improvement.
00:26:26So if you edit a skill, it will test it against the original iteration. And when I say test it,
00:26:31it runs multiple tests and gives us back actual quantifiable data. This is massive.
00:26:37In order to use the skill creator skill, just like the front end design skill, you can either
00:26:41copy this URL and bring in a cloud code, or you can head to the plugin marketplace, find the skill
00:26:46creator skill here, install it, reload your plugins, and you're all ready to go. Now let's talk about
00:26:51some external tools we can bring into cloud code with concept number 20 and 21, and that is MCPs
00:26:58and CLI tools. So MCPs are a way for us to connect cloud code to some sort of external program.
00:27:04Cloud code has an entire section of its documentation dedicated to MCP tools and lists
00:27:11the type of tool you can connect to, as well as the command you need to copy and paste into cloud code
00:27:16to install it. So we have things like Linear, Hugging Face, Cloudflare, Figma, Guru, Monday,
00:27:23Notion. The list goes on and on and on. And with an MCP server in between us and these programs
00:27:30like Notion, I can then just talk to cloud code in natural language and say, "Hey, do X, Y, and Z
00:27:37inside of Notion." And it will do it for us on our behalf, just like as if we were inside of Notion,
00:27:42executing those tasks manually. So to use these MCP tools requires a couple things. One, you need
00:27:48the specific command. Like I said, the most popular ones can be found here inside of the cloud code
00:27:52documentation, which you can find by either searching cloud code docs MCP or just asking
00:27:58cloud code to do it. And then you're just going to copy this command and then you're going to paste
00:28:02it inside the terminal. Now, the easier way to actually do this is to just say something like,
00:28:09"Set up the MCP server or Notion for me." Cloud code will do all this on your behalf. It will search
00:28:17the web to figure out what sort of commands it needs to run. And then it will come back to you
00:28:22with a list of things you need to do. Because for me to set up a Notion MCP or a PayPal or a Stripe
00:28:30or Superbase, I need to have credentials. So that means I need to go onto a website like Superbase
00:28:36and there's specific secret keys that I need to bring to cloud code or put into the settings
00:28:42folder. Now that sounds kind of complicated if you've never done that before, but guess who's an
00:28:47expert in these things? That's right, cloud code. Cloud code will literally walk you through it step
00:28:51by step to like where it says, "Click on this link, go to this page, copy and paste this." So cloud code
00:28:58will do all the heavy lifting for you when it comes to MCPs. That being said, MCPs are kind of falling
00:29:04by the wayside. Even though MCPs were hyped to the moon over the last year and a half or so,
00:29:09they are starting to be replaced by CLIs. A CLI tool is a command line interface tool. Just like
00:29:17cloud code lives in the terminal, these programs also live in the terminal. And because both cloud
00:29:23code and these programs live in the terminal, they are perfect for one another. Versus MCPs,
00:29:28MCPs have a lot of overhead, which means when you compare an MCP versus a CLI, the MCP tends to be
00:29:33slower and less token efficient. So for 90% of use cases, if there is a CLI available, you want to use
00:29:41that over the MCP. A great example of this is the Playwright MCP. So Playwright is a tool that if we
00:29:48connect cloud code to it, it will do browser automations for us. So it's like cloud code
00:29:52controlling the browser on our behalf, logging into websites, testing things. It's great. It has a CLI
00:29:57and an MCP. The CLI is way better. It's like 90% more token efficient. It's easier for cloud code
00:30:04to use. And it's a perfect case study for the CLI versus MCP dynamic. Now, how do we use CLIs? Well,
00:30:10you know exactly what I'm going to tell you. There are specific commands to use CLIs. Or what do we
00:30:15do? We go to cloud code and we say, set up the CLI for me. Now, things like CLIs and MCPs, if you
00:30:22aren't on bypass permissions, you didn't start cloud code with dangerously skipped permissions,
00:30:27it's going to ask you to do things that will probably tell you to open up a new terminal window
00:30:31and paste in these commands. If you're on bypass permissions on, it won't do all this for you.
00:30:35Now, part of that's kind of scary, right? Cloud code going in, downloading something on my computer,
00:30:40installing it, running it, frightening. However, if you're using a rather popular CLI, one that's
00:30:47definitely vetted by the community, you shouldn't be too afraid of this. Something like Playwright CLI
00:30:51is a great example. The question then becomes what CLIs should I be using? And the truth is,
00:30:57I can't tell you what CLIs to use. It's entirely use case dependent. Do you need browser automations?
00:31:03Maybe. Do you need something like Supabase for authentication to set up logins for your website?
00:31:08Maybe, maybe not. The trap here and a trap a lot of people get stuck in is they, after hearing about
00:31:15CLIs and MCPs, they go down the rabbit hole and they search up every single CLI they could possibly
00:31:20use, every MCP that might be relevant to them, install all of them and use them like crazy.
00:31:25Less is more when it comes to cloud code, at least in my opinion. So over time, you will become more
00:31:32exposed to some of these CLIs and MCPs and it will become rather obvious when it makes sense for you.
00:31:37If you are just getting started, I think it's enough to know that CLIs and MCPs exist. And more
00:31:44importantly, that we can have cloud code install and use them for us. And even in many cases,
00:31:50create skills that help cloud code use them. So if you just know that's out there, that's enough
00:31:56if you're in the beginning of your journey. If you are a bit more experienced, well then
00:32:00it's just a matter of using cloud code more and also asking cloud code if does an MCP exist for
00:32:06this use case? Does a CLI exist for a use case? Oh, by the way, no cloud code. Go use your web search
00:32:12and confirm that's the case because these things are changing all the time. Every single day there's
00:32:17a new CLI coming out. Every single day there's a new MCP going out. So I'm not going to sit here
00:32:21and give you, you know, here's the 30 you need to know, although I do have some content that
00:32:26hits on some of these things. Just understand it's out there and that cloud code can find it,
00:32:31install it and use it for you. These are the kind of like superpowers cloud code has.
00:32:36Because what I want to talk about for concept 22 is the idea of few shot prompting. What is few
00:32:43shot prompting? Few shot prompting is the idea that when I prompt cloud code, like with front end
00:32:50design, I don't just give it a prompt. I don't just give it a skill. I am in fact going to give it
00:32:55multiple examples of what I want it to do in order to better get the output I desire. And when we talk
00:33:02about something like front end design, we can do better than just screenshots. We can give it actual
00:33:07code, actual HTML that's living under the hood that cloud code can use to better get us something
00:33:14we're shooting for. So what do I mean by that? Well, you know, we originally told our webpage
00:33:17that we were kind of going for an anthropic color palette slash design. Well for one, I can take
00:33:23screenshots of what I'm going for. Let's add some of these cards. Let's get the footer, but we can
00:33:29look at the actual code. So if I do control U, what we have here is the HTML. So if I then copy
00:33:39all of this and bring that into cloud code, that is in essence, a form of few shot prompting where
00:33:45I have screenshots plus the code to better guide cloud code to get what I want. And this is perfect
00:33:50for front end design. So I said, can we get the front end to better match the anthropic aesthetic?
00:33:56Here is the HTML from their site plus screenshots. I pasted all that HTML was 2000 lines,
00:34:01and then I drag and dropped in the screenshots. So let's see how that works. And here's what it
00:34:06came back with. And it definitely has much more of a anthropic vibe in terms of the colors. Now,
00:34:13is it an exact one for one copy? Is there still a bunch of work to be done? Yes. Just like before
00:34:18with the front end design tool. But the point is by using stuff like few shot prompting, you have
00:34:23more control of the output. Anything we can do to get away from just prompt and pray and feel like
00:34:30we have some sort of agency in terms of the output. That's huge. And few shot prompting is one of the
00:34:37best ways to do that. But part of the problem of having cloud code code things when we ourselves
00:34:42aren't a coder is that we don't actually know if what cloud code is creating is correct or right.
00:34:48I mean, I can look at the output and judge it based on its final merits. But is what it created under
00:34:54the hood correct at all? It could be complete gibberish. And for most of us, we'd have no idea.
00:34:58Which brings us to our next concept, which is adversarial prompting and adversarial code review.
00:35:05Now, adversarial code review just means look at the code and tell me what's wrong. Now,
00:35:13when you do this, there's a few things you want to keep in mind. First is the idea that
00:35:18AI in general and Opus and Sonnet is part of this under this umbrella is they look kindly on
00:35:24their own code. Whatever they create, they think it's good. So if I tell, hey, look at the code and
00:35:29tell me what's wrong, it might come back with a few things, but by and large, it's going to think what
00:35:35it did is correct. And that shouldn't really be a surprise. So if I want to make sure that what I
00:35:39wrote was correct, there's kind of two options. The first is I can create another terminal and I can
00:35:46start up cloud code again. So I have cloud code in two terminals and I have a different session
00:35:51of cloud code. Take a look at the code we created inside of this code base. And I tell it to be
00:35:56adversarial. I tell it to like, look at it with a discerning eye. I tell it, hey, imagine you're
00:36:01some nerd on Reddit who hates AI and tell me what's wrong with this code base, right? That's the first
00:36:05way to do it. The second way is to use a different AI entirely to do the code review. And a great way
00:36:10to do this is using the codex plugin for cloud code. So open AI, AKA makers of chat GPT, makers
00:36:16of codex have a plugin for cloud code. So if you pay for chat GPT subscription, 20 bucks a month,
00:36:22you can use this plugin. In fact, you can actually use it for free as well, but I believe the model
00:36:26is downgraded, but we can install this just in the same way we install a skill and have codex review
00:36:34our code. And they have a specific command for adversarial review. So if you're someone who's
00:36:39like, I just don't believe what hope is the saying. And I want a second set of eyes that aren't also
00:36:44Opus. Well, codex plugin is perfect. How do you install it? Very simple. Take this URL, paste it
00:36:50into cloud code and say, Hey, I want to install codex plugin and it will run you through it. And
00:36:55you just would do forward slash codex review or forward slash codex adversarial review. And I think
00:37:00this is really important, especially if you're doing something more complicated, you know, we're
00:37:04doing something here with a front end, like a landing page. There's only so much it can screw
00:37:10up, but the more complex the project, the bigger the project, the more you're going to get out of
00:37:15something like an adversarial review. And this is great, especially, especially, especially if you
00:37:20don't come from a technical background, you don't know what it built. So at the very least you want
00:37:25someone who does know what's going on, AKA another model tell you if it was good or not. So now we're
00:37:32in section four, the power user section, everything we've talked about up until this point is something
00:37:37you should be striving to master within your first few weeks. If you can get comfortable with
00:37:41everything up until now, you will be well ahead of your average cloud code user. Everything we
00:37:46are now about to discuss though, this is more for the power user, for someone who's more experienced.
00:37:52You don't need to start implementing these things right away, but you do need to know they exist
00:37:55because as you become more experienced, you will eventually hit some walls. And some of the stuff
00:38:00you're going to be exposed to here can help you. So just know they're out there, know there's
00:38:04possibilities beyond everything that we've termed fundamental or core to cloud code. And the first
00:38:11two concepts we're going to hit are all about custom commands, custom slash commands. So when
00:38:15I do forward slash, as you've realized at this point is there are a bunch of commands that will
00:38:22prompt cloud code to do something, things like clear, right? We talked about that with context
00:38:26raw and starting a new session, but we can create our own. Oftentimes they are in the form of a
00:38:32skill. So you use the custom skill creator to create skills, which you invoke with a forward
00:38:38slash command. One of the favorite ones I use is YT-Pipeline. This is my YouTube custom skill
00:38:46research workflow because skills and cloud code don't just have to be simple things like a front
00:38:52end design text prompt that says, "Hey, when we create a front end design, make sure you do X, Y,
00:38:56and Z." Custom skills, custom slash commands, they can be workflows. They can be something that tells
00:39:01cloud code, "I want you to do A, then I want you to do B, then I want you to do C, I want you to do D."
00:39:06It becomes like its own automation. That's what my custom one does. And it uses sub skills. So it's a
00:39:13higher order skill that calls additional skills below it. And it uses things like CLIs. So your
00:39:18custom slash commands, your custom skills, your custom workflows can be pretty complicated,
00:39:22but they can save you a ton of time. Like I said, this uses the notebook LMPI. It goes onto YouTube.
00:39:28It's able to use the notebook LM actual application through cloud code to help me do research. And so
00:39:36whatever you do that has multiple steps that you do multiple times a day, you should be turning into
00:39:41a custom slash command. Custom commands can also be something like hooks. Hooks inside of cloud code
00:39:46tell cloud code to do something before a specific command or after a specific command. And these can
00:39:53be huge productivity boosts. My favorite hook is one that plays a noise every time it finishes a
00:40:00command. You probably haven't been able to hear it in this video, but anytime cloud code finishes
00:40:04a command, I get an audible sound. Now, why would you want that? Well, over time you'll realize,
00:40:10especially when you have multiple terminals up or it's running on a long task and you kind of just
00:40:15forget about it and you find yourself doom scrolling in between. It's great to have some
00:40:19sort of audible cue to say, Hey, I'm done. Let's get back to work. I would totally do that if I was
00:40:25you. And it's very simple to create these things. You just say, create a custom hook or create a hook
00:40:31that plays a noise plays a noise. I can't type when pod code finishes a task. That's simple. And you
00:40:39can have that hook be anything. Doesn't have to be a noise. It could send you an email for all you wanted
00:40:43every time it completes a task. Right? Cloud code is infinitely customizable and custom slash commands
00:40:48and custom hooks are a great way to leverage that. Now, the next concept we're going to talk about
00:40:53are all about sub agents and agent teams. So when you're working inside of cloud code at any time,
00:40:59it can autonomously on its own spawn sub agents to do tasks on its behalf. Let's imagine I was
00:41:07researching something about cloud code skills and I wanted to know, I wanted to go out to the web and
00:41:14find me information about cloud code skills. Well, it could spin up a sub agent. That's all it's doing
00:41:20is web search. So cloud code is essentially creating a second instance of cloud code. Just like you
00:41:26created a second terminal and it's telling that sub version of cloud code, Hey, go search the web for
00:41:32me. It could do that for any number of tasks it wants. And sometimes it will create multiple sub
00:41:38agents, do multiple things all at the same time. You as the human being don't really interact with
00:41:44these sub agents and they have a specific task. They complete the task and then they bring the
00:41:49information back to the main cloud code instance. Now you have the ability to create sub agents on
00:41:54your own, but for the most part, cloud code does this all automatically when it needs it. You just
00:41:58need to understand how it works theoretically because you're kind of wasting your time to
00:42:02create sub agents on your own. But this system can have some downsides. Let's say I told cloud code
00:42:06to create a more complicated webpage than the one we've been working on. And so it creates three sub
00:42:11agents on its own. It creates a sub agent for front end design. What we've been doing. It creates
00:42:16another sub agent for authentication, like a login page in it creates another sub agent for payments.
00:42:23Think like Stripe. The issue is these guys don't talk to one another. Front end design doesn't
00:42:28talk to authentication. Authentication doesn't talk to payments, which can be an issue because
00:42:32we're all trying to be on the same sheet of music. Yet with the standard sub agent, you know, paradigm,
00:42:39they're all in a silo. They do their own thing and they come back to the main cloud code session. And
00:42:44then this guy has to figure it out. If everything actually matches up well enter agent teams,
00:42:51agent teams is similar in that cloud code will spawn these sub agents. However, they now talk
00:42:58to one another. So front end design can talk to authentication. Authentication can talk with
00:43:06payments. Payments can talk with front end design and oftentimes it will actually spawn an additional
00:43:12sub agent whose entire job is to coordinate what these three guys are doing, right? Kind of acting
00:43:19like a middle manager for a team. It's trying to mimic a real human team setup, which means your
00:43:24primary cloud code doesn't have to coordinate everything on its own. Everything is done at the
00:43:29sub agent level. This is great. This is a more sophisticated setup than your normal sub agents.
00:43:35However, it's not for free because of that coordination to have all three of these guys
00:43:40talk to one another that costs more tokens. Furthermore, this is an experimental feature.
00:43:46What do I mean by experimental feature? I mean, you need to explicitly enable this
00:43:50inside of your settings.json. How do you do that? Well, you can go to dot cloud and edit yourself,
00:43:55or, and you know what I'm going to say, copy this page or copy the URL, go inside of cloud code and
00:44:01tell cloud code to enable agent teams on your behalf. Once you do that, to actually use agent
00:44:06teams, you need to explicitly tell cloud code. You want to use agent teams. In their example here,
00:44:12they said create an agent team. So it's not going to do it automatically. No matter how you say it,
00:44:17you have to say create an agent team. So let's see this in action. We're going to say create an
00:44:21agent team to work on this webpage, one agent for front end design, one agent to create a form
00:44:26submission for people who want to join our newsletter and one agent to research ideas for
00:44:30a blog machine. So again, you need to be explicit. You can see here the agent team it created. So it
00:44:35has a front end designer shows its task newsletter, dev task, blog, blog researcher task. And in this
00:44:43main cloud code session, you will get updates as the sub agents complete their tasks. And while
00:44:48they're working, let's talk about multiple sessions. Cause we talked about this for a second. And this
00:44:52is something you probably see all over the place, which is people with like nine terminals up at
00:44:57once, all working on the same project. This is something you could do. I can have pretty much as
00:45:02many terminal open. It has many terminals open as I want to work on cloud code. In a sense, I can
00:45:09mainly create my own agent teams. I could have one terminal here. That's working on front end design,
00:45:14one terminal here. That's working on the form, et cetera, et cetera. When it comes to these multiple
00:45:20sessions, there are some things you need to think about mainly kind of what we talked about with agent
00:45:24teams and sub agents at the beginning, which is like, are we having cloud code all work on the same
00:45:30piece of paper, changing different things at the same time. If you had three humans at a desk,
00:45:36all working on the same report and the report was on one notepad, you can see the issues you would
00:45:41run into. On top of that, I will say from personal experience, you can only have so many terminals
00:45:48working at the same time before you're just doing so much context switching that it feels like you're
00:45:54being productive. You're giving it a lot of prompts, but are you actually focused on any one particular
00:45:58task? Are you actually moving the needle? Are you actually moving forward in any meaningful way?
00:46:02I would argue after two terminals, maybe three, we're kind of just messing around at this point.
00:46:10If you see someone with nine terminals up, this is productivity theater. We're just pretending to do
00:46:15something. We're not really working at max capacity, but if you are going to go the multiple terminal
00:46:20route and you're going to work on a ton of things at once, you're going to want to deal with that
00:46:23problem that we talked about. Three people at desk working on one notepad, that's going to have issues.
00:46:27How can we deal with that? Well, one way we can deal with it is get work trees. So get work trees
00:46:34attempt to solve that problem. Without work trees, we have three people, three agents, three terminals
00:46:39working in the same project. They overwrite their work and we get a conflict. However, with work
00:46:44trees, instead of having three people at the same desk, everybody has their own desk and their own
00:46:50copy of the files. They do their work and eventually all the work gets consolidated. And guess who makes
00:46:57sure it all adds up when we put it together? Clod code does. Now to use work trees, you'll open clod
00:47:02code like normal, but you're going to use the work tree flag and then you're going to name that work
00:47:06tree. So something like front end design. So it'd be clod dash dash work tree, and then name the work
00:47:12tree. And then you would repeat that for all the additional terminals you open. And like you see here,
00:47:17this one is called main. This one is called front end. This one's called tests. You would work on
00:47:23those things in parallel. And then at the end, you would go back to your primary clod code session and
00:47:27say, take a look at these work trees. Let's merge these and make sure it's clean. A more advanced
00:47:33concept, especially for Git. So if you're just getting started, don't get confused and start
00:47:37using this right away. Now let's talk about another power user concept. And that is frameworks. Things
00:47:43like GSD, get shit done. Things like BMAT, to some extent, things like superpowers. It's this idea
00:47:49that there are GitHub repos out there that essentially act as an orchestration layer around
00:47:56clod code and change how clod code works at a somewhat fundamental level. It's still clod code.
00:48:01You're still in the terminal, but programs like this change how it plans certain things change the
00:48:07way it executes changes the way it records its progress. And the idea is that by using these
00:48:13orchestration layers, they help clod code do something. Most often it helps clod code handle complex
00:48:20tasks, complex projects. My take on this is that there's a lot of useful things in these
00:48:25orchestration layers, but you need to be somewhat experienced to understand when they make sense,
00:48:30because just like with CLIs and just like with MCPs, you can be a kid in the candy store and
00:48:35you think you need to use every single orchestration layer that is out there for the sake of it. As if
00:48:40you're just one orchestration layer away from really mastering clod code. I don't think that's
00:48:46the case, especially as time goes on. When GSD first came out, the way it handled things like
00:48:51context rot was pretty brilliant, especially compared to how clod code does it now.
00:48:55Yet a lot of the cool fundamental things of GSD and other frameworks like it have begun to be seen in
00:49:03the base level clod code. Like clod code out of the box does a lot of these things now. It's constantly
00:49:08being updated. It's constantly importing these best practices. That's not to say these frameworks
00:49:13don't work. It's to say, hold off on using them right off the bat. Less is usually more with clod
00:49:20code and just understand what you're actually using. Don't use these frameworks for the sake
00:49:26of them. Let's talk about the next concept, which is triggers and scheduled task, which can be kind
00:49:31of a confusing thing. Triggers, that can be a lot of different things. That's just when a certain
00:49:37thing happens, we do another thing, kind of like hooks and scheduled tasks are when we want clod
00:49:42code to do something on a schedule, even if we aren't there. When it comes to scheduled tasks,
00:49:47we have some options and this all kind of plays into triggers. And that's the idea of loop. So
00:49:53with the loop command, I can have clod code do something on an interval, whatever it is I want.
00:49:59Now there's a few caveats. First of all, it's session based. So I have to have this exact
00:50:03terminal open for this to work. Secondly, it has a timer. So max seven days as of posting this. And
00:50:10they originally came up with three days and now it's seven days. Point being you're somewhat limited
00:50:14because it has to have that terminal open. So if I shut my computer down, that loop ends.
00:50:18So something like a loop is great for, let's say you were constantly creating deployments
00:50:24and you were constantly updating your website and you wanted a loop that every 30 minutes
00:50:29checked deployment status. So almost like a mini skill in a sense, but it's hyper-focused.
00:50:37But what if you want to have clod code do something all the time, even if you aren't there?
00:50:41The answer is it kind of depends. So we talked earlier about the clod code desktop app. One
00:50:47of the things that clod code desktop app does pretty well is scheduled tasks. So if I go over
00:50:52here and hit scheduled, I can create a new scheduled task, which will run every single
00:50:58time, even if I'm not there. So I can do a remote task that will work in the cloud. So let's say,
00:51:04Hey, every morning at 7 AM, I want you to check my GitHub and do X, Y, or Z. It will do that.
00:51:09It can even do a local task. So I could have a local task for clod code searches. The web
00:51:14goes on YouTube uses the notebook LM tool and finds me the top 10 trending YouTube videos in a niche.
00:51:21It can do that as well. One of the caveats of doing that with the local task is that again,
00:51:27it's not session based. So the desktop app will create a new clod code session each time,
00:51:32kind of like creating a new terminal, but my computer needs to be on clod code needs
00:51:37to be open in some capacity. So understand that it's not exactly a scheduled task no matter what,
00:51:43but clod code does have the ability to create scheduled tasks on windows. So I have one that runs
00:51:48a GitHub API and pulls the trending get hubs for that day. Every single morning that has nothing
00:51:54to do with clod code windows, my computer, my machine itself does that, but clod code
00:51:59wrote the script. Now we just have a few concepts left. And one of them I want to talk about be
00:52:04alluded to at the beginning is ultra plan. What is ultra plan? Well, ultra plan is kind of like
00:52:11plan mode, but it's like a super plan mode and it works in the cloud. So if I do forward slash
00:52:16ultra plan and say, come up with a monetization plan for our app, it's going to say, Hey,
00:52:21do you want to run ultra plan? I'm gonna say yes. And then it's going to start a clod code session
00:52:26in the cloud. So it gives me a link and you can see clod code, just sort of like the chat app
00:52:31working here. Now there's a few differences with ultra plan. One it's not totally confirmed,
00:52:37but based on how it works, the assumption is there are multiple agents under the hood on this,
00:52:44working on this particular plan. So it's a little more powerful than your standard clod code plan.
00:52:48The second thing you'll see is that once it gives it back to us, it's a little easier to change it
00:52:54and give it sort of your input. So here's what it came back with an ultra plan. One of the differences
00:52:59is that I can just copy anything and I can leave a comment on that plan. I can even give it in emoji
00:53:06response because that's the best way to code, but overall it gives you a, just a nicer interface for
00:53:12it. That's the big difference. It's the fact that there's probably more powerful agents under the
00:53:16hood again, not confirmed. It gives you a different, more easy to use interface. And it's easier as
00:53:22well to give feedback on specific parts. If you approve the plan, you just click down here,
00:53:27approve the plan, and it reports it back in the terminal. And then you get the option to implement
00:53:31it within the session, start a new session, start a new session, just clears the conversation,
00:53:36but retains the plan. So we get a brand new context window or cancel. This just came out this week. So
00:53:42expect a lot of changes with the ultra plan. Now we've got two more concepts to cover in the second
00:53:46to last one is remote control. How you can use cloud code from your phone. The easiest ways with
00:53:52remote control. There's a few other ways, namely channels, but I will tell you for most people,
00:53:57remote control makes the most sense. You just use it from your cloud mobile app,
00:54:01but you need a session open. So the idea is I already have a particular session open.
00:54:05I'm already working on something inside of cloud code. And then I hop on my phone and I use cloud
00:54:11code remote with remote control. It's almost like I'm streaming my terminal. So it's pretty much,
00:54:18I see the exact same thing just on my phone. So it's useful in that sense. And if for whatever
00:54:24reason, your computer shuts down or it goes to sleep. If it comes back up, the session will
00:54:28reconnect on your phone as well. And the last thing I want to talk about is finding new tools
00:54:34for cloud code. I alluded to this a little bit when we talked about CLIs and MCPs and looking for them
00:54:39on GitHub via cloud code, but you can do this yourself. If you go to the trending session of
00:54:44GitHub, this is a great place to find up and coming tools for cloud code. Better yet you can have cloud
00:54:51code do this for you every single morning. Like I said before, cloud code gives me this and it breaks
00:54:55it down by section. So I see AI related GitHub repos. So you can see right here, this is the
00:55:01trending for today. Wednesday, I can see the top 10 repos that came out in the last week. I can see
00:55:07their stars. I can see their topics, descriptions. I can click inside of them. And this allows me to
00:55:13have a pretty good pulse on what's going on in the cloud code world. And if you're someone who's
00:55:19serious about this and always wants to be kind of on the bleeding edge of what's happening and what's
00:55:23trending, this is the best way to do it. Now, not every one of these is going to blow your mind away,
00:55:28but sometimes you'll see something very interesting and early, and you can also
00:55:32filter it by month. It doesn't have to be by day. So you can see all stuff, all sorts of great stuff
00:55:38here because it is pretty crazy. The stuff that's coming out every day, like it is every day, every
00:55:42single day, there's something new coming out. And instead of waiting for someone to sort of hand it
00:55:46to you and tell you, Hey, here's something you should try out. Why not just go to the source?
00:55:50And it's also really interesting to see what is trending because just by diving into these and you
00:55:56can point cloud code at it and say, Hey, clone this repo. Tell me what's going on. You're going to learn
00:56:00a lot too, because there's a reason these repos are blowing up. So that is where I'm going to leave you
00:56:05guys for today. I hope this video gave you some sort of framework, especially if you're just getting
00:56:11started, especially if you come from a non-technical background for where you need to start. When it
00:56:15comes to cloud code, this is an amazing tool yet. It is very intimidating. If you don't come from
00:56:21that sort of background, but I promise you, you can get through it. You just need to know where you're
00:56:26going. So as always, let me know what you thought. Make sure to check out chase AI+ if you want to
00:56:30get your hands on that masterclass. And other than that, I'll see you around.

Key Takeaway

Mastering Claude Code requires transitioning from simple chat interactions to an agentic workflow using context management, custom skills, and CLI-based tool integration to automate complex development tasks.

Highlights

Claude Code functions as an agentic 'body' for the Claude brain, capable of executing terminal commands and modifying local files directly.

Effective context management requires resetting the 1,000,000-token window via the /clear command once usage reaches 20% to prevent context rot and performance degradation.

The /dangerously-skip-permissions flag enables Claude Code to edit, delete, and install files without requiring manual approval for every action.

Skills are reusable text prompts that automate complex workflows, such as the front-end design skill which applies specific aesthetic guidelines to UI code.

Agent Teams and sub-agents allow Claude Code to spawn multiple specialized instances that coordinate on complex tasks like simultaneous front-end and back-end development.

Few-shot prompting for front-end design involves providing Claude with both screenshots and existing site HTML to achieve higher aesthetic accuracy.

Git worktrees allow multiple Claude Code terminals to work on the same project in parallel without causing file conflicts by giving each agent its own isolated workspace.

Timeline

Claude Code Foundations and Installation

  • Claude Code differs from the web app by having the ability to interact with computer files and execute terminal commands.
  • Installation requires pasting a single line of code into the terminal or PowerShell depending on the operating system.
  • The system uses the same underlying models as the web interface but acts as an autonomous agent.

The web app is a static chat interface, while Claude Code serves as a functional extension that can access emails and write code locally. Users initiate the setup by visiting the official documentation and running the provided installation script. Once configured, typing 'claude' launches the agentic environment directly within the command line.

Integrated Development Environments and Project Setup

  • Visual Studio Code provides a friendly interface for managing files while running the Claude Code terminal.
  • Projects function best when organized into dedicated folders that serve as the agent's working directory.
  • Terminal-based workflows are more powerful than the desktop or cowork apps due to fewer constraints.

While beginners may prefer the desktop application, the terminal offers the most control over the agent. Using Visual Studio Code (VS Code) allows non-coders to see a visual file explorer alongside the command prompt. Setting up a new project involves opening a specific folder in the IDE and launching a new terminal window to start the Claude session.

Permission Levels and Planning Mode

  • Default permission settings require manual approval for every file edit and bash command.
  • Plan mode forces the agent to outline its intended steps and ask clarifying questions before writing code.
  • Bypass mode increases speed by allowing the agent to edit and delete files autonomously.

Permissions act as security boundaries for the computer. Plan mode is a specific state that prevents the agent from making errors by requiring a back-and-forth dialogue to fill 'holes' in a prompt. High-level users often utilize the bypass flag to avoid repetitive approval prompts, although this requires trust in the agent's output.

Context Management and Performance Optimization

  • The context window is a budget of 1,000,000 tokens where every word and tool call incurs a cost.
  • Context rot occurs as the window fills, leading to lower effectiveness and higher prompt costs.
  • Regularly using the /clear command maintains high performance without losing project progress because the agent can re-read local files.

Tokens serve as the currency for large language models, and filling the context window makes the session more expensive and less accurate. Unlike web chats, clearing a Claude Code session is low-risk because the 'claude.md' file and existing code provide a permanent reference for the agent. Maintaining a custom status line helps monitor token usage in real-time to decide when to reset.

The Toolkit: Skills, MCPs, and CLIs

  • Skills are text-based prompt templates that can be installed at the user or project level.
  • Command Line Interface (CLI) tools are generally 90% more token-efficient than Model Context Protocol (MCP) servers.
  • Claude Code can autonomously search for, download, and configure external tools like Playwright or Supabase.

Skills like the 'front-end design skill' provide guardrails that prevent 'AI slop' by enforcing specific design patterns. While MCPs were previously popular for connecting to apps like Notion, CLI tools are now preferred for their speed and lower overhead. The agent acts as an expert installer, walking users through the acquisition of secret keys and credentials for these external integrations.

Advanced Prompting and Code Review

  • Few-shot prompting uses existing HTML and screenshots to guide the agent toward specific visual styles.
  • Adversarial code review involves using a second agent or a different model to find flaws in the primary agent's work.
  • The Codex plugin provides a secondary set of eyes to verify complex project logic.

Relying on a single prompt often leads to generic results, so providing concrete examples of desired code significantly improves output. Because AI models tend to view their own work favorably, running a second Claude session in a separate terminal with an 'adversarial' persona helps identify hidden bugs. This is especially useful for non-technical users who cannot manually verify the underlying logic.

Power User Features: Agents, Hooks, and Automation

  • Custom hooks can automate tasks like playing an audible sound when a command finishes.
  • Agent teams allow specialized sub-agents to communicate and coordinate on multi-part projects.
  • Scheduled tasks and loops enable the agent to perform background work, such as checking GitHub trends every morning.

Custom slash commands can transform simple prompts into complex automated pipelines. Agent teams solve the problem of siloed sub-agents by introducing a 'middle manager' agent to coordinate between specialized roles like design and payment integration. Furthermore, the loop command and desktop app scheduling allow for persistent monitoring and data retrieval even when the user is not actively prompting.

Remote Access and Future Tooling

  • Remote control allows users to monitor and interact with their terminal session via the Claude mobile app.
  • The /ultra-plan command utilizes a cloud-based interface with potentially more powerful underlying agents.
  • The trending section of GitHub serves as the primary source for discovering new Claude-compatible tools.

Ultra plan is a newly released experimental feature that provides a collaborative web interface for refining project roadmaps. For mobile productivity, remote control effectively streams the desktop terminal to a smartphone. Users are encouraged to use Claude Code to clone and analyze trending repositories to stay on the 'bleeding edge' of AI development.

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