Claude Code Official Tips Collection: Practical Techniques to Boost Productivity

Claude Code takes a different approach from traditional code completion tools as an “agent-based” AI assistant.

For example, while typical completion tools only “complete the current line you’re typing,” Claude Code can understand entire files and handle modification and verification in a single flow, like a skilled engineer on your team. When using it for the first time, you might feel “I don’t know where to start.”

This article introduces practical know-how to maximize Claude Code’s potential, based on the content of official talks by Anthropic’s development team.

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Table of Contents

• What is Claude Code?
• The First 3 Steps
• Start with “Codebase Q&A”
• Workflow for Safe Code Editing
• Systematizing “Smart” Team-wide Usage
• Designing claude.md (Shared Memory)
• Managing Allow/Deny with Enterprise Policy
• Useful Keyboard Shortcuts
• Creating “AI Unix Pipelines” with CLI-SDK
• Parallel Usage Techniques (Advanced)
• Summary

What is Claude Code?

Claude Code is a tool-driven agent that automatically combines multiple tools (file editing, search, shell execution, etc.) to process work.

For example, traditional tools often only “predict the next line,” but Claude Code goes much further, handling the design, implementation, and testing of entire features as a series of processes. It can also proceed with “just giving instructions” for bug fixes and adding complex functions.

Claude Code also has the following characteristics:

• IDE Independent

Available in VS Code, JetBrains, Vim, and even remote environments (SSH or tmux).

• Local Execution

Code is not uploaded externally and runs only in your local environment.

• Multimodal Support

Can read and process not only code but also images, PDFs, notebooks, etc. You can drag and drop images, paste file paths, or paste content directly.

Claude Code automatically reads a configuration file called claude.md immediately after startup. This enables immediate sharing of project-specific knowledge and rules, greatly improving work efficiency.

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The First 3 Steps

When starting to use Claude Code, here are three key points to cover first. The process isn’t difficult, but going through these steps will make subsequent usage smooth.

① Set up your environment

Claude Code runs in the terminal. First, executing terminal-setup enables convenient operations like using Shift+Enter for line breaks. You can also set your preferred display theme with theme light or theme dark.

② Enable GitHub integration

Executing /install-github-app allows you to mention Claude in GitHub pull requests and issues. Since you can also ask Claude for reviews and change suggestions, this is essential setup for team development.

③Utilize voice input

(For Mac) You can enable the voice prompt input function through macOS “Accessibility > Voice Input.” Speaking naturally like “organize this function” without using the keyboard enables more natural dialogue (launch with double Ctrl).

Start with “Codebase Q&A”

When using Claude Code for the first time, the most recommended approach is “asking questions about the code.”

For example,

// Example 1: Investigating class usage
"Where is PaymentScheduler instantiated?"

// Example 2: Tracking historical context
"Tell me from the Git log why this function has 15 arguments"

Claude Code will execute Git commands itself and summarize the context from the history. It’s like asking an experienced colleague, deepening your understanding of the project.

Workflow for Safe Code Editing

Before having Claude Code write code, some basic techniques can greatly improve accuracy and reproducibility. Here we introduce these steps in order.

1. Have it create a plan

"First propose an implementation approach in 3 lines → write code after approval"

2. Combine tools

edit_file + bash + search automatically orchestrated Example: Just type commit push to complete everything from branch creation to PR creation

3. Provide self-evaluation loops

Teach commands that can verify results like unit tests/Puppeteer screenshots Success or failure detection while retrying 2-3 times → greatly improved accuracy

By incorporating these steps, the quality and efficiency of work delegated to Claude Code improves dramatically. This step-by-step approach is particularly effective for changes spanning multiple files or UI requiring visual verification.

Systematizing “Smart” Team-wide Usage

What’s important when utilizing Claude Code as a team is not just “individual use,” but “having common knowledge and settings across the entire project or organization.”

The reason is simple: Claude Code’s strength lies in “smart behavior according to context.” By sharing and structuring the information that constitutes this context across the team, you can elicit more accurate and consistent responses even with a single prompt.

This chapter takes a detailed look at how to utilize claude.md and Enterprise Policy, which are core to Claude Code’s shared configuration.

Designing claude.md (Shared Memory)

Tips

• Keeping it within 100-150 lines reduces context load

• Separate personal items into .local.claude.md (no internal review needed)

Managing Allow/Deny with Enterprise Policy

For team members to use Claude Code safely and consistently, it’s essential to clearly define “which operations to allow and which to block.” This is realized through Enterprise Policy settings.

Applying Enterprise Policy provides the following specific benefits:

• Safe Bash commands are automatically allowed, dangerous URLs are completely blocked

• Even new hires can use the same tool set from day one

By following predefined rules, you can reduce the burden of manual confirmation and approval while maintaining a balance between safety and development efficiency. In particular, simplifying environment setup during onboarding so everyone can start working on a common foundation is a significant benefit.

Useful Keyboard Shortcuts

Since Claude Code operates in the terminal, learning shortcut keys is effective for improving operational efficiency. Here are some commonly used key operations.

By utilizing these shortcuts, you can significantly reduce the effort of repeated interactions and edit confirmations, using Claude Code more smoothly.

Creating “AI Unix Pipelines” with CLI-SDK

Claude Code includes an SDK (Software Development Kit) that can be called directly from the command line and can be integrated directly into scripts and CI tools. This allows you to leverage AI functionality as Unix-like pipe processing, naturally incorporating it into daily work.

For example, you can summarize Git changes and automatically generate pull request descriptions. Here’s one example:

git diff -U0 | claude -p "Summarize the following in 2 paragraphs" --format json | jq .result

This approach saves manual writing and confirmation effort while maintaining consistent review quality.

Introducing CLI SDK offers various benefits, including building reproducible workflows, reducing errors and inconsistencies, and improving response speed. It’s particularly compatible with monitoring and CI/CD tasks, showing significant automation effects.

Furthermore, Claude’s output supports streaming JSON format, making real-time integration with dashboards and alert systems easy. This enables AI to be utilized not just as a personal tool, but as a “common foundation” supporting team-wide productivity and safety.

Parallel Usage Techniques (Advanced)

While Claude Code can be fully utilized in a single session, “parallel usage” is very effective when you want to advance multiple tasks in parallel. Here we introduce advanced usage methods, showing how to divide sessions according to purpose.

Especially during large-scale development or maintenance phases, running multiple Claude instances allows role division like “investigation,” “design,” and “fixes,” balancing both work speed and accuracy. It’s worth considering within your team as well.

Summary

Claude Code is “the ultimate multi-tool an engineer can have.” Start by understanding the repository “conversationally” through Q&A, then

• Thoroughly follow the plan → edit → verify pattern

• Share claude.md and tool settings across the team

Just covering these two points has resulted in cases where onboarding periods shortened from “weeks → days”, which is not uncommon. Please experience the effects of “agent-based development” in your own projects.

Reference

This article was written based on the full transcript of an official talk (YouTube) by Anthropic technical staff member Boris.