Keep Memory Reusable
Save patterns and preferences that survive across sessions; never save snapshots of finished work.
Memory should hold patterns and preferences that pay off in future sessions: how the user likes feedback framed, what style of code review they want, recurring constraints. It should not hold snapshots of finished work — the bug you fixed last Tuesday, the PR title you used last month. Stale snapshots actively mislead future sessions when the project moves on. Ask: 'Will this entry help me a month from now?' If not, don't save it.
Where you'll practice this
One Promptles scenario teaches this principle directly.
Memory Hygiene
You just finished a two-week feature flag rollout — the `new_dashboard` flag is now at 100% and the cleanup PR is merged. In the post-mortem, your teammate suggested you 'tell Claude to remember everything we learned' so it can help next time. You're tempted to dump a…
Other principles in Context
Declare the Tools You Need
Name the tool or MCP server by name, and say what to do if it isn't reachable.
Describe Before You Prescribe
Describe the Data Shape
Claude can't clean data it can't picture.
Explain the Integration Point
Map to Real Components
Use Code Connect so it reuses your components, not new markup.
Name the Framework