Everything in this guide works on any repo, adopted one habit at a time. This step is the shortcut: one paste that sets a project up with the baseline, confirming each change before it’s made.
What it sets up (each explained in its own step):
- A clean repo with a stack-appropriate
.gitignore - Checkpoint commits as standing behavior (step 1)
- Branch discipline for non-trivial work (step 2)
- Diff-not-summary review as the merge gate (step 4)
The paste
Set up this project's git baseline. Work one step at a time, show me
every file and command before running it, and wait for my ok.
1. If this isn't a git repo yet: git init with branch "main", write a
.gitignore appropriate to the stack you detect, and make an initial
commit of the current state so there's a checkpoint before any
agent edits.
2. Add (or extend) CLAUDE.md with a "## Git agreements" section:
- Checkpoint commits: after each change that builds and passes
tests, propose a commit (small, single-purpose, message says why).
- Branch per task: non-trivial work happens on a branch named
claude/<task-slug>; main stays deployable.
- Review the diff: when work is done, present the full diff plus
what was verified and what wasn't; never merge or push without
explicit approval.
- Recovery rules: prefer revert over fix-forward on main; never
force-push; never rewrite shared history; deletions of branches
or files get asked about first.
3. Tell me which of these you can enforce mechanically in this harness
(hooks, settings) and offer to wire the one with the best
effort-to-value ratio.If you’d rather go manual
Read step 1 and step 4. Checkpoints and diff review are the two habits carrying most of the value.