That's like saying there's no point in attending a lecture on "how to get the best out of your time at University" because University courses are taught in spoken language so you could just ask the professors.

Claude Code is a tool that uses natural language ai systems. It itself is not a natural language ai system.

sounds like you might benefit from a tutorial!

"Part of the initial excitement in programming is easy to explain: just the fact that when you tell the computer to do something, it will do it. Unerringly. Forever. Without a complaint.

And that’s interesting in itself.

But blind obedience on its own, while initially fascinating, obviously does not make for a very likeable companion. What makes programming so engaging is that, while you can make the computer do what you want, you have to figure out how."[0]

- [0] https://www.brynmawr.edu/inside/academic-information/departm...

Yes, but you gotta learn what is possible.

I wouldn't have the thought to say to the machine to compact its context if I didn't know it has context and it can be compacted, right?

honestly, the biggest reason i deep dove on proper .claude stuff, was because im a cheap ass. I saw someone mention their agents/ that delegates to cheaper models, and figure that was a way I could reign in my own overall usage, and its been true so far. Im sure im one of the very few heavy claude code users that still stubbornly sits on the pro version. It won't be forever, if i land an important contract or job, I'll pretty quickly hop to max or whatever, but for my own usage right now, im getting by.

Sure, maybe this stuff isn't crazy relevant 2 years from now, but right now? Giving your agent a clean way to navigate and delegate tasks to keep that context window clean? its 100% vital.

edit: hop to max*