strategic-compact

Session continuity is preserved by creating a context compaction artifact at logical phase boundaries. This structured format captures current state, key decisions, blockers, and prioritized next steps, enabling deterministic session resumption instead of relying on arbitrary token-limit trimming.

Manual context compaction should be applied during phase completion, when approaching context limits, during session handoffs, or at major architectural and domain transitions. These phase boundaries provide logical transition points to capture current state and key decisions.

The best way to document project handoff state is creating a Context Compaction artifact titled "Context Compaction: <Project Name>" that summarizes the completed phase, current state, key files, endpoints, tests, key decisions, known issues, and prioritized next steps.

Manual context compaction works for data pipelines and infrastructure projects by providing project-type guidance. Phase boundary templates are available for web apps, data pipelines, and infrastructure/DevOps work, reducing ambiguity about when to compact context.

Token-limit trimming causes rework because it arbitrarily cuts context without preserving semantic continuity. Manual compaction at phase boundaries prevents lost continuity by capturing key decisions and prioritized next steps in a structured format for deterministic session resumption.

Structure a context compaction artifact by summarizing the completed phase, recording current state including key files and tests, documenting key decisions, listing known issues, and defining prioritized next steps so a later session can resume immediately.