A Claude Code rule that turns three letters into a whole request

Today's file is a rule for Claude Code. Some requests need the same tail every time: "don't change anything, just answer", "show me a plan first and wait", "look up how others do it". With this rule each of those tails is three letters at the end of the request.

How it works

The rule lists four short commands. rbp: Claude looks up on the internet how the best do it and relies on what it found. awm: it writes a plan first and waits for your approval, changing nothing. nch: it changes nothing. jao: it does nothing and just answers. An abbreviation counts only as a separate word: with a space on both sides, at the start or end of the message, or on a line of its own. Inside a word, like the nch in "launch", it is not read.

In our test in four languages, already with the one line we added (more on it below), "Create the file menu.txt with the menu of my coffee shop jao" left no file 12 times out of 12: Claude answered in words, often with a draft menu right in the chat. The same request with awm got a plan and no file 8 times out of 8. Without the rule Claude created the file. nch on a request to add a check to a backup script left the script untouched and showed the change Claude would make. rbp sent Claude to web search, and the same question without it was answered from memory. A plain question, "what is 17*23", and a fix in a file whose code has nch = number of channels in a comment worked as usual.

What to change

We changed one line. The file said an abbreviation counts only "when there is a space on either side of it", and the note's own checks put it at the very end of the request, where nothing follows it. In Portuguese Claude took that literally in one run of two: it created menu.txt and explained that jao had no space after it. We added "it starts or ends the message", and after that every check passed in all four languages, also with a full stop after the abbreviation and with the abbreviation at the start. The abbreviations can be swapped for your own, and the note below shows how to add a new one (stp, "shorter and to the point"). Pick letters that are not a word you already type: in Serbian jao is also an everyday interjection, like "ouch", and "jao ne radi mi backup.sh..." without a comma was taken as the command, so Claude did not even open the script. With a comma, "Jao, ...", it was not.

Install

The rule goes at the end of ~/.claude/CLAUDE.md, the file with your instructions for all projects; the note below has the exact request. That folder holds Claude's own settings, so Claude asks before it edits the file: answer Yes. Then close Claude Code and open it again, because the file is read at startup. The check from the note below: ask to create menu.txt with jao at the end and get an answer in words with no file, then the same with awm and get a plan that waits for your approval.