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Recipes

Abhisek Jha edited this page Apr 17, 2026 · 1 revision

Recipes

Common workflows with Pith — not command references, but narratives showing how the pieces fit.


Debugging a bug you can't find

You have a bug. You don't know which file it's in yet.

/pith ultra

Switch to ultra first — debugging sessions get long fast, and you want output tight from the start.

Now navigate with symbols instead of full file reads:

/pith symbol --list src/auth/         (if it's a directory, use the specific file)
/pith symbol src/auth/middleware.ts validateToken

This gives you the exact function body — 30 lines instead of 400. If Claude needs to see a caller:

/pith symbol src/routes/api.ts authMiddleware

When you find the bug and fix it:

/pith debug

This forces Claude's diagnosis into Problem / Cause / Fix / Verify format — tight, no prose padding.

After fixing:

/pith commit

Gets you a Conventional Commits message based on what changed.


Starting a new project

First session in a new directory, Pith runs onboarding automatically. Answer three questions and you get:

wiki/
  index.md
  overview.md
  log.md

Then as you build, after any significant decision, Pith offers:

Worth saving this as a decision record? [y/n]

Say yes. Takes 2 seconds. Three months later when you're wondering "why did we use Redis instead of Postgres for sessions," the answer is in wiki/decisions/.


Picking up an existing codebase

New project you didn't write, or returning after a long break.

/pith wiki

Activates wiki mode. If there's an existing wiki, it's loaded into context at the start of each prompt.

If there's no wiki yet:

/pith setup

Runs the brownfield bootstrap: reads main files (compressed automatically), writes initial entity and concept pages. Takes one session.

Then:

/pith wiki "how does authentication work?"
/pith wiki "what database are we using and why?"

These search the wiki first, then the codebase if needed.


Ingesting a spec or research paper

You have an external document — a design spec, a paper, a competitor's docs — that's relevant to current work.

/pith ingest raw/sources/auth-spec.pdf
# or fetch directly:
/pith ingest --url https://company.notion.site/auth-design-v2

Pith extracts entities, key claims, and contradictions with existing wiki pages. Shows you what it found before writing anything. Confirm → pages created.

After ingesting several sources:

/pith compile

Re-reads all sources together, identifies cross-cutting themes, creates synthesis pages with multi-source citations. Use --dry-run first to see the plan.


Long session management

You're 50+ turns into a session and the context is getting full.

Check status:

/pith status

If fill is >60%, Pith's hindsight analysis runs automatically. It shows stale reads (files read multiple times — only the latest matters) and large early outputs now irrelevant.

/compact

Summarizes history. Session continues. Wiki and mode settings preserved.

If you're hitting quality degradation before context fills:

/pith budget 150

Hard ceiling per response — forces Claude to be concise.


Code review session

You want tight, structured feedback on a PR.

/pith review

Every response is one line per issue: L42: BUG token expiry wrong unit. No prose, no summaries. Just the list.

For architecture questions:

/pith arch

Outputs an options table + chosen approach + risks. Good for async decisions you want to document.

After the review, save the significant decisions:

/pith wiki

Offer will appear after any decision-level discussion.


Checking wiki health

After several ingests or a long project:

/pith lint --quick   → structural checks only (fast, no LLM)
/pith lint           → full semantic check: contradictions, gaps, missing pages, imputable facts
/pith lint --fix     → same + auto-create stubs for missing entity pages

Lint report is a numbered list with recommended action per issue. Contradictions show which pages conflict and what they say. Gaps show topics referenced in multiple pages but lacking their own page.

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