A drop-in operating rule that forces any agentic coding assistant — Claude Code, OpenAI Codex / ChatGPT, Cursor, Cline, Roo Code, Windsurf, GitHub Copilot, Augment Code, Aider, and any other system-prompt-driven agent — to deliver exactly what was asked, nothing more, at the lowest defensible token and diff cost.
The rule itself lives in one file: .agents/budget-rule-SKILL.md.
Everything else in this repo is auxiliary.
- Minimum viable change set — smallest coherent diff that satisfies the request.
- Scope lock — no "while I'm in there" refactors, renames, or reformatting.
- Output economy — terse, action-oriented responses by default; no preambles, recaps, or unsolicited summaries.
- No unsolicited files — especially no new
README*,*.md, changelogs, or "summary" files unless explicitly requested. - Decision escalation — when ambiguous, destructive, or out-of-scope, the agent stops and asks a single focused question with 2–4 options instead of guessing silently.
- Opt-in verbose mode — full explanation only when you ask for it
(
"be verbose","walk me through","explain the tradeoffs").
Read the full rule: .agents/budget-rule-SKILL.md.
The rule is plain prompt text. Install it by placing the contents of
.agents/budget-rule-SKILL.md wherever your AI tool reads project or system
instructions from. Pick the section for your tool:
Append the rule to your project's CLAUDE.md (or ~/.claude/CLAUDE.md for
global use across all projects):
cat .agents/budget-rule-SKILL.md >> CLAUDE.mdClaude Code loads CLAUDE.md automatically on every session.
Place the rule in AGENTS.md at the repo root, or in ~/.codex/AGENTS.md
for global use:
cp .agents/budget-rule-SKILL.md AGENTS.mdOpen your Custom GPT (or Project, or account-level Custom Instructions),
paste the entire contents of .agents/budget-rule-SKILL.md into the
System / Instructions field, and save.
Save the rule as .cursorrules at the project root, or as
.cursor/rules/budget-rule.mdc for the newer rules format:
cp .agents/budget-rule-SKILL.md .cursorrulesEither:
- Save the rule as
.clinerules(Cline) or.roo/rules/budget-rule.md(Roo) at the project root, or - Paste the rule into the extension's Custom Instructions setting (Settings → Cline/Roo → Custom Instructions).
Save the rule at .github/copilot-instructions.md:
mkdir -p .github && cp .agents/budget-rule-SKILL.md .github/copilot-instructions.mdCopilot Chat reads this file automatically for repo-aware conversations.
Save as .windsurfrules at the project root, or as
.windsurf/rules/budget-rule.md for the newer rules format.
Save into .augment/rules/budget-rule.md — Augment auto-loads any
.md file under .augment/rules/.
Append the rule to .aider.conf.yml under read: as a referenced file,
or pass it on the command line:
aider --read .agents/budget-rule-SKILL.mdPrepend the contents of .agents/budget-rule-SKILL.md to your system prompt.
The rule is written as a tool-agnostic behavioral contract — it does not
depend on any specific runtime, model, or tool harness.
Once installed, the rule is active by default: quiet, surgical, scope-locked.
The rule's verbose mode is opt-in per turn. Trigger it explicitly:
"Be verbose — explain the design tradeoffs." "Walk me through this implementation." "Comprehensive review, please."
The agent reverts to quiet mode on the next turn automatically.
A correctly-loaded agent will:
- Stop and ask before adding new files, dependencies, or refactors.
- Respond with one-line confirmations instead of multi-paragraph status reports.
- Flag — not silently fix — out-of-scope issues it notices.
If your agent still produces unsolicited refactors, summary files, or multi-paragraph recaps, the rule is not being read — re-check the install step for your tool.
.agents/budget-rule-SKILL.md The SKILL (the star of this repo)