Forge Studio
Agent = Model + Harness. The harness is everything except the model: behavioral steering, context management, memory, evaluation, orchestration, and multi-agent decomposition. Research shows changing only the harness can produce a 6x performance gap.
Forge Studio implements harness principles as composable Claude Code plugins.
8 plugins. 33 skills. 17 hooks. 4 agents.
Install
# Add the marketplace
/plugin marketplace add ArtMin96/forge-studio
# Install by layer — pick what you need
# Behavioral Steering (recommended: start here)
/plugin install behavioral-core@forge-studio
# Context Management
/plugin install context-engine@forge-studio
# Memory Architecture
/plugin install memory@forge-studio
# Evaluation & Quality Gates
/plugin install evaluator@forge-studio
# Orchestration
/plugin install workflow@forge-studio
# Multi-Agent Decomposition
/plugin install agents@forge-studio
# Reference & Tips
/plugin install reference@forge-studio
# Execution Trace Collection
/plugin install traces@forge-studio
After installing, start a new session for plugins to load.
Recommended CLAUDE.md
A lean CLAUDE.md template is included at templates/CLAUDE.md. Designed to work with forge-studio plugins — covers personality, judgment, context management, self-evaluation, and project config without repeating what hooks enforce.
cp templates/CLAUDE.md ./CLAUDE.md
# Edit the Project Config and Conventions sections for your project
Recommended settings.json
A power-user settings.json template is included at templates/settings.json. Enables extended thinking, maximum effort, LSP tools, and bypass permissions with a deny list for destructive commands.
# Copy to your global Claude Code config
cp templates/settings.json ~/.claude/settings.json
Key choices:
- Bypass permissions + deny list — allows everything except destructive commands. Two safety layers: the deny list here and behavioral-core hooks.
- No co-authored-by — removes the "Co-Authored-By: Claude" trailer from commits
- Always thinking + high effort — maximizes reasoning quality at the cost of more tokens
- LSP + tool search — enables IDE-level code navigation and on-demand tool loading
- Auto-compact at 75% — compacts context earlier than the default 95%, preventing quality decay
- 90-day transcript retention — extends the default 30-day cleanup period
See Settings Best Practices for detailed documentation.
Architecture
┌─────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│ User / IDE │
├─────────────────────────────────────────────┤
│ Harness (Forge Studio) │
│ │
│ behavioral-core ──── Steering & discipline │
│ context-engine ───── Context window mgmt │
│ memory ───────────── Cross-session recall │
│ evaluator ────────── Quality gates & review│
│ workflow ─────────── Orchestration patterns│
│ agents ───────────── Multi-agent triad │
│ reference ────────── Power-user tips │
│ │
├─────────────────────────────────────────────┤
│ Claude Model │
└─────────────────────────────────────────────┘
See docs/architecture.md for the full design rationale.
Plugin Reference
behavioral-core — Behavioral Steering
Re-injects behavioral rules on every message to prevent drift in long sessions. Rules live in rules.d/ as individual files, priority-ordered by numeric prefix (10-no-sycophancy, 20-no-filler, etc.). Add, remove, or reorder rules by managing files. Hooks enforce ~100% compliance where system prompt instructions degrade to ~80%.
| Skill | Purpose |
|---|
/rules-audit | Audit session for sycophancy, apologies, scope creep, filler |
/scope <task> | Define task boundaries and acceptance criteria |
/timebox [N] | Set a message budget (default 15) for the current task |
context-engine — Context Management
Progressive 5-stage context pressure tracking replaces fixed message-count thresholds. Warns at ~50% (re-read files), ~65% (consider compact), ~75% (recommend compact), ~85% (recommend handoff), ~92% (critical — handoff now). Automatically uses actual context percentage when Claude Code exposes it.
| Skill | Purpose |
|---|
/handoff [topic] | Generate a session transfer document |
/resume | Pick up from the latest handoff |
/checkpoint | Mid-session drift and scope creep check |
/audit-context | Analyze token overhead from CLAUDE.md, plugins, MCP servers |
/lean-claude-md [path] | Trim CLAUDE.md to only lines that change behavior |
/context-tricks | Guided compaction, /btw, checkpoints, @ references |
memory — Memory Architecture
ArtMin96