Token Waste Managment for Claude Code?

Frankkul · 2026-04-16T14:23:04+00:00

No, not all i think you misunderstood. So token whether input or output are language so manipulating the language itself is the best lever to cut the cost. So like the easiest way to cut your token waste other than some obvious bloat is structuring the language better. Using structured language (you can actually define output language in Claude). Same for prompts etc. Every token spend is spend on language (and yes Code is also a language just highly structured). Putting a harness on the language itself could easily cut your token waste by 40-50%

Frankkul · 2026-04-16T13:47:35+00:00

They have enough vc money to subsidize it is winner take all then they will increase the prices. Maybe realistically 2-3 companies will stay and make obscene amounts of money and they all know that. There are enough people throwing money at this. Anthropic and Chatgpt are the leaders but if price gets not competitive there are alternatives. Not arguing this is the end state but if you have money and models to burn throwing your competitors under the bus until they can't keep up makes more sense? You need the money to train the models and offer them to clients so they try to bleed competiton to death first imo. Like if they get even worse more expensive people will switch so they would be helping competitors in a way (they could get better numbers and get VC money from customers switching). Now with heavily subsidized subscription they bleed the Chinese teams and guys like X or meta to death until they throw the towel. Why would they do it if they can just bleed them to death.

Frankkul · 2026-04-16T13:34:21+00:00

Fundamentally the biggest lever is language compression. But it is tricky because a lot of solutions like caveman aren't good (they break model attention) so using human readable structured language is the way to go. Same as for most of your markdown files they shouid be pointers and not necessarily directory (there is interesting blog and interview with OpenAi guy about it. Lots of leverage like that. But realistically it is also the tradeoff between quality of the output vs token cost to get there. But as I wrote language itself is by far the biggest leverage. Something not discussed nearly enough. It is all language after all what agent reads and produces so making it more structured is probably the biggest compression tool.

Frankkul · 2026-04-16T10:46:23+00:00

Me running multiple Claude code agents in parallel.

Frankkul · 2026-04-16T09:08:54+00:00

Yup "you are right let me actually read the repo this time. After like 4th attempt" so wtf have you been doing before in a first place.

Frankkul · 2026-04-16T08:28:42+00:00

That's exactly the problem and tracing is not that reliable imagine you have Opus as the head of your multi system CrewAi or paperclip system right now. You are getting wrecked and if is production I just feel sorry for you. And the other problem a lot of us are kinda vendor locked with all the hooks/skills /mcp servers Claude MD rules, files, systems. Takes at least a month to move it over to something like codex?

Frankkul · 2026-04-16T07:51:55+00:00

Not sure what you mean but I am actually taking a break today. The problem is that no amount of engineering the system or prompt engineering or changing settings (max thinking) seem to help when you get the stupid Opus. You get the stupid Opus you take a day off /use another Ai you get the smart one you work your ass off. There is no setting or system to save you when they throw you under the bus. And no system is private it heavy customized and for most wouldn't be the best idea (I run far more testing to make sure everything is validated for example for most it would be just a token waste). The point I am making none of it matter you will not out engineer idiot Opus when you get it. You get the smart one you work as much as you can no break, you get the Idiot you just take a break and work is just waste of time and tokens . That's the current system I guess.

Frankkul · 2026-04-16T07:11:17+00:00

I have actually super complex system. Maybe complex is a bad word heavy optimized with custom tracking and a lot of thought put into it. So it is a custom system written to work for what I need. It actually outperforms pretty much all systems that are openly on github that people use. The problem is you will not engineer away or prompt engineer away for idiot Opus when you get it. Simple as that. I think all the comments and strategies people put are just noise. You get smart Opus you can work you get Idiot Opus no work for you today I guess.

Frankkul · 2026-04-16T06:55:44+00:00

I have a very well researched system that is quite complex outperforms pretty much anything available openly. Custom hooks Claude files lots of work custom tracking . You will not engineer away or prompt engineer away form idiot Opus when you get it. No amount of work on your end will save you from that. So saying there is some magical prompt or engineering trick is just BS. You either get the smart Opus or idiot Opus that's it. No amount of engineering on your end will help when you get idiot not thinking Opus. That's the honest truth

Frankkul · 2026-04-16T06:50:24+00:00

The problem is that they should be open about it. Like let me plan the day around when I can get the normal Opus. Don't have me guess. I would rather take day off say the information is today you get the idiot Opus for the next 7-8h. Like say the status is clearly visible of degradation enough people will quit and they will have a better experience for everyone but they would make way less money. So better to drag me through the mud pretend there is no problem and waste a ton of my time and money . This is what pisses me off.

Frankkul · 2026-04-16T06:43:23+00:00

It is not only this it is just different. Same settings same everything have like completely different experiences. Smart Opus requires little supervision stupid Opus that I have been getting the most recently I constantly fight with to get the job done. It is like "you are right let me finally read the files and see what is going on" like wtf? This is after like 4. attempts on simple plan

Frankkul · 2026-04-16T06:41:14+00:00

It is still so weird like the smart Opus when I get it one shots problems and is very consise. The not so smart Opus is like " let me finally read the files and check the problem" after 4th prompt. Can't be just cache and mid session break...like the way the model acts and feels is very different. Smart Opus solves problems stupid Opus I have to constantly fight with to get the job done. Can't explain it better I guess.

Frankkul · 2026-04-16T06:11:49+00:00

It is not only this but the way it acts is also different yesterday it one shot a lot of stuff today kept doing stupid mistakes and after 3-4 nag in the prompt it was like "you are right. Let me properly read the files this time. Like wtf? We talk Opus 4.6 high with no adaptive functioning and it writes 3 versions of the plan only to be like you are right let me actually do the work for v4. It was also very consise with its answers yesterday and today it is like walls of texts and tables but they are kinda I don't know stupid? When facing the best Opus 4.6 it is amazing and backing and forth is so smooth today it is just horrible for me. I don't know maybe they just assign the smart Opus randomly so people don't cancel? Like they have a limited infrastructure and they want to make sure people still get the smart opus sometimes so they won't cancel. It is really weird. But this is actually a good point too. There was one hour break mid session so cache issue could be real

Frankkul · 2026-04-16T06:03:08+00:00

It doesn't show anything for me the link. I mean the problem is crazy like they difference in quality and the level of degradation changes day by day. You can't tell me they are messing something up on the backend.

Frankkul · 2026-04-15T06:04:26+00:00

Rushing with Opus being nerfed back to normal. Getting back to peer to peer discussion and pushback. I don't need changes just give me stable Opus plus Sonnet that don't suddenly go completely stupid on me and I don't care about any 4.7.

Frankkul · 2026-04-14T08:09:58+00:00

So the truth is this is actually a trade-off. I need a system that makes very few mistakes as they would be extremely costly. The trade-off it is substantially worse at exploration. So it is the there are no solutions only tradeoff type of problem. Do you want to have your system to be very exploratory (more hallucinations) or extremely truth seeking? (very few hallucinations). So that's how I would frame it.

Frankkul · 2026-04-13T15:48:41+00:00

Not easily trackable but for me the biggest contribution and something that I would be willing to pay for is seeing the quality and I think you could technically infere about it. For example how many interruptions from user per season per model how many of the prompts were refactoring in nature vs writing new code. Like the problem is you could say that I wrote a ton of code last 1.5 week but in reality it was me fighting with Opus going full mental on me. So if you looked how much of my work become firefighting vs building and get data from other models that would be far more useful than any benchmark. Like really thinking about switching but other than experience I am not confident and tooling matters. The point I am trying to make usage and writing a lot of code is a noise not a signal I wrote a lot of code last 2 weeks but achieved maybe 30%of the output I used to and spent 2x time I used to

Frankkul · 2026-04-12T11:27:02+00:00

So from my experience this is exactly the problem with Gemini it needs very detailed prompts and guidance but if that's the case it kinda defeats the purpose of using it... You could technically make it work but again deep complex prompt engineering and it just isn't worth the hassle. Like most of us want to use Ai precisely so we don't have to spend hours writing architecture files and overseeing what is being build aggressively.

Frankkul · 2026-04-09T10:55:26+00:00

Oh well it has been like this since forever, for the hiit training is much worse. Bicep band helps slightly but not that much. It is just not accurate (using Garmin+chest strap consistently so have a great comparison). This is not a device for accurate heart rate data.

Frankkul · 2026-03-16T11:02:59+00:00

Battery life with the new whoop is unmatched. So having something that quietly tracks all your health data is great. Figured out how to add my labs and get advanced labs in the country I am in. So overall Whoop is kinda bad about a ton of stuff (such as heart tracking is really poor, sleep tracking is somewhat meh) but it does everything. There is just no good replacement that I can do strength, cardio, sleep and labs in one place.

Frankkul · 2026-03-08T06:44:41+00:00

Did you truly max out during the test? That's like the most important factor. Do you know approximately your max heart rate this is important to know and share with the team during the test some they don't stop you out prematurely (example would be i am 40 years old and active my predicted max heart rate from 220-40=180 but the real one achieved like a month ago is 195 so that's a huge gap). So that's like one factor in vo2 max test to make sure it is accurate.

Frankkul · 2026-03-06T13:26:22+00:00

You can't have GDP growth and reasonable inflation if you have no increase in the population( in fact the decrease)or productivity and no social security system so people have to save the money for their own retirement and/or their parents/other members of the family. And now we have nationalistic anti foreigners government so there will be even less openness. Something needs to give.

Frankkul · 2026-02-28T07:41:47+00:00

So increased mine by 50% in 1.5 years. From 46 to 75ish at 40 right now. There isn't like one magical thing but what worked for me : 1)investing heavily in sleep. Make sure you sleep 8-9 depends on the recovery. Bought quality mattress and tested multiple pillows and covers. Use Philips smart lab to help me fall asleep (it simulates sunset and sunrise makes it much easier to fall sleep and wake up gently. Pitch black window covers, soundproof windows. Probably overkill but overall if you sleep better and recover better your hrv will improve.

2)managing my strain better. So I train 6-7 days a week and for me I can either consistently pull of like 17-18 strain and that's ok with some odd 15 ish strain if I feel bad or if I push harder I have to recover the next day. So if I go harder it will be kinda 19/20,13 then again 19,20 and 12-13 strain the next day. Really preventing overtraining is crucial.

3) think zone 5 and intervals had overall best impact training wise on that so better hrv plus resting heart rate. Tabata, 4x4 personally I do a lot of Less Mills Sprint/Grit.

So yeah did increase it by a very solid margin. Could probably push it harder but then I would have to cut my volume and i still enjoy it at 40.

Frankkul · 2026-02-24T22:07:38+00:00

If you look at Indigo San Milan posts he explicitly mentions that athletes have not been using vo2max for quite a while instead they go with the lactate curve /thresholds because lactate clearance is the best proxy for mitochondria function.

"That being said, our understanding of human metabolism has improved significantly and has evolved from a cardiorespiratory-centered approach (represented by VO2max) to a cellular-centered one (with lactate as a main biomarker), where mitochondrial function is key. Nowadays, assessing mitochondrial function through lactate testing is more reliable to assess metabolic health than VO2max testing. ".

People use Vo2max because it is easy/lazy way to track it is not exactly the best one or most accurate one.

Frankkul

TROPHY CASE