---
description:
  Review Claude Code configuration for context efficiency, signal density,
  and anti-patterns. Use when user says "review config", "review setup", "check configuration",
  "review cc config", "context review", "config review", "review my setup", "review
  skills", "review agents", "review hooks", or wants feedback on their Claude Code
  configuration quality. NOT for editing config files — review only; user applies
  fixes unless --fix is passed. NOT for applying config changes (use
  `evolving-config`).
name: reviewing-cc-config
targets:
  - claude
---

# Claude Code Configuration Review

Review configuration against context engineering principles derived from
Anthropic's "Effective Context Engineering for AI Agents" and
"Best Practices for Claude Code."

Track these 5 phases. Keep work scoped to ONLY these review targets and keep agent prompts/output compact:

1. Discover and inventory configuration
2. Measure context budget impact
3. Review against rubric (parallel agents)
4. Aggregate and present findings

## Phase 1: Discovery

Scan for all Claude Code configuration components. Check BOTH standard layout
and plugin layout (cc-thingz style). Findings must cite concrete file paths or configuration locations such as `CLAUDE.md`, `.claude/settings.json`, `.claude/skills/<name>/SKILL.md`, `plugins/<plugin>/skills/<name>/SKILL.md`, `plugins/<plugin>/hooks/<hook>.sh`, or `.claude-plugin/marketplace.json`.

### Standard layout

```bash
# Glob these patterns in parallel
CLAUDE.md
CLAUDE.local.md
.claude/CLAUDE.md
.claude/settings.json
.claude/settings.local.json
.claude/skills/*/SKILL.md
.claude/agents/*.md
.claude/commands/**/*.md
# Also check parent dirs (monorepo) and home
~/.claude/CLAUDE.md
../CLAUDE.md
```

### Plugin layout (if `plugins/` or `.claude-plugin/` exists)

```bash
plugins/*/skills/*/SKILL.md
plugins/*/agents/**/*.md
plugins/*/hooks/*.sh
plugins/*/commands/**/*.md
.claude-plugin/marketplace.json
```

### Hooks and MCP servers

Extract hook script paths from settings.json `hooks` field. Read each script.
Extract MCP server names from settings.json `mcpServers` field. Count them.

Build inventory list:

- **CLAUDE.md**: count, ~N tokens, paths
- **Skills**: count, ~N tokens, names (auto/invocable)
- **Agents**: count, ~N tokens, names (model)
- **Hooks**: count, ~N tokens, events
- **Commands**: count, ~N tokens, names
- **MCP servers**: count, names

Token estimation: `word_count * 1.3` for English text.

## Phase 2: Context Budget Measurement

Calculate the **session startup cost** — tokens loaded before the user's
first prompt:

```
Startup Budget = CLAUDE.md tokens
               + auto-activated skill bodies (skills without user-invocable: true
                 that match common prompts)
               + hook startup output (SessionStart hooks)
               + settings overhead
```

### Thresholds

- **<2K tokens** — LEAN: Ideal — maximum attention available
- **2K-4K** — OK: Acceptable for complex projects
- **4K-6K** — HEAVY: Consider moving content to skills
- **>6K** — BLOATED: Urgent — context rot risk from turn 1

Count CLAUDE.md lines and estimate tokens. Flag if CLAUDE.md exceeds 150
lines or ~3K tokens.

## Phase 3: Review Against Rubric

Find and read the rubric (co-located with this skill):

```bash
# Try both plugin layout and standard layout
Glob("**/skills/reviewing-cc-config/RUBRIC.md")
```

Read the first match. If no match found, **stop and warn the user** that
RUBRIC.md is missing — do not proceed without the rubric. If the rubric or requested config files are unavailable, stop and report the blocker instead of inventing findings.

### Parse `$ARGUMENTS`

- No args or `all` → review everything
- `skills` → review only skills
- `agents` → review only agents
- `hooks` → review only hooks
- `claude-md` → review only CLAUDE.md files
- `commands` → review only commands
- `--fix` → apply fixes after review (Phase 5)

### Spawn review agents (ALL in ONE message)

Read `RUBRIC.md` (co-located with this skill) first. Pass relevant rule IDs
to each agent. Spawn up to 4 agents in parallel, one per component type.
Skip agents for component types not present or not in scope.

Each agent prompt must include:

1. The agent's role and component type
2. The list of files to review
3. The relevant rules from RUBRIC.md (paste the rule IDs and one-line checks)
4. The output format specified below

### Agent 1: CLAUDE.md Reviewer

Rules: SD-CLAUDE-MD, AR-HOOK-DETERMINISTIC, AR-SKILL-DEMAND, AP-OVER-SPECIFIED (>150 lines), CB-STARTUP (<3K tokens).
Output per file: `### path (lines, ~tokens)` + rule/verdict/notes list.
Keep under 1500 tokens.

### Agent 2: Skills Reviewer

Rules: SD-DESCRIPTION, CB-FORK, SD-TOOL-MINIMAL, AR-VERIFY, AR-MODEL-MATCH, AP-TRIGGER-OVERLAP, AP-OVER-SPECIFIED (>200 lines), CB-PROGRESSIVE.
Output per skill: `### name (model, invocable, lines)` + rule/verdict/notes list + trigger overlap (conflicts only).
Do not score instruction prose quality — defer to `reviewing-instructions`.
Keep under 2000 tokens.

### Agent 3: Agents & Commands Reviewer

Rules: AR-ISOLATION, SD-TOOL-MINIMAL, SD-RETURN, AP-SCOPE-UNBOUNDED, AR-MODEL-MATCH, AP-OVER-SPECIFIED (>100 lines).
Output per agent/command: `### name (model, tools, lines)` + rule/verdict/notes list. Keep under 1500 tokens.

### Agent 4: Hooks Reviewer

Rules: AR-HOOK-DETERMINISTIC, plus: performance (<2s), exit code discipline (0=context, 2=blocking), event appropriateness (PreToolUse=validation, PostToolUse=verification, SessionStart=setup, Notification=alerts, PostCompact=metrics).
Output per hook: `### name (event, lines)` + check/verdict/notes list. Keep under 1000 tokens.

## Phase 4: Aggregate, Cross-Check & Present

Collect results from all review agents. **Cross-check**: for each ERROR
finding that references a specific line number or file path, verify it
exists by reading the actual file. Agents can hallucinate line numbers —
drop findings that don't match reality. Every finding must include a concrete file path/config location and actionable fix. Do not report generic "CLAUDE.md" or "RUBRIC.md" unless that exact path was read or requested. Present:

Report structure:

1. **Context Budget** table: component / count / token est / rating (LEAN/OK/HEAVY/BLOATED)
2. **Findings by Severity**: ERRORS (must fix), WARNINGS (should fix), INFO (consider)
   - One sentence per finding, no preamble. State what IS wrong. Include concrete file paths/config locations, component names, line numbers, and token counts where relevant
3. **Cross-Cutting**: trigger overlap matrix, model routing summary, hook vs CLAUDE.md balance
4. **Top 5 Highest-Impact Improvements** with estimated savings
5. **What's Working Well** — explicit acknowledgment of good patterns

## Phase 5: Apply Fixes (only if `--fix` in arguments)

Skip this phase entirely unless `--fix` is in `$ARGUMENTS`. When `--fix` is present, load and follow [references/apply-fixes.md](references/apply-fixes.md) — the approval flow, per-component fix list, diff discipline, and post-fix verification.

## Examples

```
/reviewing-cc-config                    # Review all config components
/reviewing-cc-config skills             # Review only skills
/reviewing-cc-config claude-md          # Review only CLAUDE.md files
/reviewing-cc-config hooks agents       # Review hooks and agents
/reviewing-cc-config all --fix          # Review everything, then apply fixes
```

Execute this workflow now.
