green-pt/honey-for-devs/honey-compress

Honey Compress

Apply Lever 2 to a file the agent re-reads every session. The cheapest token is the one not re-sent — a one-time rewrite that saves on every future load.

Do

1. Back up first. Copy FILE → FILE.original.md. If that backup already exists, stop and ask — never clobber a restore point. If no backup can be written, refuse.
2. Rewrite the prose tersely — drop wind-up, hedging, narration, and redundancy; fragments over paragraphs; merge guidance that repeats.
3. Preserve every distinct instruction — terser words, identical rules. If unsure whether a line changes behavior, keep it verbatim.
4. Verify, then keep or undo. Run node "${CLAUDE_PLUGIN_ROOT}/bin/check.js" fidelity FILE.original.md FILE.

It fails if any number, code span, URL, negation or safety word was lost, or if the file didn't get smaller. On a failure, fix the named loss, or restore the backup (cp FILE.original.md FILE) when the fix would cost the savings. Never report a failing rewrite as done. (If CLAUDE_PLUGIN_ROOT is unexpanded, bin/check.js lives at the plugin root, two directories above this file; installed from npm it is honey-check.)

1. Report original vs new byte count (the check prints it) and the backup path.

Keep exact — never compress

• Code blocks, commands, paths, identifiers, versions.
• Any load-bearing directive — MUST/NEVER rules, and anything touching auth, secrets, money, migrations, or deletes. Compressing an instruction that changes behavior moves cost, it doesn't remove it.

Don't

• Don't touch code, config, or data files — prose context only.
• Don't merge two rules into one if they differ in effect.
• Don't compress a file you can't back up.

Boundaries

Reversible by design — FILE.original.md is the restore path. The fidelity check is the floor, not the ceiling: it catches lost facts, not a reworded rule that changed meaning, so still read the diff.