---
title: standards/ — how I build, write, and work with AI
summary: The index - one line per standard, so a reader loads one file, not six.
---

# 📐 standards/: how I build, write, and work with AI

[![Made with Claude](https://img.shields.io/badge/Made_with-Claude-D97757?logo=anthropic&logoColor=white)](https://tjakoen.github.io/notes/ten-times-zero)
[![License: Apache 2.0](https://img.shields.io/badge/license-Apache_2.0-blue)](LICENSE)
[![Published](https://img.shields.io/badge/published-tjakoen.github.io%2Fstandards-2ea44f)](https://tjakoen.github.io/standards)

The single source of truth for how I work across every repo: how I build software with an AI
partner, how anything under my byline reads, and how a new repo is set up. Public and portable:
any repo of mine references this folder instead of copying its own drifting rules.

**How to use this, human or AI:** read this index first, then fetch **only** the standard the task in
front of you needs. Each line below is the whole hook: that's the point, so you load one file, not
six.

## The standards

| Read this when you're… | Standard | In one line |
|---|---|---|
| **Building anything with an AI** | [AI-DEVELOPMENT.md](AI-DEVELOPMENT.md) | The working relationship, the definition of done, the conventions and pitfalls every change is held to. The rulebook. |
| **Structuring a repo so AI sessions compound** | [AI-REPO-STANDARD.md](AI-REPO-STANDARD.md) | The repo-side companion to AI-DEVELOPMENT: the kit you commit (the map, the contracts, the guardrails) so every AI session inherits what the last one learned. AI-DEVELOPMENT owns the working relationship; this owns the repo. |
| **Deciding where a file lives / unbloating a root** | [TREE.md](TREE.md) | The layout standard: keep the root a readable index, only load-bearing files earn a place there, everything else folds one level down into a named home. AI-REPO-STANDARD owns *which* files exist; this owns *where* they sit. |
| **Running a session / handing off** | [SESSION-LOOP.md](SESSION-LOOP.md) | The session lifecycle: orient, the loop, the recurring chores, memory (so lessons stick), the handoff, and model economy. |
| **Running one AI workflow across every repo** | [LOOP.md](LOOP.md) | The system *around* the sessions: the work-triggered heartbeat that makes skipped chores visible, the thin-kit shape, the accountability contract that keeps an unattended run honest. One floor above SESSION-LOOP. |
| **Answering a code question without burning the window** | [GRAPH.md](GRAPH.md) | Ask the code graph a scoped question before you fan out grep, reads, and subagents. Query by symbol not prose, keep it fresh with a free per-edit hook, never commit the artifact. The retrieval half of the loop. |
| **Writing prose in my name** | [VOICE.md](VOICE.md) | The writing standard: cadence, the honesty clause, the machine-tells to refuse. Owns *how it reads*. |
| **Drafting a note / blog post** | [NOTE-STANDARD.md](NOTE-STANDARD.md) | How a note is built (frontmatter, structure, footer), plus a runnable prompt. Owns the *artifact*; VOICE owns the words. |
| **Making a diagram or chart** | [FIGURES.md](FIGURES.md) | The figure standard: two tokenized inline-SVG scaffolds (data-viz + flow), one palette each, no mermaid on the published site. |
| **Setting up a README** | [README-STANDARD.md](README-STANDARD.md) | Title emoji, the honest badge row, the "built with Claude" footer, plus a runnable prompt. |
| **Deciding which stack layers a new project needs** | [KICKSTART.md](KICKSTART.md) | A paste-in prompt that interviews you, reads the live stack and the public repos, and proposes which BREAD layers your project actually needs (and which it does not). The on-ramp before the repo exists. |
| **Starting a new repo** | [CLAUDE.starter.md](CLAUDE.starter.md) | The `CLAUDE.md` template that wires a fresh repo into all of the above from day one. |

## How they fit together

- **AI-DEVELOPMENT + SESSION-LOOP** are the engineering pair: the first is the standards, the second
  is the session mechanics that run against them. Start here for any building work.
- **LOOP** sits one floor above the pair: SESSION-LOOP owns a single session, LOOP owns the system that
  spans them: the heartbeat, the shared kit shape, the contract that holds across a whole estate of
  repos worked the same way. Read it when the question is "how does *every* repo run," not "how does
  this session run."
- **TREE** is the layout companion to AI-REPO-STANDARD: the latter decides *which* files a repo commits,
  TREE decides *where* each one sits and keeps the root a readable index instead of a junk drawer. Read it
  when a root has grown past a screen or a file has no obvious home.
- **GRAPH** is the retrieval half of that loop: a narrow rule for answering a structural code question
  cheaply (ask the graph before you fan out) that SESSION-LOOP's model economy and LOOP's heartbeat both
  lean on. Read it the moment you catch yourself about to grep the whole tree.
- **VOICE + NOTE-STANDARD + README-STANDARD + FIGURES** are the writing set: VOICE owns the prose,
  the others own specific artifacts and point back at it. Start here for any published words.
- **KICKSTART + CLAUDE.starter** are the two on-ramps, in order: KICKSTART runs *before the repo
  exists*, deciding which layers the project needs; CLAUDE.starter is how the repo you then create
  inherits the whole set from day one.

## The one rule this folder lives by

Single source of truth, everywhere. Each fact has exactly one home here; every other mention is a
*pointer*, never a copy. Two copies of a rule drift, and then both are suspect. If you find the same
thing stated in two of these files, one of them is a bug: fix it to a link.

---
🤖 **Built with Claude, rules included.** The standards that govern how I work with an AI were themselves written with one, which is either very meta or very honest, and I am going with both. **I don't prompt and pray, I prompt and prove.** [How I actually work with AI, receipts and all →](https://tjakoen.github.io/notes/ten-times-zero)