# Best Practices



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These practices come from teams using Context to build knowledge for large engineering organizations. Most of them are about one thing: **correct course early**, while it is cheap.


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## Talk first, then start

After initializing the Context knowledge workspace, have a free conversation before any production. Explain what the knowledge should cover, where it comes from — document links, repository addresses, the modules you care about — and what form you expect. The Agent researches and asks back until it can write a **work-start report**: the confirmed configuration and scope, the planned content, and the expected package or site layout. See [Start Reports](</context/llms/pages/4e6033003b381ddf2e380cb83cc57f84.txt>).

Production then takes time — on average about one minute per task. The Agent keeps reporting progress and the total number of tasks, and you can ask for a local preview at any point. After publication, check the package and other outputs; the Agent commits the workspace to Git to close the production.


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## Preview early, correct with examples

On a large task, open the work-start report and the changed pages as soon as they are available. If something is off, ask for a revision and be specific: show the wording you want, give a counterexample, describe the style. The earlier you correct, the better the final quality.


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## Three questions for every review

The review report decides the scope and quality of what gets approved. Read it with three questions:

1. Does the **structure** — topics, directories, documents — match what you expected?
2. Does the **content** — the intent of each article, its style — match what you expected?
3. Is anything relevant still **missing from the scope**, or included that should be left out?

See [Reading Review Reports](</context/llms/pages/1ee5af170f818c848c9e91a9b1d98d4e.txt>).


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## Reorganize once the knowledge grows

First-version titles tend to be abstract, and directory names and structure are rarely ideal. Once the knowledge has grown, ask the Agent to research the approved knowledge again and propose a more readable, intuitive directory and article structure — it does this better now than it could during planning. Revise, then observe for another round. Revising costs far less than producing again and suits fine-tuning of both structure and content. See [Reorganizing at Scale](</context/llms/pages/9b7018d3ff025bc9a5ed714bf0a7762c.txt>).


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## When documents lag behind code

Production cross-checks sources, and documents lagging behind code is normal. By default the Agent revises the knowledge to match the code. To fix the upstream documents as well, add a rule at the start of the task or in the workspace `AGENTS.md`:

```text
When a revision is caused by a document lagging behind code, record it in
update-remote/<date>-<topic>.md with the context, the judgment and a suggested fix.
After the task, work through update-remote: find each upstream document and
revise it, or give a concise suggested fix for the user to decide.
```

Upstream documents then stay current and the knowledge does not drift away from them. See [Writing Back Upstream](</context/llms/pages/5b6cb959db2d1cf01afb5ceb37339ff0.txt>).


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## Split very large work into batches

A very large task goes through planning first, with at most about 30 to 50 documents per batch. Each batch is produced, published, recorded in the plan file (`PLAN-*.md`) and committed before the next one starts. See [Planning a Large Project](</context/llms/pages/50c06cb5af03a7d6f924874b49d02d50.txt>).

---

## Sources

- note:20261012/usage-practices.md · usage-practices.md L1–L3
- note:20261012/usage-practices.md · usage-practices.md L5–L9
- note:20261012/usage-practices.md · usage-practices.md L14–L14
- note:20261012/usage-practices.md · usage-practices.md L16–L22
- note:20261012/usage-practices.md · usage-practices.md L24–L26
- note:20261012/usage-practices.md · usage-practices.md L28–L37
- note:20261012/usage-practices.md · usage-practices.md L11–L13
- [context/plugins/context/README.md L33–L46 · 3b0ce0a](<https://github.com/context4ai/context/blob/3b0ce0a0a1761f5fceb3bb48fb9dc29b54c0786b/plugins/context/README.md#L33-L46>)