Use with Claude Code¶

Claude Code speaks the Anthropic dialect and honors the ANTHROPIC_BASE_URL override, so routing it through context-guru takes one environment variable — no changes to Claude Code itself.

Claude Code ──ANTHROPIC_BASE_URL──▶ context-guru :4000/anthropic ──▶ Anthropic
                                     (compacts tool outputs)          (or Bedrock/Vertex)

The one-liner¶

Start the proxy, then point Claude Code at it:

context-guru-proxy --preset agent          # long-session preset; mask is the big lever

ANTHROPIC_BASE_URL=http://localhost:4000/anthropic claude

That's the whole integration. Every request Claude Code makes now flows through the pipeline; the response path resolves any context_guru_expand calls automatically.

Which preset?

Claude Code sessions are long and dominated by re-sent tool outputs (file reads, command logs), so --preset agent (mask + dedup + failed_run + extract) is the biggest lever — ~27% token savings with no task-reward change in the benchmarks. Use coding if you want skeleton to strip function bodies from big source reads. See Choose a preset.

With a wrapper script¶

scripts/with-guru.sh starts the proxy, exports the base-URL env, and runs any agent command through it:

scripts/with-guru.sh agent -- claude

Gateway mode (proxy holds the key)¶

Give the proxy the real key and hand Claude Code a placeholder — the proxy injects the real credential on forward, so the key never lives in Claude Code's config:

ANTHROPIC_API_KEY=sk-ant-real... context-guru-proxy --preset agent

ANTHROPIC_BASE_URL=http://localhost:4000/anthropic \
ANTHROPIC_AUTH_TOKEN=placeholder \
  claude

Leave ANTHROPIC_API_KEY unset on the proxy to pass Claude Code's own auth straight through instead.

Project-scoped via `.claude/settings.json`¶

To make it sticky for a repo without exporting env each time:

{
  "env": {
    "ANTHROPIC_BASE_URL": "http://localhost:4000/anthropic"
  }
}

Verify it's working¶

curl -s localhost:4000/stats | jq

requests climbs as Claude Code makes calls, and savings_pct / per-component saved_tokens show what each component removed. See Measure savings.

Pin the model (optional)

context-guru forwards whatever model Claude Code sends. To force a model regardless (e.g. in eval harnesses), set FORCE_MODEL on the proxy. Claude Code's own model env (ANTHROPIC_MODEL, ANTHROPIC_SMALL_FAST_MODEL) still selects the model it asks for.