I Was Paying for Pro and Still Getting Billed by the Console
Your subscription and your API usage are two separate ledgers, and Claude Code will happily run on either one. Which credential wins is decided by a precedence list where your login sits dead last. Here is how to read status, and why unattended runs answer differently.
I Send Images Twenty at a Time — The Day the 21st Image Changed the Rules for the Other 61
Sending 62 images in one request failed with invalid_request_error. The cause was the image count, not the payload size. Here is how I recounted visual tokens as 28px patches and built batches that respect count, dimensions, and payload at once.
One plugin.json turns a shelf of skills into something you can switch off as a group
When I sorted my skills by what work they belong to, the set I open almost daily turned out to be 5 percent of the total. Here is how I dropped a .claude-plugin/plugin.json into each group so I could switch a whole shelf off, plus the two loading rules I tripped over on the way.
I counted 42 skills on my shelf, and four of them were just a note saying they had moved
Claude Code v2.1.261 added /skill-doctor. Before running it I counted my own skill shelf from the files, found four tombstones, and learned that the obvious awk one-liner for spotting duplicate plugin names quietly reports skills that are not duplicates at all.
The One File I Keep Out of Claude Code's Reach: project.pbxproj
With Xcode project files, the breakage that still opens costs far more than the breakage that refuses to open. Here is what I measured before moving every edit behind a script, and where the line sits today.
Aligning Log Timezones at Display Time, or Fixing Them at Write Time
AdMob, the store reports, and my own logs each ended the day at a different moment. Here is how I went back and forth between display-side and write-side timezone handling, and what I settled on.
One Space in a Folder Name Turned 80 Checks Into Zero
An inspection loop reported 80 files checked and 0 readable. The files were fine. Here is how word splitting turns path fragments into real directories, measured side by side, plus the count assertion I now put in front of every delete-heavy batch.
I counted the keys in my connected folder: filenames found 5 of the 18
A record of counting what lives inside a connected folder, once by filename and once by file contents. Filenames returned 24 hits of which only 5 were real, while a content scan returned 18 of which 13 left no trace in their names. Includes a scanner that never prints a secret, its real output, and the rules I adopted afterwards.
Switching to headersHelper in Claude Code broke auth for project-scoped catalogs only
Moving a private plugin catalog to headersHelper worked at user scope and failed under the project directory. The cause was credential non-inheritance. Here are two working helpers, measured execution costs, and what unattended runs need.
My read-deny rules never reached inside the folder I had allowed
An audit of how far permissions.deny Read rules actually reach in a working tree where secrets and source code live side by side, with a script you can run today.
The Biggest Section in Your SKILL.md Is Usually the One to Keep
A skill I run every week cost about 10K tokens just to load. Measuring it section by section showed why the largest block was the one I had to leave in place, and what splitting by reach actually saved.
What to Settle Before Watermarked Claude Text Ships Inside Your App
Claude models released on or after August 2, 2026 embed watermarks in generated text and attach C2PA-signed provenance metadata to files. Here is how I redrew the line for shipped copy, plus a measured look at where image metadata disappears and a submission gate that keeps provenance reproducible.