Context Compaction
A long task does not fail at the context limit, it degrades well before it. The agent starts forgetting decisions it made an hour ago, re-litigates settled questions, and re-reads files it already understood. This harness compacts deliberately: it decides in advance what must survive, writes a checkpoint that can be resumed cold, and drops the rest.
When to use
- Multi-hour or multi-session tasks: migrations, large refactors, long investigations.
- Any agent loop that runs until a goal is met rather than for a fixed number of steps.
- Work that may be interrupted and picked up later, possibly by someone else.
Install
bash
npx openagents-cli add openagents/context-compaction| Runtime | Installed to |
|---|---|
claude-code | .claude/skills/context-compaction/ |
codex | .codex/skills/context-compaction/ |
openai-agents | agents/context-compaction/ |
langgraph | graphs/context-compaction/ |
generic | .openagents/context-compaction/ |
What is in the package
HARNESS.md- what survives compaction, what does not, and when to trigger it.templates/checkpoint.md- the checkpoint format, resumable without the transcript.
License
MIT