Freek Van der Herten, a prolific PHP developer at Spatie, has published his full Claude Code configuration - and it's a useful blueprint for anyone trying to get more out of the tool.
The setup centers on a few practical ideas that are easy to steal.
Context Window Monitoring
Van der Herten built a custom status line script that shows two things: the current repository name and how much of Claude Code's context window you've used, displayed as a percentage. It's color-coded green below 40%, yellow from 40-59%, and red at 60% and above. The visual cue tells you when a conversation is getting stale and you should start a fresh one. Context window bloat is one of the most common reasons Claude Code starts giving worse answers mid-session, so this alone is worth copying.
Four Purpose-Built Agents
Instead of using Claude Code as one general-purpose tool, he splits work across four custom agents, each with a specific job:
- laravel-simplifier (runs on Opus) - refines code for simplicity and readability
- laravel-debugger (runs on Sonnet) - focuses specifically on bug identification
- laravel-feature-builder (runs on Opus) - develops new features
- task-planner (runs on Opus) - breaks large tasks into smaller steps before coding starts
The model choice matters here. Opus handles the tasks that need deeper reasoning (simplification, feature design, planning), while Sonnet gets the more mechanical debugging work where speed matters more than depth.
40+ Contextual Skills
The most interesting part: he maintains over 40 skill files covering PHP patterns, marketing, and SEO. These load only when relevant rather than sitting in the context window permanently. This is the right approach - stuffing everything into a single CLAUDE.md file wastes context on instructions the model doesn't need for the current task.
He also keeps extended thinking mode always on, which he says produces noticeably better results for complex tasks. His global instructions tell Claude to maintain a critical perspective and follow Spatie's PHP coding standards.
The full configuration is available in his public dotfiles repository. Even if you don't write PHP, the structural patterns - context monitoring, task-specific agents, lazy-loaded skills - apply to any Claude Code workflow.