Claude AI Guide: Tips, Tutorials & Best Practices

You switched your Claude API calls to a newer model, and now you get AttributeError: 'ThinkingBlock' object has no attribute 'text', or the response text comes back empty. The cause is that Claude 5 and later models think when needed even if you don't set thinking, so the first block of the response becomes a thinking block. Claude 4 models didn't think unless you set it, so changing only the model name changes the shape of the response. With simple inputs the first block is still text, so tests that use light inputs pass. Based on Anthropic's documentation and my own tests of four models (November 1, 2026), this article covers the cause, how to fix it by finding text blocks by type (Python and TypeScript), what to do when max_tokens leaves you with no text, which models can and can't turn thinking off, and how not to miss it in testing.

If you put several sites in one repository and place a CLAUDE.md or AGENTS.md in each site's folder, those rules aren't guaranteed to be read before work begins. Claude Code loads a CLAUDE.md below the launch directory when Claude reads, writes or edits a file in that folder, while Codex reads only the AGENTS.md files from the project root down to the launch directory, once at the start of each run. This article compares, item by item, how both tools load these files and how to check whether they were loaded (/context shows only what was loaded at startup), then covers a check that stops the release if anything outside the assigned folder changes, and tool settings that block writes. It also shows how to tell similarly named repositories apart by remote URL and root commit, and commands that show only environment variable names (checked November 1, 2026).

Claude's Max plan includes $100 in API credits a month, Ultra $200 and Team up to $500 in total, while Free and Pro get none. Gemini includes Google Cloud credits of $10 a month with Google AI Pro, $40 with Ultra 5x and $100 with Ultra 20x, and none with Plus. Since October 28, 2026, ChatGPT has included $100, $200 and $500 a month with Pro 100, 200 and 500, and per-seat credits with Business (up to $500 in total), while Go and Plus get none. Based on the three companies' official pricing pages, help articles and developer docs (checked October 27, 2026; ChatGPT checked October 30), this article compares, in the same order, where the credits can and can't be used (your Claude Code usage limits don't change), how to claim them (Gemini requires a $5 prepayment), when they expire (Claude and ChatGPT credits expire monthly, while Gemini credits are valid for 12 months and accumulate), what you can use for free without a plan (Claude's trial credit, Gemini's free tier and OpenAI's free tokens for data sharing), and whether the content you send is used for training, then sums up the deciding factors for choosing.

On October 26, 2026 (US time), Anthropic filed a Form S-1 for an initial public offering (IPO) with the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and applied to list on the Nasdaq Global Select Market under the ticker "ANT". The listing date, share count, price range and amount to be raised have not been set. Drawing on the original S-1, this article covers revenue ($4.585 billion in 2025 and $16.286 billion in the first half of 2026) and what is behind the losses, the five share classes (A, N, T, F and E) and their voting rights, how the Long-Term Benefit Trust (LTBT) and the public benefit corporation (PBC) structure work, the stakes held by Amazon and Google, the use of proceeds and the risk factors. It then walks through the steps to listing based on the SEC's guidance, whether and how you can buy the shares (checked October 27, 2026), and what it means for Claude users. It is not investment advice, and it is updated whenever new information comes out.

"Codex won't go parallel unless you tell it to" is true, with conditions: the Codex app, CLI and IDE extension spawn subagents when you ask directly, or when AGENTS.md or a skill instructs delegation (Ultra in ChatGPT Work also delegates on its own judgment). Claude Code delegates on its own based on the request and each subagent's description. Using the official OpenAI and Anthropic documentation (checked October 26, 2026), this article compares what triggers parallel work, five things to put in your instructions, ready-to-use example prompts, [agents] in Codex's config.toml and the TOML files in .codex/agents/, Claude Code's .claude/agents/ and environment variables, commands such as /subagents, /tasks, /subtask, /batch and /worktree, tasks that suit parallel work and tasks that don't, and the impact on usage limits, and it also shares lessons this site learned from running subagents in parallel.

"Your credit balance is too low to access the Anthropic API" (shown as "Credit balance is too low" in Claude Code) means your Claude Console organization doesn't have enough prepaid credits. There are two causes: your balance really is too low, or you meant to use a plan such as Pro or Max but Claude Code is running on an API key from the ANTHROPIC_API_KEY environment variable and billing the API instead. You tell them apart with /status. Based on Anthropic's official documentation and Help Center (checked October 26, 2026), this article explains how the error appears, three questions to find the cause, how to buy credits under Billing in the Console and set up auto-reload, how to remove the API key on macOS, Linux and Windows and check it in VS Code, how this differs from the monthly API credits for Max and Team and from usage credits, and similar but different errors.

There are two ways to use Claude while staying on your Google Cloud bill: the Google-managed version, which Google runs as part of Agent Platform (formerly Vertex AI), and the Anthropic-managed version, which became generally available on October 22, 2026. Claude Code runs on the Google-managed version, configured with CLAUDE_CODE_USE_VERTEX and related settings (pinning the models is recommended if you roll it out to multiple people). If you need the Files API, Agent Skills, Managed Agents, fast mode and similar features, choose the Anthropic-managed version. On the Google-managed global endpoint, Opus 5.5, Sonnet 5.5 and Haiku 5.5 cost the same as the Claude API, while the us and eu multi-regions cost 1.1x. The Anthropic-managed version is metered in CCU, and no per-token price list appears in the official docs. Based on the official documentation (checked October 26, 2026), this article covers the differences and how to choose, pricing, regions, getting started, the SDKs, Claude Code setup, and how to handle quotas and 429 errors.

If the Claude API returns '`temperature` is deprecated for this model.', the cause is sending non-default values for temperature, top_p, or top_k to a Claude 4.7 or later model, and removing all three from the request fixes it. Claude 4.7 and later models already reject non-default values under API version 2023-06-01, and under the new API version 2026-10-21 they return a 400 error for any model, even with default values; newer SDKs such as Python anthropic 2.0.0 send 2026-10-21 automatically and no longer include the three arguments in their types, so code that still passes them will fail with an argument error or a 400 after an SDK upgrade. This article explains the two situations where the error appears, how to get consistent answers without these settings, how to find them in code, SDK versions, related changes such as how the API key is sent, and the fix for the similar 'anthropic-version: header is required' error, based on Anthropic's official documentation (checked October 26, 2026).

You don't need a high-end PC to run Claude Code or Codex. Both run their models on servers, so buying a new PC won't shorten the time the AI spends thinking and writing. Claude Code's CLI requires at least 4GB of RAM, an x64 or ARM64 CPU, and an internet connection, while Codex publishes no RAM or CPU figures. Your PC affects the time spent running commands locally, such as builds, tests, and searches. This article compares requirements, fast mode, per-OS sandbox conditions, and fixes for heavy workloads, and explains how to measure where your time goes and the three things to check before buying new hardware.

Claude Code's /goal lets you write down what counts as done. A separate small model checks the condition after each turn, and Claude keeps working until it is met. The article covers setup, checking, and clearing /goal from the official documentation, how the checker works and when it stops, how to write conditions, and how /goal differs from /loop and Codex's /goal. It also reports two runs aligning sentence-ending punctuation across this site's articles, including a 321-item run that finished in one turn, and notes that the checker cannot confirm finished quality that does not show up in the numbers.

Anthropic released Claude Dashboards, which builds dashboards when you ask questions about your company's data, and Claude Motion, which turns reports and charts into short explainer animations, in beta on October 8, 2026. Based on Anthropic's announcement and help documentation (checked October 22, 2026), this article covers the data sources you can connect (BigQuery, Snowflake, Salesforce, and more), the queries behind each chart, and three points to verify with queries. It also explains how Motion works (code-driven, not a video generation model, exported as MP4), plans and admin settings, how to choose between Docs, Slides, and Design, and when these tools fit or don't.

Claude Duet is Anthropic's app in which Claude works as a proactive agent, sending a morning briefing and periodic check-ins and carrying out tasks in the cloud. Based on Anthropic's announcement and help documentation (checked October 22, 2026), this article covers the Make and Tasks tabs and over 6,000 connectors; who can use it and pricing (invitation-only Pro and Max in the US, no extra charge, limits shared with Claude, and a limit reset through November 30); the approval safeguards before sending, paying, signing, or deleting; current limitations; availability outside the US; and how it differs from ChatGPT's dot.