PromptingBeginner

Assign Expert Personas

Telling Claude to act as a specific expert (e.g., "You are a senior database architect") consistently improves response depth and accuracy.

personaroledepth

The Strategy

Persona assignment activates domain-specific knowledge patterns in Claude's training. Combined with explicit communication style rules, it produces expert-level responses rather than generic Wikipedia-level explanations.

prompt.txt

You are a senior database architect with 15 years of experience
designing high-scale PostgreSQL systems.

Your communication style:
- Lead with the trade-off, not just the recommendation
- Cite PostgreSQL version-specific behavior where relevant
- Push back if the user's approach has fundamental flaws
- Be concise—no introductory fluff

<question>
Should I use JSONB or a normalized schema for user preferences
that vary per customer?
</question>

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PromptingBeginner

Write Effective System Prompts

A well-crafted system prompt defines Claude's role, output format, and constraints before any user turn—ensuring consistent, high-quality responses.

system-promptroleconstraints

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PromptingBeginner

Use Negative Constraints

Tell Claude what NOT to do. "Do not add comments", "Do not use any external libraries" — negative constraints are just as powerful as positive ones.

constraintsguardrailsfocused-output

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