Claude Code

Claude Code is the most direct ACT experience today. It supports ACT skills, research agents, and hooks with the least translation in the docs.

Install

cd ~/.agentic-coding-toolkit && ./scripts/install.sh --tool claude

Custom Config Directories

ACT supports Claude Code installs into a non-default config directory. Use this when you run separate Claude profiles, isolated environments, or experimental configs:

cd ~/.agentic-coding-toolkit && ./scripts/install.sh --tool claude --config-dir ~/.claude-work

ACT also respects Claude Code’s CLAUDE_CONFIG_DIR environment variable:

CLAUDE_CONFIG_DIR=~/.claude-work ./scripts/install.sh --tool claude

If both are set, --config-dir wins.

What Gets Installed

Location	Includes
`~/.claude/skills/`	Symlinked canonical ACT skill directories
`~/.claude/agents/`	Generated Claude-compatible ACT agent files
`~/.claude/hooks/`	Copied ACT hook core scripts and Claude adapters
`~/.claude/settings.json`	ACT hook entries merged into Claude Code settings
`~/.config/agentic-coding-toolkit/`	Shared ACT settings and copied runtime helper

If --config-dir or CLAUDE_CONFIG_DIR is set, that Claude config directory is used instead of ~/.claude.

Verify

Start a new Claude Code session from the same environment where you installed ACT, then run:

/act-help

You should see the ACT help navigator listing skills and agents.

Skills

Invoke ACT skills directly by name:

/act-interview "add a settings screen"
/act-create-spec
/act-create-issues ai_specs/0001-settings/spec.md
/act-implement ai_specs/0001-settings/work-items/01-settings-screen.md
/act-git-push-make-pr

Hooks

ACT installs Claude-compatible hooks through Claude’s settings system. That includes ACT hook automation and ACT statusline support.

Permissions

For the strategy comparison, see Permissions & Safety.

Strategy 1: Permission rules

Claude Code supports file-based permission configuration through .claude/settings.json at the project level, or ~/.claude/settings.json at the user level.

For a typical ACT setup, add tool permissions like this:

{
  "permissions": {
    "allow": [
      "Bash(git *)",
      "Bash(flutter *)",
      "Bash(dart *)",
      "Bash(node *)",
      "Bash(gh *)",
      "Read",
      "Read(~/.pub-cache/**)",
      "Write",
      "Edit",
      "Glob",
      "Grep"
    ],
    "deny": [
      "Edit(~/.pub-cache/**)"
    ]
  }
}

For Flutter projects, this grants read-only access to ~/.pub-cache, which many apps need for dependency resolution and tooling.

If you install ACT with --config-dir or CLAUDE_CONFIG_DIR, Claude Code’s user-level settings live in that resolved config directory instead of ~/.claude.

Strategy 2: DSP / yolo + non-sudo account

Claude Code’s DSP mode skips normal permission prompts:

claude --dangerously-skip-permissions

If you want, you can also define an alias in your ~/.zshrc or ~/.bashrc:

alias cc-dsp='claude --dangerously-skip-permissions'

Use this only from a dedicated non-sudo account or another isolation boundary that does not contain personal files, broad SSH keys, production credentials, or unrelated project secrets.

Remote machines and containers

You can run Claude Code on a VPS or remote dev machine and use the same permission strategy there. Treat the remote host as the isolation boundary.

Claude Code is also a good fit for Docker/devcontainer workflows when you want stronger isolation or a reproducible environment. See Permissions & Safety for the full VPS and Docker tradeoffs.

Troubleshooting

If permissions do not persist, check whether the expected settings.json exists in the project or user config directory.
If a project setting conflicts with a user setting, the project setting is the one to inspect first.
If you use --config-dir or CLAUDE_CONFIG_DIR, make sure you edit the same config directory where ACT was installed.