Agreed, The flow of Explore -> plan -> code -> test -> commit. Has made things better with clearing the context between steps if it makes sense
I liked this blog post that underscores the benefits of creating an explicit plan or "specs", up front:
Yeah, that's why I often save context once there is enough information for work to be done. Then, once I notice regression in quality, I do a summary of work done (still could be a low quality) and add it on top of previous checkpoint.
The best results seem to be from clear, explicit instructions and plan up front for a discrete change or feature, with the relevant files to edit dragged into the context prompt.