FAQ

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Does it work without an internet connection?

Agents themselves run locally as Claude Code subagents. Only Claude API calls reach Anthropic. No code or memory is sent anywhere else.

Is my source code used to train models?

No. The Claude API is zero-retention by default for paying customers. great_cto adds nothing — your code stays yours.

What if I already have CI/CD?

great_cto runs before CI. Catches issues at architecture, review, and pre-merge. Use both — they're complementary, not competing.

Cursor / Copilot / Aider support?

All five hosts work via npx great-cto adapt --platform <host> — Claude Code, Cursor, OpenAI Codex CLI, Aider, Continue. Same archetype + compliance machinery generates platform-native config (CLAUDE.md, AGENTS.md, .cursorrules, .aider.conf.yml, .continue/rules.md). Daily Canary verifies adapt for all 5 every 06:00 UTC.

Can I disable hooks if they're getting in the way?

Every hook honors GREAT_CTO_DISABLE_<NAME>=1 env vars (e.g. GREAT_CTO_DISABLE_SECRET_SCAN=1). Per-file opt-out via // great_cto:allow-secrets for the secret-scan hook.

How do you keep token costs down?

Three layers:

1. Haiku-by-default for cheap agents
2. Kimi K2 router for triage (60–80% savings)
3. cost-guard hook warns before expensive prompts

See /cost for live spend.

What happens to my data when I uninstall?

Plugin state lives in ~/.great_cto/ (global decisions) and .great_cto/ (per-project). Both are plain markdown — rm -rf clears everything. No external services to deauthorize.

Why not auto-pilot? Why "two decisions per feature"?

LLMs are powerful but lose product judgment on ambiguous specs. Keeping a human at gate:plan and gate:ship catches the 5% of bad calls that account for 95% of cost. See ADR-015 — Learning loop architecture.

Is great_cto for teams?

No. great_cto is built for the one-person engineering org — solo founders, indie hackers, technical CTOs running everything themselves. If you have 2+ engineers and need shared dashboards, multi-seat auth, or per-developer audit logs, look at Cursor Business or GitHub Copilot Workspace instead. Going multi-user is not on the roadmap — solo-CTO is the product.

You can still use great_cto with one cofounder via shared git repo + Beads through Dolt, but there's no shared UI.

Does it work on Windows?

Daily Canary runs Ubuntu + macOS only. Windows isn't actively tested — file an issue if you hit something specific. WSL2 should work fine.

Can I read recent decisions / lessons / patterns?

Yes — they're all plain markdown:

cat ~/.great_cto/decisions.md         # global ADR log across all projects
cat .great_cto/lessons.md             # per-project retros
cat ~/.great_cto/global-patterns/*.md # crystallized incident patterns

/inbox summarises pending decisions; /digest produces a weekly delta.