Clawback

Give Claude Code the verification loops Anthropic reserves for their own engineers.

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The Story

On March 31, 2026, Claude Code's source map leaked via npm. Inside 512,000 lines of code, the community discovered something interesting: employee-only verification loops gated behind USER_TYPE === 'ant'.

Anthropic engineers get a Claude that checks whether generated code actually compiles before claiming it's done. The rest of us get a Claude that says "Done!" and hopes for the best.

Clawback takes those patterns back. Not by hacking flags or bypassing auth -- but by implementing the same behavioral guarantees through Claude Code's public hooks API.

"Prompts are requests, hooks are guarantees."

What It Does

One node install.cjs and your Claude Code gets 5 hooks that fire automatically:

Hook	Event	What It Does
protect-files	PreToolUse	Blocks edits to .env, lockfiles, .git/ -- before Claude touches them
post-edit	PostToolUse	Formats your code, then lints it (report-only) -- after every edit
stop-verify	Stop	Runs full typecheck + lint -- Claude can't say "Done!" until it passes
post-compact	PostCompact	Re-injects git state + gotchas.md after context compaction
notification	Notification	Desktop notification when Claude needs your attention

Plus a behavioral CLAUDE.md that handles what hooks can't: phased execution, anti-sprawl limits, mistake logging.

The Stop Gate

This is the core feature. When Claude tries to complete a task:

Claude: "Done! I've implemented the feature."
  └→ stop-verify fires
       ├→ tsc --noEmit (60s timeout)
       ├→ eslint (15s timeout)
       ├→ errors scoped to files YOU changed (not pre-existing debt)
       └→ errors found? → BLOCKED. "Fix these first."
           └→ 3 consecutive blocks? → circuit breaker allows stop + final warning

No more "the code compiles in my imagination."

Zero Config, Any Stack

Clawback auto-detects your project. You don't configure anything.

Detected via	Typecheck	Lint	Format
tsconfig.json	tsc --noEmit	eslint	prettier
go.mod	go build	go vet	gofmt
Cargo.toml	cargo check	cargo clippy	cargo fmt
pyproject.toml	mypy / pyright	ruff / flake8	ruff / black
composer.json	phpstan	pint / php-cs-fixer	pint

No config file found? Hooks silently no-op. No errors, no noise.

Monorepo? Walk-up detection finds the nearest config from the edited file's directory. Different sub-projects use different tools automatically.

Your stack not listed? Extend it without forking.

Install

git clone https://github.com/LZong-tw/clawback.git
cd clawback
node install.cjs

That's it. Open Claude Code, type /hooks to verify.

Options

node install.cjs --with-read-guard    # Also block reading ~/.ssh, ~/.aws, ~/.gnupg

What it installs

• 5 hook scripts + 2 lib modules to ~/.claude/hooks/
• Merges hook config into ~/.claude/settings.json (preserves your existing hooks)
• Appends behavioral guidance to ~/.claude/CLAUDE.md (preserves your existing rules)

Uninstall

cd clawback
node uninstall.cjs    # Clean removal, restores your original settings

Design Principles

Hooks are 100% stack-agnostic. Every hook delegates to detect-stack.cjs -- the single file that knows about languages. Adding Java support means editing one file, not five.

Zero external dependencies. Node.js built-in modules only. No node_modules, no supply chain risk, no version conflicts.

Cross-platform. Windows (Git Bash / MINGW64), macOS, Linux. Path handling via path.join(), subprocess safety via platform-aware exec.cjs.

Idempotent. Run node install.cjs ten times. You get one set of hooks, not ten duplicates.

Safe to remove. node uninstall.cjs reverses everything. Your settings go back to how they were.

Adding Custom Stacks

Create ~/.clawback/detect-stack.local.js:

module.exports = function(startDir, projectRoot) {
  const fs = require('fs');
  const path = require('path');

  if (fs.existsSync(path.join(projectRoot, 'build.gradle'))) {
    return {
      typecheck: { cmd: 'javac', args: ['-d', '/tmp/clawback/classes'] },
      lint: { cmd: 'checkstyle', args: ['-c', '/google_checks.xml'] },
      lintFile: { cmd: 'checkstyle', args: ['-c', '/google_checks.xml'] },
      sourceExtensions: ['.java', '.kt'],
      lockfiles: ['gradle.lockfile'],
    };
  }
  return null;
};

Your local overrides take priority over built-in detection.

Architecture

~/.claude/hooks/
├── lib/
│   ├── detect-stack.cjs        ← sole language-aware module
│   └── exec.cjs                ← cross-platform safe subprocess
├── protect-files.cjs           ← PreToolUse (Edit|Write)
├── post-edit.cjs               ← PostToolUse (Edit|Write)
├── stop-verify.cjs             ← Stop (circuit breaker)
├── post-compact-reinject.cjs   ← PostCompact
├── notification.cjs            ← Notification
└── clawback-manifest.json      ← tracks what was installed

How the Two Layers Work

┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│  CLAUDE.md (behavioral guidance)                    │
│  "Don't touch >5 files per response"                │
│  "Re-read files after 10+ messages"                 │
│  "Log mistakes to gotchas.md"                       │
│  → Claude follows these. Usually. Hopefully.        │
├─────────────────────────────────────────────────────┤
│  Hooks (mechanical enforcement)                     │
│  protect-files  → BLOCKED. Period.                   │
│  stop-verify    → tsc fails? Can't stop. Period.     │
│  post-edit      → Formatted. Linted. Every time.     │
│  → These fire whether Claude wants them to or not.  │
└─────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘

Known Limitations

We believe in documenting what doesn't work, not hiding it.

• Bash bypass: echo secret > .env via Bash bypasses protect-files. Use Claude Code's built-in permission deny rules for shell safety.
• Windows notifications: Console bell only. No desktop toast. (PRs welcome.)
• Anti-sprawl: "Max 5 files per response" is CLAUDE.md guidance, not a hook. The hooks API has no concept of response boundaries.
• Large TypeScript: tsc timeout is 60s. Projects over 100k LOC may need incremental builds.
• TS 5.0-5.1 monorepos: tsc --build --noEmit not supported in these versions. Upgrade to 5.2+.

Testing

npm test    # 39 tests, zero dependencies

Reviewed to Death

This project went through 9 rounds of adversarial design review before a single line of code was written. The implementation plan was then reviewed through 4 more rounds of code-level attack. Every finding was fixed. The final review returned: "No further issues."

Full design spec | Implementation plan

Related

• production-verify -- Production verification framework (smoke tests + architecture proofs)
• Claude Code Hooks Guide -- Official hooks documentation

Contributing

PRs welcome. The architecture is designed for contribution:

• New language support? Edit lib/detect-stack.cjs only. No hook changes needed.
• New hook? Add to hooks/, register in install.cjs. Existing hooks untouched.
• Bug fix? 39 tests protect you from regressions.

Author

LZong -- DevOps engineer. Building tools that make AI coding actually reliable.

License

MIT