Claude Code Vocabulary — Plain English Translation

01 / Tools

What Claude uses to do work.

These are the tools Claude Code has on its belt. When you see one of these words appear, that's Claude reaching for a specific capability — like a chef pulling a knife versus a whisk.

Grep

Find Text

"Search inside files for specific text."

Looks inside files for words, code, or patterns. The most-used tool. Built on a fast tool called ripgrep.

Plain talk: "Find every place I mention 'Schneider' in my notes."

Glob

Find Files

"Find files by their name."

Searches for files matching a name pattern. Where Grep looks inside files, Glob just finds the files themselves.

Plain talk: "Find every file with 'CHARLES' in the name."

Read

Open File

"Open this file and look at it."

Reads the contents of one specific file. Like double-clicking a doc to see what's in it.

Plain talk: "Open my CLAUDE.md and tell me what's in it."

Write

Create File

"Make a new file from scratch."

Creates a new file (or completely replaces an existing one). Different from Edit — Edit is surgical, Write is total.

Plain talk: "Create a new proposal file with this content."

Edit

Change File

"Make a precise change inside a file."

Surgical. Finds an exact string and swaps it for a new one. Safer than rewriting the whole file.

Plain talk: "Change just this one paragraph and leave the rest alone."

MultiEdit

Batch Edit

"Make several small changes at once."

Same as Edit but for multiple changes in one shot. Faster than Edit, Edit, Edit, Edit.

Plain talk: "Make these five changes to the file in one pass."

Bash

Run Command

"Run a command in the terminal."

Lets Claude run actual shell commands — git, npm, curl, anything. This is the powerful one. Where most "do something real" actions happen.

Plain talk: "Run git status and tell me what's changed."

LS

List Folder

"Show me what's in this folder."

Lists files and folders in a directory. Same as opening Finder and seeing what's inside.

Plain talk: "What's in my CORTEX folder?"

WebFetch

Get Web Page

"Go grab the content of a webpage."

Fetches a specific URL and reads what's there. Different from WebSearch (which searches the whole internet).

Plain talk: "Open loftsixfour.com and read what's on the homepage."

WebSearch

Search Web

"Search the internet like Google."

Runs a web search and gets results. Used when Claude doesn't already know something.

Plain talk: "Search the web for 'rooftop pool waterproofing'."

Task

Send a Subagent

"Send a helper off to do something while I keep working."

Launches a subagent — your CORTEX/PITCH/SCOUT/RIFF setup uses this. The subagent does its thing and reports back with only the answer.

Plain talk: "Have SCOUT research this and come back with a summary."

TodoWrite

Track Tasks

"Make and update a checklist of what I'm doing."

Claude creates a visible to-do list for multi-step jobs, marking items done as it goes. Like a project plan you can watch.

Plain talk: "Show me a checklist as you work so I can see progress."

02 / Verbs

What Claude says it's doing.

These are the action words Claude uses as it narrates its work. When you see these, you know roughly what's happening under the hood.

Searching

Verb

"I'm looking for something."

Could mean Grep (text inside files), Glob (file names), or WebSearch (the internet). Context tells you which.

Scanning

Verb

"I'm getting a lay of the land."

Reading multiple files to understand the structure before doing anything. Often done by a subagent in Plan Mode.

Parsing

Verb

"I'm breaking this down into pieces I understand."

Reading data or code and pulling structure out of it. Like skimming a contract and listing the key clauses.

Batching

Verb

"I'm doing several things at once instead of one by one."

Running multiple tool calls in parallel. Faster than going one-at-a-time.

Iterating

Verb

"I'm doing it, checking the result, then adjusting."

Try → see error → fix → try again. The core agent loop. When you see this, Claude is in a debug rhythm.

Delegating

Verb

"I'm handing this off to a subagent."

Spawning a helper to handle a side task. Common in Plan Mode for repo exploration.

Compacting

Verb

"I'm summarizing our conversation to save space."

Triggered by /compact. Compresses the chat history into a dense summary so you can keep working without hitting the context ceiling.

Diffing

Verb

"I'm comparing two versions to see what changed."

From git diff. Shows the difference between two versions of a file, line by line.

Staging

Verb

"I'm gathering changes I plan to save."

A git step. Marks files as ready to be committed. Like putting items in a shopping cart before checkout.

Committing

Verb

"I'm saving a snapshot of the current state."

A git commit. Locks in a version you can roll back to later. Like saving a checkpoint in a game.

03 / Concepts

The infrastructure words.

These come up constantly. Once you know what they mean, half of Claude Code's output makes sense.

Repo / Repository

Concept

"A project folder, version-tracked."

Short for repository. A folder containing your project plus a hidden history of every version of every file. Your CORTEX vault is one.

Codebase

Concept

"All the files in this project."

The full collection of files in the repo. When Claude says "scanning the codebase," it means reading across all your project files.

Words from the coding world.

You don't need to write code, but these words will come up. Knowing what they mean lets you read what Claude says without guessing.

Function

Code

"A reusable chunk of code that does one thing."

Like a recipe step you can call by name. Pass in ingredients, get back a result.

Variable

Code

"A named container holding a value."

Like a labeled box. clientName = "Schneider" stores "Schneider" in a box labeled clientName.

String

Code

"A piece of text."

Anything in quotes. "Hello" is a string. "Schneider Haus" is a string.

Array

Code

"A list of things in order."

Like a numbered list. ["Allie", "Nate", "Avery"] is an array of three names.

Object

Code

"A bundle of related labels and values."

Like a contact card. {name: "Brandon", role: "CVO"} is an object with two fields.

Regex

Code

"A pattern for matching text."

Short for regular expression. A cryptic-looking pattern that finds matching strings. Grep uses regex.

Syntax

Code

"The grammar rules of a programming language."

Misplaced comma = syntax error. The structure has to be exactly right or the code breaks.

Bug

Code

"A defect in the code."

Something that's not working as intended. "Debugging" = finding and fixing bugs.

Refactor

Code

"Reorganize code without changing what it does."

Like rearranging furniture in a room — same room, better layout.

API

Code

"A doorway one program uses to talk to another."

Application Programming Interface. How Monday.com and Gmail and Claude all talk to each other.

JSON

Code

"A standard way to write structured data."

Curly braces, quotes, key-value pairs. The most common format for passing data between systems.

Branch

Code

"A parallel version of your project."

A git concept. Lets you experiment without messing up the main version. Like a working sketch versus the final drawing.

05 / Quick

Quick translate.

The fastest reference. See it. Know what it means. Move on.

When you see

Grep

It means

Searching inside files

When you see

Glob

It means

Finding files by name

When you see

Read

It means

Opening a file

When you see

Write

It means

Creating a new file

When you see

Edit

It means

Changing part of a file

When you see

Bash

It means

Running a terminal command

When you see

Task

It means

Sending a subagent

When you see

Context

It means

Working memory

When you see

Repo

It means

Your project folder