How Brendan works with Claude

One person, two machines, five layers, and a dozen business systems. A plain-files second brain holds knowledge and state, GitHub carries instructions and code to an always-on Mac mini, and every write to money or email passes a human. Click any box in the map to see what it is and what touches it.

Verified against both machines on 2026-10-15Public edition: machine names, people, credentials and internal findings are left out on purpose

LAYER 1Knowledge and stateAn Obsidian vault: projects, references, tasks, decisions, journal, inboxPlain markdown and JSON. Never in git.

LAYER 2MemoryAbout 200 files, one fact each, shared by both machines through the vaultClaude edits them in place

LAYER 3HarnessGlobal instructions, 40 slash commands, 41 skills, three plugin marketplacesA private git repo cloned to ~/.claude on both machines

LAYER 4CodeAPI clients, MCP servers, engines, web tools~/scripts: 60-odd directories, mostly private repos

LAYER 5Runtime and systems of recordMission Control on the mini; QuickBooks, Ramp, Shopify, HubSpot and the restReached through APIs, never copied

The map

Phone

Credentials

Laptop · canonical author

GitHub

Mac mini · always on · runs everything scheduled

Systems of record · reached through API, MCP or a browser session · never copied

Team

knowledge + statememoryharnesscoderuntimesystems of recordteamcredentials

Detail

Click a box

Each box names its home, who writes it, how it reaches the other machine, and what it must never hold. The lines are the transports: Obsidian Sync, git pull, the replicator, and the API or MCP calls to the business systems.

Ten rules of the road

The vault stays. It is the second brain and the state store. Other tools attach to it; nothing replaces it.

Facts from the source system, routing from a table, execution from code, judgment from the model. A repeated problem is fixed in code or a rules table, never in prompt text.

Deployed means read back from the machine that runs it. A commit, a push, or an exit code of zero proves nothing.

One transport per tree. Each directory reaches the mini by git pull or by the replicator, never both.

No email sends and no financial writes without approval. A clear "send it", an Approve on a Desk card that shows the full draft or write, or a skill's own approval point.

The task inbox is Brendan's. Agents capture only their own work; anything for him goes through a Desk card.

Journal is read-only to Claude. Projects are read-write. Memory is edited in place, never stacked on stale facts.

Secrets live in the password manager, never in git. The vault, machine settings and credentials stay out of GitHub.

The Controller's world has a hard edge. Never Mission Control, payroll, commissions, or ownership matters.

Merges happen in the session. Show the diff, get one "ship it", merge, confirm delivery.

How things move

A thought becomes a task

Phone appends to one capture file, or anything calls the task API
Mini sweeps every 3 minutes into an append-only event log
An agent clarifies; the server auto-files above a confidence threshold
Money, deadline, or person rules hold it for Brendan

Brendan's inbox is his

An email becomes work

Superhuman thread → Mission Control triage on the mini
A validation door repairs the card from the source
One Desk card per thread, full draft inside
Approve on the card is the send approval

one Approve, never implied

A scheduled skill runs

Registry entry → cron engine on the mini
The Agent SDK runs the command from ~/.claude
The skill reads memory and rules tables, calls MCP, Python clients, a browser
Writes after its own approval point; files one card if it needs a human

evidence is the artifact it wrote

Code reaches the mini

Edit on the laptop, commit, push
Both machines pull every 10 minutes with a read-only key
Everything not git-delivered rides a one-way replicator every 15 minutes
Mission Control ships through one script that verifies the mini's health endpoint

exactly one transport per tree

A team skill reaches everyone

Edit the team marketplace repo, open a PR
A code owner reviews; one approval
Merge; every staff machine pulls at its next session start
The same content renders to the internal wiki

Brendan's own commands never travel this way

The Controller gets accounting work

A front-door repo plus the accounting code repos
Cloned on the Controller's own machine with their own tokens
The accounting GitHub team has write; the mini is not involved

never Mission Control, payroll, commissions

Which Claude surface sees what

What the terminal has	Desktop Code tab	Desktop Cowork	claude.ai chat	Claude Code on the web	Mission Control (mini)
Global + vault CLAUDE.md	Yes	Partial	No	No (the vault is not a repo)	Yes
40 commands, 41 skills	Yes	No, upload to Customize	Only uploaded skills	Account skills only	Yes
Plugins from settings.json marketplaces	Yes	No, account plugins only	No	No	Yes
Local MCP servers	Yes	No	No	No	Yes
claude.ai connectors	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Auto memory	Yes	Not stated	Separate store	No	Yes
Scheduled runs	Only while the app is open	Scheduled sessions	No	Routines: cloud, repo-based, no local MCP	The real scheduler

The desktop app felt like a different product because Cowork and chat are the claude.ai product and do not read ~/.claude. Open the vault in the desktop app's Code tab and it is the terminal session with a window around it.

Where a new thing goes

Is it a secret?The password manager. Stop.
Payroll, commissions, individual pay, ownership, cap table?Brendan-only: the vault with a sensitive tag, or a personal private repo. Never the company org, never the Controller's repos.
Does an agent execute it?Code or skill: ~/scripts or ~/.claude for Brendan, the team marketplace for the team. Versioned, tested where possible.
Does an agent only read it?Knowledge: the memory folder (Claude's facts), References (shared context), a plugin's docs (team context).
Does another person edit it with you?Not the vault. GitHub if reviewed or versioned, Drive if a record, Notion only for the team's reading and tracking layer.
Does it change many times a day?Mission Control (task store, Desk) or the business system of record. Never a hand-edited markdown file.
Is it a one-time answer?It stays in the conversation.

The team layer: what goes where

Artifact	Home	Why
Brendan's journal, memory, projects, session logs	Vault	One editor, local-first, greppable by local agents
Code and every skill or rules table an agent executes	GitHub, canonical	The PR is the control gate; Anthropic's own guidance commits skills to version control
Mirrors of pure-instruction team skills for non-terminal staff	Notion skills library, labelled with the commit	Run with / from Notion; a badge shows staleness
"How we work with AI" wiki, who owns what, meeting notes, decisions log	Notion, verified pages	Non-technical editors; agents read it over MCP
Coffee launch tracker and other team databases	Notion	Triggers and column permissions
Marketing tasks	Asana	Unchanged
Signed agreements, board PDFs, job descriptions, the sheets tools read	Drive	Immutable records; searchable from Notion
Brendan's tasks and the Desk	Mission Control	State with an API; never shared
Payroll, commissions, comp, cap table, HR	Brendan-only, never Notion	Standing rule
The Controller's accounting workflows	GitHub accounting repos	Deterministic scripts with tests