10 prompt patterns I use every single day

10 Prompt Patterns I Use Every Single Day Last Tuesday I spent 40 minutes arguing with Claude about a database schema before I realized I had never told it what I already tried. I described the problem, it gave me the same three suggestions I had already ruled out, I pushed back, it apologized and gave me variations of the same three suggestions. The entire session was garbage because I started from zero instead of from where I actually was. I closed the tab, rewrote my first message, and had a working solution in six minutes. That gap — between how most people prompt and how it actually works when you treat the model like a collaborator who needs real context — is what this post is about. Pattern 1 & 2: Lead With What You Already Tried, and State the Constraint That Binds You These two patterns are almost always used together, so I won't pretend they're separate. When you describe a problem without the history of your attempts, you are forcing the model to rediscover your dead ends. Every developer knows this frustration: you explain a bug, get back a solution you tried on Monday, explain you tried that, get a variation, explain that too — it's a recursive waste. The fix is brutal honesty upfront: "I need X. I already tried A and B. A failed because [specific reason]. B is off the table because [constraint]. Don't suggest either." The constraint layer is the other half. Models are optimists by default. They will give you the architecturally clean, perfectly testable solution that requires three new dependencies and a refactor of your auth layer. Unless you tell them you are shipping in two days, can't add dependencies, and the code needs to be readable by someone who last touched Python in 2019. Constraints aren't limitations on the answer — they are the answer. Front-load them or you will spend the session rejecting suggestions that are technically correct but situationally useless. Pattern 3 & 4: Output First, Reasoning After — and Diff Only, Not Rewrites Two sid