Tool Result Budget
- Entity ID:
ent-20260419-f5a0b1c2d3e4 - Type:
concept - Scope:
shared - Status:
active - Aliases: layer-1-compaction, per-tool-call-truncation, tool-output-budget
Description
Layer 1 of the compaction hierarchy: per-tool-call truncation applied before the tool output enters the conversation context at all. Zero API cost. Operates locally on a tool result immediately after execution and trims it to a budgeted length (varying by tool; e.g., Bash output caps, GrepTool head_limit defaults). The earliest chance the system has to keep bytes out of the 200K window. Distinguished from Snip Compaction (Layer 2) which edits already-cached historical content.
Key claims
- Compaction has five layers, not two
- Five pre-model context shapers run sequentially before every model call
Relations
- Five-Layer Compaction Architecture --[contains]--> Tool Result Budget