Profile

A profile is a named, on-disk configuration for the project’s .claude/ tree. Profiles live under .claude-profiles/<name>/, and exactly one profile is active at a time. The active profile is the one whose files are materialized into .claude/ for Claude Code to read.

Anatomy

.claude-profiles/
└── dev/
    ├── profile.json          # manifest — extends, includes, description, tags
    ├── CLAUDE.md             # optional: profile-managed section of project-root CLAUDE.md
    └── .claude/              # the files that get copied into ./.claude/ on `c3p use`
        ├── settings.json
        ├── agents/
        └── commands/

The profile.json manifest declares:

• extends — single-parent inheritance (extends)
• includes — additive components spliced in (includes)
• description — one-line description shown by c3p list
• tags — free-form labels (also shown by list)

Lifecycle

1. Create a profile with c3p new <name>, or seed one from your existing .claude/ tree with c3p init.
2. Switch to it with c3p use <name> — this resolves extends/includes, merges the result, and materializes the merged tree into .claude/.
3. Inspect the live tree with c3p drift and c3p status; compare profiles with c3p diff.
4. Re-apply source edits with c3p sync.

Why profiles, not branches?

Profiles are checked into git as source bytes. The active profile and the materialized .claude/ tree are artifacts — derived state. You commit the profile sources; the live tree is regenerated on each swap.

This means switching contexts (solo dev → team lead → CI) takes a single command, not a git stash/git checkout dance.