{"version":"2.1.288","anchor":"the-read-tool-description-lost-text","canonical_anchor":"the-read-tool-description-lost-text","heading":"Read tool instructions no longer include the PDF page-range guidance","tier":"notice","area":"File Tools","scope":"individual","heads_up":false,"url":"https:\/\/changelogs.core-directive.com\/v\/2.1.288\/e\/the-read-tool-description-lost-text","release_url":"https:\/\/changelogs.core-directive.com\/v\/2.1.288","markdown":"### Read tool instructions no longer include the PDF page-range guidance\n\nThe instructions Claude gets for opening files dropped the paragraph about reading PDFs and asking for page ranges on large ones\n\n**Unclear.** The prompt ledger records the longest Read description as unchanged in this release, so it is unclear which model's instructions lost the paragraph.\n\n**What**\n\nThe Read tool is what Claude uses to open files. The instructions Claude Code sends to Claude about it no longer include this paragraph on PDFs: that it can read PDF files, that for PDFs over 10 pages it must ask for specific pages (such as \"1-5\"), that reading a large PDF without doing so will fail, and that the limit is 20 pages per request. This was seen in the instructions for both the command line and the SDK.\n\n**Why**\n\nClaude's own instructions shape how it behaves, so Claude is no longer told up front how to handle large PDFs. Nothing here shows whether the Read tool's actual handling of PDFs changed.\n\n- Area: File Tools\n- Tier: You'll notice\n- Useful: 2\/5\n- Signal: 2\/5\n- Scope: individual\n- Heads-up: no"}