1---
  2name: handling-customer-data
  3description: Handles customer data responsibly by answering questions ABOUT data without ever seeing the data directly. Use when querying Redis, databases, logs, or any source containing customer information like JIDs, emails, phone numbers, or account details.
  4license: GPL-3.0-or-later
  5metadata:
  6  author: Amolith <amolith@secluded.site>
  7---
  8
  9**You must NEVER see customer data directly.** When working with data that may contain customer information (JIDs, emails, phone numbers, names, account IDs, etc.), filter through shell tools to answer questions about the data without the data itself appearing in your context.
 10
 11## Core principle
 12
 13Answer questions ABOUT data, not WITH data. The user may see data directly; you may not.
 14
 15## Approved patterns
 16
 17### Counting matches
 18
 19```bash
 20redis-cli KEYS "pattern-*" | wc -l
 21grep -c "pattern" file.txt
 22```
 23
 24### Boolean checks
 25
 26```bash
 27redis-cli KEYS "pattern-*" | grep -qE "[A-Z]" && echo TRUE || echo FALSE
 28```
 29
 30### Saving for user review
 31
 32```bash
 33redis-cli KEYS "pattern-*" | grep -E "[A-Z]" > results.txt
 34# Report: "Saved N results to results.txt"
 35```
 36
 37### Aggregations
 38
 39```bash
 40redis-cli KEYS "prefix-*" | wc -l
 41cat file.txt | cut -d',' -f2 | sort | uniq -c | sort -rn | head -5
 42# Report: "Top 5 categories by count: [counts only, not values]"
 43```
 44
 45## Prohibited patterns
 46
 47**Never do these:**
 48
 49```bash
 50# DON'T: Print matching data
 51redis-cli KEYS "pattern-*" | grep "something"
 52
 53# DON'T: Show file contents with customer data
 54cat customer_jids.txt
 55
 56# DON'T: Display query results
 57redis-cli GET "jmp_customer_jid-12345"
 58
 59# DON'T: Print filtered results
 60grep "error" /var/log/app.log  # if log contains customer data
 61```
 62
 63## Decision flow
 64
 651. **Does this data source contain customer information?**
 66   - Redis keys/values with JIDs, emails, phones → Yes
 67   - Application logs → Likely yes
 68   - Database tables with customer columns → Yes
 69   - Configuration files → Usually no
 70
 712. **What question am I answering?**
 72   - "How many?" → Use `wc -l`, `grep -c`
 73   - "Does X exist?" → Use `grep -q && echo TRUE || echo FALSE`
 74   - "Which ones match?" → Save to file, report count only
 75   - "What are the values?" → **Stop. Ask user to look directly.**
 76
 773. **Will the output appear in my response?**
 78   - If yes and contains customer data → Redirect to file instead
 79   - If yes and only contains counts/booleans → Acceptable
 80
 81## Example session
 82
 83**User**: "Are there any uppercase JIDs in Redis?"
 84
 85**Good**:
 86```bash
 87redis-cli KEYS "jmp_customer_id-*" | grep -qE "[A-Z]" && echo TRUE || echo FALSE
 88```
 89Response: "TRUE - there are uppercase characters in some JID keys."
 90
 91**User**: "How many?"
 92
 93**Good**:
 94```bash
 95redis-cli KEYS "jmp_customer_id-*" | grep -cE "[A-Z]"
 96```
 97Response: "52 keys contain uppercase characters."
 98
 99**User**: "Which ones?"
100
101**Good**:
102```bash
103redis-cli KEYS "jmp_customer_id-*" | grep -E "[A-Z]" > uppercase_jids.txt
104```
105Response: "Saved to `uppercase_jids.txt`. You can review the file directly."
106
107**Bad** (never do this):
108```bash
109redis-cli KEYS "jmp_customer_id-*" | grep -E "[A-Z]"
110```
111This would print customer JIDs into the response.
112
113## When in doubt
114
115If you're uncertain whether output contains customer data, assume it does. Redirect to a file and let the user review.