Context Shunt — Read Cheap, Keep Context Small

Reading big files into context is the most expensive thing an agent does for the least reasoning value. The shunt hands those reads to a cheap worker model (bulk-read) that answers a question about the files and returns a compact summary. The raw bytes never enter this session's context.

This is orthogonal to whole-turn routing (srooter / route-task): those pick the model for the turn; the shunt trims what a tool call pulls into context when the turn is legitimately here.

Decision: read raw, shunt, or graph?

• Editing this exact file — read it raw. You need every line; never edit against a summary.
• A fact/answer across large or many files — bulk-read "<question>" file....
• A code symbol (function/class/route) — get_code_snippet(qualified_name): free and exact.
• Small file (under threshold) you need in full — read it raw.

A shunt answer is for understanding, not for producing a diff.