Fluffy Parrot

Tuning Claude until you can feel what changed.

Getting closer to the Claude API

I wanted to build Fluffy Parrot to get closer to the Claude API. There are options and parameters available through the API that you don't normally see in a chat interface, but they can have a significant impact on what you're building. I wanted a surface where I could explore those controls and understand what changing them did to the output.

Inspired by the VSTs of my youth

Live music and audio controllers are part of my world, as you can see in Maschine Code. For Fluffy Parrot, I took inspiration from the VSTs of my youth: the software instruments and effects I used when making music.

That led to a fun, playful interface with knobs for adjusting the model's settings. I wanted experimenting with the API to feel hands-on, with controls I enjoyed using.

Tweak, run and compare

I can enter a prompt, run it, tweak the parameters and run it again, then compare the outputs side by side. Each run keeps its own tab, along with its cost and timing, so I can look back at what changed.

That gives me a way to consistently test how different settings affect the output in my projects. I can fine-tune the work by comparing the results, while having fun with the process.

A tool for my own experiments

Fluffy Parrot is free and open source. It stores the API key in the Mac Keychain and sends requests directly to Anthropic, without a separate Fluffy Parrot backend.

For me, it brings together an interest in how models behave with the kind of playful controls I've always enjoyed in music software.

Built with: Electron, React, TypeScript, the Claude API, Claude Code

Part of the Rolling Waves work archive.