Cheat sheet

Prompt Engineering

Prompt structure, examples, reasoning, tools, retrieval, structured output, injection defense, evaluation, and production habits.

Task	Key instruction
Classification	Closed label set, definitions, "other" option
Extraction	Exact fields, null when absent, no guessing
Summarization	Audience, length, what to keep or drop
Rewriting	Preserve meaning; change only tone or length
Coding	Language, version, tests, no placeholder code
SQL	Schema, dialect, read-only, explain assumptions

Failure	Fix
Ignores the format	Show an exact example; restate the format at the end
Too verbose	Set length limits; ask for bullets
Hallucinated facts	Ground in sources; allow "unknown"
Inconsistent labels	Define each label; add contrastive examples
Follows injected text	Delimit data; enforce rules in code
Drifts on long inputs	Chunk the input; summarize, then answer