| name | deslop |
| description | Remove AI-generated code slop, unnecessary comments, and over-engineering from the current branch diff. Cleans up boilerplate, simplifies abstractions, strips defensive code, and in skill-file mode lints SKILL.md files for quality. Use when cleaning up code, simplifying, removing boilerplate, before committing, or when reviewing a skill before promoting it. |
Remove AI Code Slop
Check the diff against main and remove AI-generated slop introduced in the branch.
Trigger
Use after completing changes, before committing, or when code feels over-engineered.
Commands
git fetch origin main
git diff origin/main...HEAD --stat
git diff origin/main...HEAD
Workflow
- Run diff commands to see all changes on the branch.
- Identify slop patterns from the focus areas below.
- Apply minimal, focused edits to remove slop.
- Re-run
git diff origin/main...HEAD to verify only slop was removed.
- Run tests or type-check to confirm behaviour unchanged:
npm test -- --changed --passWithNoTests 2>&1 | tail -10
- Summarise what was cleaned.
Focus Areas
- Extra comments that state the obvious or are inconsistent with local style
- Defensive try/catch blocks that are abnormal for trusted internal code paths
- Casts to
any used only to bypass type issues
- Over-engineered abstractions for one-time operations (premature helpers, factories)
- Deeply nested code that should be simplified with early returns
- Backwards-compatibility hacks (renamed
_vars, re-exports, // removed comments)
- Features, refactoring, or "improvements" beyond what was requested
- Added docstrings, type annotations, or comments on code that wasn't changed
- Error handling for scenarios that can't happen in trusted internal paths
Guardrails
- Keep behavior unchanged unless fixing a clear bug.
- Prefer minimal, focused edits over broad rewrites.
- Three similar lines of code is better than a premature abstraction.
- If you remove something, verify it's truly unused first.
- Keep the final summary concise (1-3 sentences).
Skill-file mode
When the target is a SKILL.md (not a code diff), lint it against the same
slop instinct applied to prose. Run this before promoting a skill. Flag:
- Stale lines - guidance written for an old version of the skill that no
longer matches what it does. Cut it.
- Bloat - the skill runs past one screen with detail that belongs in a
linked reference. Push it down: in-skill step, then in-skill reference, then
an external file behind a pointer.
- Dead sentences - a line that changes nothing if deleted. Delete it.
- Duplication - the same instruction stated in two places, so edits drift.
Keep one source of truth.
- Premature stop - the method ends before the work does (asks the question
but never records the answer, cleans but never verifies).
- Weak anchor - no single concept the skill turns on. A skill the reader
can name in one word triggers and executes in fewer tokens.
- Missing invocation intent - no declared human-run vs auto-triggered mode.
See
rules/skill-conventions.mdc.
- Wrong write op - a state-changing skill that does not say whether it
adds, updates, or appends, or that duplicates its output on a second run.
Skill-file mode output: the flagged issues by line, the edits applied,
the cleanup summary, and whether the skill is ready to promote.
Output (code mode)
- List of slop patterns found with file locations
- Edits applied
- One-line summary of what was cleaned
