kill-ai-slop

# Kill AI Slop AI slop is **ugly** in a specific way: it piles on every possible style and detail without settling on a focus. A gradient, a glow, a mascot, emoji, a wall of glowing cards, every default switched on at once, until every product looks like the same garish template. It reads as "designed" in a thumbnail and falls apart the moment anyone looks. Your job is to strip it back to something a person would actually choose. The principles, held on every fix you make: 1. **Decide before you decorate.** Every visual choice must be explainable. 2. **One accent, one voice.** 3. **Hierarchy from scale and space.** Coloring words or swapping fonts is a shortcut. 4. **Subtract first.** The first move toward not-ugly is removing things. 5. **Specific beats punchy** in copy. 6. **Decoration must mean something** — icons, badges, callouts are signals. ## Workflow Follow these steps in order. Do not mass-edit before the user has seen the report. ### 1. Scope Confirm what to scan. Default to the app/site source (skip `node_modules`, `dist`, `build`, `.git`, `vendor`, lockfiles, minified files). Ask if the project mixes several apps. ### 2. Scan Run the bundled scanner, which greps the codebase for the code-level signals of each tell and prints grouped `file:line` hits: ``` node scripts/scan.mjs <root> # human-readable report node scripts/scan.mjs <root> --json # machine-readable, for triage ``` It is pure Node (no dependencies) and never edits files. Use its output as a starting map, not gospel — confirm each hit by reading the code. To narrow a scan: `--only=01,06` / `--skip=19` filter by tell id, and `--exclude=legacy` drops paths (substring match on the project-relative path). `--rules=extra.mjs` loads additional project- or language-specific tells (`scripts/rules.ru.mjs` is a shipped Russian-copy example and the template for your own). Hits the user has confirmed as intentional can be pinned in source with `deslop-ignore`, `deslop-ignore-next-line 06`, or `deslop-ignore-file` comments — prefer the id-scoped forms so new tells still surface. ### 3. Triage For every hit, open the file and decide **slop vs. intentional**. This is the step that separates this skill from a lint rule. A gradient, a serif, or an emoji can be a real, defended choice. Keep anything the user clearly chose (brand tokens, a logo, a deliberate illustration). Flag only defaults. Read `references/taxonomy.md` for what each tell is and why it reads as machine-made, and `references/detection.md` for the exact patterns and their common false positives. ### 4. Report Before changing anything, give the user a grouped summary: each tell, the `file:line` hits you confirmed, one sentence on why, and the proposed fix. Mirror the format: ``` slop src/Hero.tsx:12 indigo→violet gradient → one solid accent slop src/Hero.tsx:31 gradient-clip headline → solid ink, scale up slop src/Note.tsx:8 border-l-4 callout ×3 → 1 aside, rest is body slop copy.md:1 "not just X — it's Y" → say the specific thing → 4 groups, 11 hits. ``` Then ask which groups to apply, or whether to proceed on all. ### 5. Fix Apply the minimal change that removes the tell while preserving intent and function. Use `references/fixes.md` for the before→after pattern per tell. - Prefer editing shared tokens/components over touching every call site. - Never invent new brand colors; if a palette must change, propose neutrals + the project's existing accent and let the user confirm. - Keep copy meaning; make it specific, don't just delete it. - Re-run the scanner after fixing to confirm the count dropped, and note any hits you intentionally left (with the reason). ## Guardrails - **Respect authorship.** Treat unfamiliar files and deliberate flourishes as someone's choice. When unsure whether something is slop, ask — don't strip it. - **Small, reviewable diffs.** Never reformat unrelated code. Never run `git add -A`; stage explicit files only, and leave others' work-in-progress alone. - **No new dependencies** to do this work. - **Verify visually when possible.** If a dev server exists, look at the before and after; a passing scan is not the same as a better page. ## References - `references/taxonomy.md` — the 35 tells: what each is, why it's slop, the fix. - `references/detection.md` — concrete ripgrep/regex patterns + false positives. - `references/fixes.md` — before→after remediation patterns. - `scripts/scan.mjs` — the dependency-free scanner.