| name | writing-clearly |
| description | Rules for clear, concise writing. Apply when drafting or editing docs, READMEs, comments, commit bodies, or any user-facing prose. |
Writing Clearly and Concisely
Adapted from softaworks/agent-toolkit
Overview
Write with clarity and force. This skill covers what to do (Strunk) and what not to do (AI patterns).
When to Use This Skill
Use this skill whenever you write prose for humans:
- Documentation, README files, technical explanations
- Commit messages, pull request descriptions
- Error messages, UI copy, help text, comments
- Reports, summaries, or any explanation
- Editing to improve clarity
If you're writing sentences for a human to read, use this skill.
Elements of Style
William Strunk Jr.'s The Elements of Style (1918) teaches you to write clearly and cut ruthlessly.
Rules
Elementary Rules of Usage (Grammar/Punctuation):
- Form possessive singular by adding 's
- Use comma after each term in series except last
- Enclose parenthetic expressions between commas
- Comma before conjunction introducing co-ordinate clause
- Don't join independent clauses by comma
- Don't break sentences in two
- Participial phrase at beginning refers to grammatical subject
Elementary Principles of Composition:
- One paragraph per topic
- Begin paragraph with topic sentence
- Use active voice
- Put statements in positive form
- Use definite, specific, concrete language
- Omit needless words
- Avoid succession of loose sentences
- Express co-ordinate ideas in similar form
- Keep related words together
- Keep to one tense in summaries
- Place emphatic words at end of sentence
The Most Important Rules (10-13, 16, 18)
- Active voice: "The team shipped the feature" not "The feature was shipped by the team"
- Positive form: "He forgot" not "He did not remember"
- Specific language: "It rained every day for a week" not "A period of unfavorable weather set in"
- Omit needless words: "The question as to whether" → "Whether". "He is a man who" → "He". "The reason why is that" → "Because"
- Keep related words together: Subject near verb, modifier near the word it modifies
- Emphatic words at end: "Humanity has barely noticed this loss" not "This loss has barely been noticed by humanity"
AI Writing Patterns to Avoid
LLMs regress to statistical means, producing generic, puffy prose. Avoid:
- Puffery: pivotal, crucial, vital, testament, enduring legacy
- Empty "-ing" phrases: ensuring reliability, showcasing features, highlighting capabilities
- Promotional adjectives: groundbreaking, seamless, robust, cutting-edge
- Overused AI vocabulary: delve, leverage, multifaceted, foster, realm, tapestry
- Formatting overuse: excessive bullets, emoji decorations, bold on every other word
Be specific, not grandiose. Say what it actually does.
For the full catalog of AI writing tells (sentence structure, tone, composition patterns), use /write-as-human.
Bottom Line
When writing for humans: use active voice, put statements in positive form, be specific, and omit needless words. If it sounds like marketing copy, rewrite it.
