{"id":"2816bf39-63eb-49f0-bdf8-cea29ae969d0","shortId":"LvuRGL","kind":"skill","title":"writing-clearly-and-concisely","tagline":"Use when writing prose humans will read—documentation, commit messages, error messages, explanations, reports, or UI text. Applies Strunk's timeless rules for clearer, stronger, more professional writing.","description":"# Writing Clearly and Concisely\n\n## Overview\n\nWrite with clarity and force. This skill covers what to do (Strunk) and what not to do (AI patterns).\n\n## When to Use This Skill\n\nUse this skill whenever you write prose for humans:\n\n- Documentation, README files, technical explanations\n- Commit messages, pull request descriptions\n- Error messages, UI copy, help text, comments\n- Reports, summaries, or any explanation\n- Editing to improve clarity\n\n**If you're writing sentences for a human to read, use this skill.**\n\n## Limited Context Strategy\n\nWhen context is tight:\n\n1. Write your draft using judgment\n2. Dispatch a subagent with your draft and the relevant section file\n3. Have the subagent copyedit and return the revision\n\nLoading a single section (~1,000-4,500 tokens) instead of everything saves significant context.\n\n## Elements of Style\n\nWilliam Strunk Jr.'s *The Elements of Style* (1918) teaches you to write clearly and cut ruthlessly.\n\n### Rules\n\n**Elementary Rules of Usage (Grammar/Punctuation)**:\n\n1. Form possessive singular by adding 's\n2. Use comma after each term in series except last\n3. Enclose parenthetic expressions between commas\n4. Comma before conjunction introducing co-ordinate clause\n5. Don't join independent clauses by comma\n6. Don't break sentences in two\n7. Participial phrase at beginning refers to grammatical subject\n\n**Elementary Principles of Composition**:\n\n8. One paragraph per topic\n9. Begin paragraph with topic sentence\n10. **Use active voice**\n11. **Put statements in positive form**\n12. **Use definite, specific, concrete language**\n13. **Omit needless words**\n14. Avoid succession of loose sentences\n15. Express co-ordinate ideas in similar form\n16. **Keep related words together**\n17. Keep to one tense in summaries\n18. **Place emphatic words at end of sentence**\n\n### Reference Files\n\nThe rules above are summarized from Strunk's original text. For complete explanations with examples:\n\n| Section | File | ~Tokens |\n|---------|------|---------|\n| Grammar, punctuation, comma rules | `02-elementary-rules-of-usage.md` | 2,500 |\n| Paragraph structure, active voice, concision | `03-elementary-principles-of-composition.md` | 4,500 |\n| Headings, quotations, formatting | `04-a-few-matters-of-form.md` | 1,000 |\n| Word choice, common errors | `05-words-and-expressions-commonly-misused.md` | 4,000 |\n\n**Most tasks need only `03-elementary-principles-of-composition.md`** — it covers active voice, positive form, concrete language, and omitting needless words.\n\n## AI Writing Patterns to Avoid\n\nLLMs regress to statistical means, producing generic, puffy prose. Avoid:\n\n- **Puffery:** pivotal, crucial, vital, testament, enduring legacy\n- **Empty \"-ing\" phrases:** ensuring reliability, showcasing features, highlighting capabilities\n- **Promotional adjectives:** groundbreaking, seamless, robust, cutting-edge\n- **Overused AI vocabulary:** delve, leverage, multifaceted, foster, realm, tapestry\n- **Formatting overuse:** excessive bullets, emoji decorations, bold on every other word\n\nBe specific, not grandiose. Say what it actually does.\n\nFor comprehensive research on why these patterns occur, see `signs-of-ai-writing.md`. Wikipedia editors developed this guide to detect AI-generated submissions — their patterns are well-documented and field-tested.\n\n## Bottom Line\n\nWriting for humans? Load the relevant section from `elements-of-style/` and apply the rules. 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