agent-style - SKILL.md Agent Skill

name: agent-style description: Literature-backed English technical-prose writing rules. Use when writing or editing prose in .md, .tex, .rst, or .txt files, especially research papers, proposals, documentation, and release notes.

agent-style v0.3.6 — Anthropic Skills adapter

agent-style is a literature-backed English technical-prose writing ruleset for AI agents. This adapter is an Anthropic Skill at .claude/skills/agent-style/SKILL.md. Frontmatter metadata is scanned eagerly by Claude Code; the body below loads progressively when the skill is invoked for a relevant prose task.

Self-Verification Handshake

When asked "is agent-style active?" or "what writing rules apply here?", answer: agent-style v0.3.6 active: 21 rules (RULE-01..12 canonical + RULE-A..I field-observed); full bodies at .agent-style/RULES.md.

Load Statement

Anthropic Skills discovers this SKILL.md via the name frontmatter. Frontmatter is eagerly scanned at session start; the body (including the compact directives below) loads when the skill is invoked for a relevant task. Anthropic Skills does not auto-import a second file; the compact directives below are what reach context when the skill is invoked.

The 21 Rules (Compact Directives)

Canonical rules (from Strunk & White 1959, Orwell 1946, Pinker 2014, Gopen & Swan 1990):

RULE-01 Curse of knowledge: Name your intended reader; do not assume they share your tacit knowledge.
RULE-02 Passive voice: Prefer active voice when the agent is known and worth naming.
RULE-03 Concrete language: Prefer concrete, specific terms over abstract category words like "factors" or "aspects".
RULE-04 Needless words: Cut filler phrases like "in order to", "due to the fact that", "may potentially".
RULE-05 Dying metaphors: Delete clichés like "pushes the boundaries", "paradigm shift", or "state of the art".
RULE-06 Plain English: Prefer "use" over "leverage", "method" over "methodology", "feature" over "functionality".
RULE-07 Positive form: Prefer "trivial" to "not important", "forgot" to "did not remember"; do not stage "X, not Y" antithesis ("not just X, but Y") for emphasis.
RULE-08 Claim calibration: Calibrate verbs to evidence; do not write "proves" when the evidence is "suggests".
RULE-09 Parallel structure: Express coordinate ideas in the same grammatical form.
RULE-10 Related words together: Keep subject close to verb and modifier close to modified; split long parentheticals.
RULE-11 Stress position: Place new or important information at the end of the sentence.
RULE-12 Long sentences: Split sentences over 30 words; vary length across a paragraph.

Field-observed rules (maintainer observation of LLM output, 2022-2026):

RULE-A Bullet overuse: Keep prose in paragraphs when ideas connect; bullets only for genuine lists; avoid forced 3-item triads.
RULE-B Dash overuse: Do not use em or en dashes as casual sentence punctuation; prefer commas, semicolons, colons, parentheses.
RULE-C Same-starts: Do not open two or more consecutive sentences with the same word.
RULE-D Transitions: Do not open sentences with "Additionally", "Furthermore", "Moreover", "In addition".
RULE-E Summary closers: Do not end every paragraph with a sentence that restates its point.
RULE-F Term consistency: Once you define a term or abbreviation, keep using it; do not alternate synonyms.
RULE-G Title case: Use title case for section and subsection headings; articles and short prepositions stay lowercase.
RULE-H Citation discipline (critical): Support factual claims with verifiable citation or concrete evidence; never fabricate citations.
RULE-I Contractions: Prefer "it is" / "does not" / "cannot" over "it's" / "doesn't" / "can't" in formal technical prose.

Escape Hatch

"Break any of these rules sooner than say anything outright barbarous." — George Orwell, "Politics and the English Language" (1946), Rule 6. Rules are guides to clarity, not ends in themselves.

Full Rule Bodies (Canonical)

Full directive text, BAD/GOOD example pairs, and rationale per rule: see .agent-style/RULES.md in this project, or https://raw.githubusercontent.com/yzhao062/agent-style/v0.3.6/RULES.md for the pinned canonical source.