Cleanup Build Artifacts

Cleanup Build Artifacts

Sweep up the transient artifacts this task produced so the working tree and disk stay clean. Implements the AGENTS.md / AGENTS.md rule: "Clean up build artifacts you produced once the task is done."

Scope

In scope — artifacts created during this task:

• Release binaries built for one-off verification (target/release/<bin>)
• cargo mutants output (mutants.out/, mutants.out.old/)
• cargo llvm-cov reports (target/llvm-cov-target/, generated lcov.info / HTML report dirs)
• Scratch files at the repo root: pr.diff, *.diff, ad-hoc *.tar/*.tar.gz, throwaway *.log, scratch_*, tmp_*
• One-off binaries built outside target/ (e.g. via --out-dir)
• Temporary fixture dirs created for an investigation that aren't checked in

Out of scope — DO NOT TOUCH:

• The persistent target/ debug tree being actively iterated on (cargo build, cargo test incremental output). Leave it.
• Anything tracked by git that's modified (M) or staged — those are real work.
• .ironlint/ runtime state unless the task explicitly created it for a one-off check.
• Pre-existing files in the working tree the task didn't author.

If unsure whether something is yours, leave it.

Instructions

Step 1: Enumerate what this task produced

Before cleaning, list candidates. Run these in parallel:

# Untracked files that appeared during the task
git status --short --untracked-files=normal

# Release binaries (likely candidates if you ran `cargo build --release`)
ls -la target/release/ 2>/dev/null | grep -v -E '^(d|total|\.|deps|build|examples|incremental)'

# Mutants output
ls -d mutants.out* 2>/dev/null

# Coverage output
ls -d target/llvm-cov-target lcov.info coverage/ 2>/dev/null

# Repo-root scratch files
ls *.diff *.tar *.tar.gz *.log scratch_* tmp_* 2>/dev/null

Cross-reference with what the conversation actually did. If you didn't run cargo mutants this task, leave mutants.out/ alone — it belongs to a prior run.

Step 2: Confirm before destructive operations

If the list contains anything non-obvious (e.g. a .diff you don't recognize, a binary you didn't build, an .ironlint/ directory with data), surface it to the user before deleting. The user's AGENTS.md says investigate-before-deleting when finding unfamiliar state.

For artifacts clearly produced this turn, proceed without asking.

Step 3: Remove with the right command

Rules:

• Always pass explicit paths. Never rm -rf target/, never rm *.rs, never globs that could match tracked files.
• Use cargo clean -p <crate> rather than rm -rf target/release/ so the rest of target/ survives.
• One rm per logical artifact unless they're clearly the same family (e.g. mutants.out + mutants.out.old).

Step 4: Verify

git status --short
du -sh target/ 2>/dev/null

The diff to git status should be limited to whatever real work the task did — no leftover untracked scratch files. target/ may still be large; that's expected (it's the working tree).

If a release binary was rebuilt at ~30MB+ purely to verify behavior and is now gone, mention the freed space in the end-of-turn summary.

Examples

Example 1: Built a release binary to spot-check CLI output

User asked to verify that ironlint check exits 2 on a Block verdict. The task ran cargo build --release and ./target/release/ironlint check tests/fixtures/....

Actions:

1. ls target/release/ironlint — confirm it exists
2. cargo clean -p ironlint-cli — drops the binary and its build cache for the cli crate
3. git status --short — confirm no other scratch files

Result: target/release/ironlint gone, target/debug/ (the iterating tree) untouched.

Example 2: Ran cargo mutants on a diff

The task ran git diff main.. > pr.diff && cargo mutants --in-diff pr.diff.

Actions:

1. rm pr.diff
2. rm -rf mutants.out mutants.out.old
3. git status --short — clean

Result: 2MB+ of mutants output and the diff file gone.

Example 3: Task only edited source files

The task added a new pub fn and a test, ran cargo test -p ironlint-core, all green.

Actions:

1. git status --short — only the intentional file edits show
2. No artifacts to remove. target/debug/ stays (it's the iterating tree).

Result: Skill no-ops cleanly. Don't invent work.

Troubleshooting

cargo clean -p <crate> says "package not found"

Cause: Wrong crate name. The workspace has ironlint-core and ironlint-cli; the binary is ironlint but the package is ironlint-cli.

Solution: Check Cargo.toml [package] name = fields, or cargo metadata --no-deps --format-version 1 | jq '.packages[].name'.

git status still shows scratch files after cleanup

Cause: The files match a pattern in .gitignore (e.g. mutants.out*/ is ignored) so git status won't show them even when present. Re-run ls from Step 1 to confirm physical removal.

Solution: Trust the filesystem check, not just git status.

Found an unfamiliar .ironlint/ or scratch directory you didn't create

Cause: Prior session or another tool produced it.

Solution: Don't delete. Surface it to the user: "Found <path> — not from this task, leaving it. Want me to remove?"