# Lean Trim Comments

> Use when existing source comments or docstrings are bloated, dense, repetitive, AI slop, or should be trimmed, debloated, and kept light.

- Skill: `tony/lean-trim-comments` (Agent Skill, multi-file: 2 files)
- Install (CLI): `npx skillmds@latest add tony/lean-trim-comments`
- Raw SKILL.md: https://api.skillmd.com/api/skills/tony/lean-trim-comments/raw
- Safety review: pending
- Works with: Claude Code, Claude.ai, OpenAI Codex
- Category: Coding & Dev Tools
- Author: tony (https://skillmd.com/u/tony)
- Updated: 2026-09-17
- Page: https://skillmd.com/skills/tony/lean-trim-comments

---


# this skill

Judge every comment and docstring in the target files against
`references/comment-policy.md`, then delete or rewrite the ones
that fail. Edits in place and prints a diff. Never commits, never
pushes, never requires a clean tree.

## Confirm before the first edit

This skill deletes code the user did not ask you to touch, and it can
be routed to from a passing remark about comments. Present the
classification and get an explicit yes through `ask-user-choice`
before any `Edit`.

No exceptions: not for a single comment, not for a file the user just
named, not under `--all`. `--diff-only` is the way to skip the edit,
not the confirmation.

## `$ARGUMENTS`

- `paths/globs` — files to audit, resolved through `git ls-files --
  <glob>` when tracked, else as literal paths.
- `--staged` — audit what is staged rather than the branch diff.
- `--all` — audit every tracked file. Expect a large diff; say so
  before confirming.
- `--diff-only` — classify and show what would change, edit nothing.

With no paths, the target set is the files this branch changed.

## Steps

1. **Resolve targets.** With paths, expand them. With `--all`, take
   `git ls-files`. With `--staged`, take the staged names:

   ```console
   $ git diff --name-only --cached --diff-filter=d
   ```

   Otherwise find the trunk ref (`git rev-parse --abbrev-ref
   origin/HEAD`, falling back to the repo's default branch) and take
   its merge base:

   ```console
   $ git merge-base HEAD origin/HEAD
   ```

   Then take the names changed since it:

   ```console
   $ git diff --name-only --diff-filter=d <merge-base>
   ```

   Keep source files; drop lockfiles, generated output, and vendored
   trees. Reject an empty target set with a clear message rather than
   widening the scope on your own.

2. **Load the policy and voice.** Read
   `references/comment-policy.md`, then `./AGENTS.md` and
   `./CLAUDE.md`. Where the host project sets its own comment rules,
   those govern.

3. **Classify.** Every comment and docstring in range gets one verdict
   — keep, rewrite, or delete — and a failing gate by name for
   anything not kept. A verdict you cannot attach to a gate is a keep.

   Read the surrounding code before judging. A comment that looks like
   narration but pins an invariant is a keep, and the loss gate is
   what protects it.

4. **Preview and confirm.** Show each rewrite as old and new text, and
   each deletion with the code it sat above, grouped by file. Confirm
   through `ask-user-choice`. Skip only for `--diff-only`.

5. **Apply.** Use `Edit`. Rewrites are concrete and shorter than what
   they replace. Do not touch the code itself; a comment that is wrong
   because the code is wrong is a finding to report, not to fix here.

6. **Diff.** Print `git diff -- <targets>`.

7. **Report and hand off.** Give the counts kept, rewritten, and
   deleted, and name anything skipped and why. Then offer next steps
   through `ask-user-choice`: commit with `/commit`, tighten the prose
   too with the `lean-tighten` skill, or discard — review the printed diff
   first, since `git checkout -- <file>` resets the whole file to HEAD
   and drops any other uncommitted work in it.

## What this does not do

- Commit or push — that is `/commit`.
- Edit code, only its comments.
- Rewrite prose files — that is the `lean-tighten` skill.
- Rewrite history — that is the `pr-deslop` skill.
- Add missing comments. Absence is not a finding here.


## Portability notes

- `ask-user-choice` — present the listed options and wait for the user to pick one. Hosts with a structured multiple-choice tool (Claude Code's `AskUserQuestion`) should use it; otherwise print a numbered list and wait for a numbered reply. Never proceed on an assumed answer.
- `$ARGUMENTS` — the text the user passed when invoking this skill. If your host does not substitute it, read it as the user's request in the current turn, and ask when there is none.
- Bundled files — every relative path in this skill points at a file shipped inside this skill directory. Read them from here, not from the host's plugin tree.