AgentSkillsCN

Writing Clearly And Concisely

将 Strunk 的写作法则应用于人类阅读的所有文字——无论是文档、提交信息、错误提示、说明文字、报告，还是 UI 文本。

SKILL.md
--- frontmatter
description: Apply Strunk's writing rules to any prose humans will read—documentation, commit messages, error messages, explanations, reports, or UI text.

Writing Clearly and Concisely

William Strunk Jr.'s The Elements of Style (1918) teaches you to write clearly and cut ruthlessly.

WARNING: elements-of-style.md consumes ~12,000 tokens. Read it only when writing or editing prose.

When to Use

Use when writing 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.

How to Use

  1. •Before writing prose, Read the file ~/.pi/agent/skills/writing-clearly-and-concisely/elements-of-style.md
  2. •Apply the rules to your draft
  3. •Revise ruthlessly

Key Rules (quick reference)

Grammar/Punctuation

  1. •Form possessive singular by adding 's
  2. •Comma after each term in series except last
  3. •Enclose parenthetic expressions between commas
  4. •Comma before conjunction introducing co-ordinate clause
  5. •Don't join independent clauses by comma
  6. •Don't break sentences in two
  7. •Participial phrase at beginning refers to grammatical subject

Composition

  1. •One paragraph per topic
  2. •Begin paragraph with topic sentence
  3. •Use active voice
  4. •Put statements in positive form
  5. •Use definite, specific, concrete language
  6. •Omit needless words
  7. •Avoid succession of loose sentences
  8. •Express co-ordinate ideas in similar form
  9. •Keep related words together
  10. •Keep to one tense in summaries
  11. •Place emphatic words at end of sentence

Bottom Line

Writing for humans? Read elements-of-style.md and apply the rules.