Agent skill · writing content · davila7
writing-clearly-and-concisely
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.
Why this skill is useful
Codifies specific writing standards and practices to enhance clarity and professionalism in prose.
What it needs
About 2k tokens when loaded. Last updated 2026-08-06. 30,138 stars on the source repository.
What this skill does
Writing Clearly and Concisely Overview Write with clarity and force. This skill covers what to do (Strunk) and what not to do (AI patterns). When to Use This Skill Use this skill whenever you write 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. Limited Context Strategy When context is tight: 1. Write your draft using judgment 2. Dispatch a subagent with your draft and the relevant section file 3. Have the subagent copyedit and return the revision Loading a single section (~1,000-4,500 tokens) instead of everything saves significant context. Elements of Style William Strunk Jr.'s The Elements of Style (1918) teaches you to write clearly and cut ruthlessly. Rules Elementary Rules of Usage (Grammar/Punctuation): 1. Form possessive singular by adding 's 2. Use 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 Elementary Principles of Composition: 8. One paragraph per topic 9. Begin paragraph with topic sentence 10. Use active voice 11. Put statements in positive form 12. Use definite, specific, concrete language 13. Omit needless words 14. Avoid succession of loose sentences 15. Express co-ordinate ideas in similar form 16. Keep related words together 17. Keep to one tense in summaries 18. Place emphatic words at end of sentence Reference Files The rules above are summarized from Strunk's original text. …
How to use it
Reference it in AdaL, Claude Code, Cursor or any coding agent — nothing to install:
@skills davila7/writing-clearly-and-concisely