name: unslop description: Strip AI phrasing from prose before it is posted to a Confluence page, sent to a customer, or shared in chat. Use when a draft sounds like it was written by an LLM: ornamental hedging, breathless transitions, vague intensifiers, symmetrical bullet padding, or any of the other tells listed in references/tells.md.

Unslop

The page-reviewer catches structural problems; this skill catches voice problems. Both run before a page goes live.

The unslop pass is line-anchored, deterministic, and reversible. It returns a diff-style report; the author or the calling skill applies the changes.

Hard rules

Never edit silently. Every change appears in the report with the line, the original phrase, and the suggested replacement.
Never invent voice. The rewrite defaults to short, declarative, and Netcracker-house — see references/house-style.md.
Don't rewrite technical content. If a sentence is slop but the technical claim is correct, fix the phrasing, not the claim.
Don't rewrite quotes. Code, command output, error messages, and customer-quoted text stay literal.
Don't touch structured data. Tables, lists of identifiers, file paths, URLs, and version numbers are not slop.

Workflow

Read the draft. Mark each line with one of: clean, slop, unsure.
For each slop line, look up the tell in references/tells.md and propose a concrete rewrite.
For each unsure line, leave it alone and flag it for the author with a short rationale.
Cluster check. If more than 5 slop lines appear in a 30-line block, mark the block rewrite-block — voice problems cluster, and the author should rewrite that section by hand rather than accept a chain of small fixes.
Return the report.

Report shape

# Unslop report — <page slug>

L<line>: <tell> — <phrase>
  > <original>
  + <proposed rewrite>
L<line>: <tell> — <phrase>
  > <original>
  + <proposed rewrite>

# Rewrite-block sections (cluster of >5 slop lines)
- L<start>-L<end>: <section title>

# Uncertain — author decides
- L<line>: <short rationale>

The calling skill applies line-by-line fixes; the author rewrites the marked sections.

What counts as slop

Full list with examples in references/tells.md. The high-frequency ones:

Tell	Example	Fix
Ornamental hedging	"It's important to note that…"	Delete the preamble.
Breathless transition	"Let's dive in!"	Replace with the next fact.
Vague intensifier	"really", "very", "quite" (when not load-bearing)	Delete.
Symmetric padding	"X is Y. X is also Z. Both X's are…"	Pick the one that matters.
AI résumé	"With over X years of experience…"	Replace with the actual fact.
Performative caveat	"It's worth mentioning that…"	Delete or move to the conclusion.
Marketing tone	"seamlessly", "robust", "powerful", "leverage"	Replace with the specific capability.
Triplet	"fast, reliable, and scalable"	Pick the one that is actually true, drop the rest.
Heading question	"Why is X important?"	State the answer, not the question.
Sign-off	"Hope this helps!", "Let me know if you have questions!"	Delete.

When to refuse

The text is a customer-quoted block, a log line, or a code comment — leave it alone.
The text is technical and correct; only the framing is fluffy. Fix the framing, not the substance.
The rewrite would change the meaning. Mark it unsure and let the author decide.

Skill	Role
`page-reviewer`	Calls unslop as part of the pre-post gate
`confluence-page`	Uses the report to apply line-by-line fixes

Limitations

Unslop is a heuristic pass, not a guarantee. A page can be technically slop-free and still sound corporate, and a page that sounds conversational can still be slop-free. Voice is not the only quality dimension; this skill addresses one of them.

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