Simplify Skill: Reuse, Inline, Remove
Most code gets longer over time, not better. Agentic tools accelerate that — they happily create helpers for everything. This skill plays the other side: review recent changes through a complexity-first lens and propose focused subtractions.
Full Prompt
An installable skill that takes a complexity-first look at recent changes and proposes focused simplifications.
What It Does
- Reuse first — points to existing functions before any new code
- Inlines premature abstractions — single-use helpers become inline
- Removes dead paths — unreachable error branches, defensive checks for guaranteed-safe inputs
- Stops at one-shots — if something is done once, it stays inline
Install in 30 Seconds
Pick your tool above and download the right file:
- Claude Code:
~/.claude/skills/simplify/SKILL.md - OpenAI Codex CLI: append to
AGENTS.md - Cursor: append to
.cursorrules
Run it after a feature is working and before merging. It's a great paired second pass after the Code Review skill.
Why It's Different From a Lint
Lints catch style. This skill catches structure — the new abstraction that doesn't pay rent, the helper that's the same as one already in the repo, the error path nothing can hit. Those are the cleanups a lint can't see and a tired reviewer often misses.
Install once, ship leaner diffs.