Sharp Writing
Conventions for writing sharp, concise prose and Markdown, for human readers and AI agents. Read before writing documentation, READMEs, instructions, agent skills, or any prose text.
Install
$ agentstack add skill-paleo-alignfirst-sharp-writing ✓ scanned · ✓ verified, works with Claude Code, Cursor, and more.
Security review
✓ PassedNo issues found. Passed automated security review. · v0.1.0 How review works →
- ✓ Prompt-injection patterns
- ✓ Secret / credential exfiltration
- ✓ Dangerous shell & filesystem operations
- ✓ Untrusted network calls
- ✓ Known-malicious package signatures
What it can access
- ✓ Network access No
- ✓ Filesystem access No
- ✓ Shell / process execution No
- ✓ Environment & secrets No
- ✓ Dynamic code execution No
From automated source analysis of v0.1.0. “Used” means the capability is present in the source — more access means more to trust, not that it’s unsafe.
Verified badge
Passed review? Show it. Paste this badge into your README, it links to the public security report.
Links to your public security report.[](https://agentstack.voostack.com/security/report/skill-paleo-alignfirst-sharp-writing) Reliability & compatibility
Declared compatibility
Compatibility is declared by the source manifest. End-to-end runtime verification is coming, see below.
We're building live execution health for every listing: tool-call success rate, median latency, uptime, and last-checked timestamps, measured, not self-reported. It isn't live yet, so we don't show numbers we can't stand behind.
How agent discovery & health will work →About
Sharp Writing
Write sharp text: every word counts. These rules cover all prose and Markdown. Most hold for both human readers and AI agents; only the em-dash style differs.
Principles
- Sharp, precise, concise. Straight to the point. The less, the better.
- Don't pad. No bloated orders, no filler.
- Respect the reader. No insistent or authoritarian tone; don't treat them like a child. Make what is important more obvious instead.
- No emoticons. No informal language.
Structure text like code
Good text is like good code:
- Avoid repeating or duplicating.
- Refactor text as you refactor code, so every idea is well-organized and clear.
One idea, one sentence. One concern, one paragraph. When a concern needs several paragraphs, give it a section title; split a complex idea into sub-ideas the same way. Never pack several ideas into one sentence, or several concerns into one paragraph.
Show the direct path, not your detours. Writing is like climbing an uncharted mountain: you wander and backtrack to find the way, then from the summit you see the straight route. Write that route. Readers want the direct path, not the search that found it.
Markdown
Don't wrap text to 80 characters. Let lines run freely.
Em-dash: the one audience difference
The em-dash (—) is the main style difference between the two audiences.
- For humans: use the em-dash only as a visual separator.
- For AI agents: the em-dash is also fine inside prose.
Valid for both, as a visual separator:
> - key1 — description 1 > - key2 — description 2
Valid only for AI agents, inside a sentence:
> State the main idea — then add a caveat after the dash.
Source & license
This open-source skill is cataloged on AgentStack and links to its original source — we do not rehost the code.
- Author: paleo
- Source: paleo/alignfirst
- License: CC0-1.0
Install and usage instructions live in the source repository linked above.
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Versions
- v0.1.0 Imported from the upstream source.