Simplify

Use When

• A change works but contains avoidable duplication, wrappers, branches, abstractions, or compatibility residue.
• The user asks to simplify, reduce, consolidate, clean up, or make code easier to understand without changing behavior.
• A focused refactor can improve locality and readability without becoming a broader architecture redesign.

Do not use this skill to redesign product behavior, perform an open-ended repository cleanup, or hide unresolved correctness problems.

Workflow

1. Confirm the exact scope and read its callers, tests, types, and repository conventions.
2. Establish current behavior with focused tests or another reproducible proof.
3. Identify duplication, unnecessary indirection, dead compatibility paths, over-general abstractions, and control-flow noise.
4. Prefer deletion, direct data flow, standard-library features, and one clear owner.
5. Make the smallest coherent simplification; avoid unrelated formatting or style churn.
6. Re-run focused verification, then broader checks in proportion to risk.
7. Summarize what was removed or consolidated and call out any behavior that was not evaluated.