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GoogleKnown publishergoogle/tf-remote-vars/.github/skills/ponytail/ponytail-review/SKILL.md

ponytail-review

Skill1 starsChanged 3 months agoApache-2.0View on GitHub

Code review focused exclusively on over-engineering. Finds what to delete: reinvented standard library, unneeded dependencies, speculative abstractions, dead flexibility. One line per finding: location, what to cut, what replaces it. Use when the user says "review for over-engineering", "what can we delete", "is this over-engineered", "simplify review", or invokes /ponytail-review. Complements correctness-focused review, this one only hunts complexity.

We split this skill into the rules it gives an agent

2 rules. 0 are common, 1 is distinctive, and 1 is very specific to this project.

  • 0

    Common

    Most of the 33 edited versions we read keep these.

  • 1

    Distinctive

    This author's own choices. Worth a look.

  • 1

    Very specific

    Tied to their project's names, files or tools. Probably skip.

  • Common
  • Distinctive
  • Very specific
  1. Very specific:

    If there is nothing to cut, say Lean already.

    line 48
  2. Distinctive:

    Does not apply the fixes, only lists them.

    line 56

“Common” is measured: kept by at least 6 in 10 of the 33 edited versions of this file we could read. “Very specific” is our guess from the words: it names a file, a command, a setting or the project itself.

Keep what fits and drop the rest. Your version, ready for your agents.
Files
SKILL.md

Review diffs for unnecessary complexity. One line per finding: location, what to cut, what replaces it. The diff's best outcome is getting shorter.

Format

L<line>: <tag> <what>. <replacement>., or <file>:L<line>: ... for multi-file diffs.

Tags:

  • delete: dead code, unused flexibility, speculative feature. Replacement: nothing.
  • stdlib: hand-rolled thing the standard library ships. Name the function.
  • native: dependency or code doing what the platform already does. Name the feature.
  • yagni: abstraction with one implementation, config nobody sets, layer with one caller.
  • shrink: same logic, fewer lines. Show the shorter form.

Examples

❌ "This EmailValidator class might be more complex than necessary, have you considered whether all these validation rules are needed at this stage?"

✅ L12-38: stdlib: 27-line validator class. "@" in email, 1 line, real validation is the confirmation mail.

✅ L4: native: moment.js imported for one format call. Intl.DateTimeFormat, 0 deps.

✅ repo.py:L88: yagni: AbstractRepository with one implementation. Inline it until a second one exists.

✅ L52-71: delete: retry wrapper around an idempotent local call. Nothing replaces it.

✅ L30-44: shrink: manual loop builds dict. dict(zip(keys, values)), 1 line.

Scoring

End with the only metric that matters: net: -<N> lines possible.

If there is nothing to cut, say Lean already. Ship. and stop.

Boundaries

Scope: over-engineering and complexity only. Correctness bugs, security holes, and performance are explicitly out of scope. Route them to a normal review pass, not this one. A single smoke test or assert-based self-check is the ponytail minimum, not bloat, never flag it for deletion. Does not apply the fixes, only lists them. "stop ponytail-review" or "normal mode": revert to verbose review style.

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Trending

Rising: 6 new projects took it in the last 4 weeks, 2× the 4 weeks before.thin data

Week of Aug 30: 1 new projectWeek of Sep 6: 1 new projectWeek of Sep 13: 1 new projectWeek of Sep 20: 0 new projectsWeek of Sep 27: 2 new projectsWeek of Oct 4: 2 new projectsWeek of Oct 11: 2 new projectsWeek of Oct 18: 0 new projects
Aug 2026Sep 2026Oct 2026
New projects taking a version of this file each week, over the 8 weeks our latest run read: only 9 in all, so this is a hint, not a trend.

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