refactor

A Lean 4 command that reorganizes proofs around clearer strategies, existing mathlib results, and reusable helper lemmas. mathlib is Lean's large library of formalized mathematics.

In plain words
What is it for?
Use it on all proofs in a file, one proof, or files changed since the last commit. It can search mathlib and preview opportunities before editing.
Why use it?
It helps replace complicated proof approaches with simpler ones and can reduce repeated work by extracting helpers, while leaving theorem statements unchanged.

Command

Install

Getting it into your agent

One page per mod, every tool's command on it. A separate URL per tool would split the same page into five that compete with each other.

agentmods
npx agentmods add commands/cameronfreer/lean4-skills/refactor
Clone the repo
git clone --depth 1 https://github.com/cameronfreer/lean4-skills
Per session 14 Only the description is in the session, so the agent can decide to use it. The body loads when it is invoked.
When invoked 1,212 The whole file, excluding the scripts and references it only reads on demand.
Security scan A 0 findings. Scan, not verified.
Origin original No closer match found in the catalogue.
Token cost

What it costs to keep this loaded

Counted locally with the o200k_base tokenizer, which is exact for GPT models; Claude uses its own tokenizer and its counts differ. Treat this as one consistent yardstick across the catalogue rather than a bill. Prices are per million input tokens.

ModelPer sessionOnce invoked
Fable 5 $0.00014 $0.01212
Opus 5 $0.00007 $0.00606
Sonnet 5 $0.00003 $0.00242
Haiku 4.5 $0.00001 $0.00121

Measured 3d ago against content hash 899abf463ba5, method: parsed. Prices are Anthropic first-party input rates as of 2026-08-30, from the pricing page.

Security

Grade A, and why

refactor scanned grade A with 0 findings against 26 rules in 11 categories — prompt injection, anti-refusal, data exfiltration, privilege escalation, supply chain, agent snooping, system-prompt leakage, SSRF and excessive agency — measured 3d ago.

A static scan of the body, not an audit. Every finding is printed with the line that produced it so you can judge whether it matters here. A mod is markdown that instructs an agent; that is exactly why what it instructs is worth reading.

Nothing flagged

None of the 26 patterns this scan looks for appear in this file: no shell pipes, no recursive deletes, no credential paths, no hidden text, no instruction-override or anti-refusal phrasing, no agent-config snooping. That is not a guarantee, it is the absence of the things that are checkable.

Origin

Copies of this mod

1 near-identical copy found in the catalogue:

  • refactor — 98% identical, 1 lines differ
plugins/lean4/commands/refactor.md · 97 lines

How it starts

The opening of the file, as written. The whole thing — 97 lines — stays where its author put it; the contents beside it link to each section on GitHub.

Lean4 Refactor

Strategy-level proof simplification: find better proof approaches, leverage mathlib, and extract reusable helpers. Complements /lean4:golf (tactic-level optimization) and /lean4:review (read-only audit).

Mutating command: Edits files with user approval. Does not change theorem statements, introduce axioms, or create commits.

Usage

/lean4:refactor File.lean                  # Refactor all proofs in file
/lean4:refactor File.lean:149              # Refactor proof at line 149
/lean4:refactor --scope=changed            # Refactor files modified since last commit
/lean4:refactor --scope=changed --dry-run  # Report opportunities without editing

Inputs

Arg Required Description
target No File or File.lean:line
--scope No file (default with target), changed (default without target)
--dry-run No Report only, do not edit
--search No quick (default) or full (exhaustive mathlib search)
--extract-helpers No on (default) or off (skip helper extraction)

Scope Behavior

Input Scope
File.lean All proofs in file
File.lean:149 Single proof containing line 149
No target --scope=changed (files modified since last commit)
--scope=changed Files modified since last commit

Line target: Identifies the enclosing theorem/lemma/def containing the given line and refactors that proof only.

Large-run confirmation: When --scope=changed touches >5 files or >20 opportunities, confirm before proceeding.

Preconditions

  • Target proofs must compile (no sorries, no build errors in scope)
  • Run /lean4:prove or /lean4:autoprove first if there are open sorries

Refusal: If preconditions are not met:

⚠️  Cannot refactor: File.lean has 2 sorries and 1 build error.
Run /lean4:prove first, then retry /lean4:refactor.

Actions

  1. Audit — Read target proofs, identify repeated patterns, long proofs (>30 lines), hand-rolled arguments, case splits replaceable by congr/EqOn/EventuallyEq, thin definition APIs
  2. Search — For each opportunity, search mathlib via LSP-first protocol. --search=quick: up to 2 LSP queries per opportunity. --search=full: up to 5 queries with module exploration.
  3. Plan — Present findings with estimated impact:
    ## Refactor Plan — File.lean
    ### Strategy Improvements
    1. [proof] (line N): [current] → Use [mathlib lemma] (saves ~N lines)
    ### Helper Extraction
    1. [pattern] — Nx (lines ...) → Extract `helper_name`
    ### Estimated Impact
    - Lines before: N → after: ~N | Helpers: N | New mathlib lemmas: N
    
  4. Approval — Ask before each batch (--dry-run stops here). A batch groups opportunities within a single proof or closely related proofs. Prompt: Apply batch N (M changes)? [yes / skip / stop] — yes applies, skip moves to next batch, stop ends the session.
  5. Apply — Edit files, verify with lean_diagnostic_messages after each batch; revert batch on any new diagnostic or sorry increase
  6. Verifylake env lean <file> file gate (run from project root); lake build project gate if multi-file. If final gate fails, revert all batches applied in this session.
  7. Report — Summarize changes applied, helpers extracted, line count delta

Read the full file on GitHub · 97 lines

Changes

What this file has done since we first saw it

Hashed on every crawl. A supply-chain change to an agent config is a question of when, not whether, so the history is kept rather than the latest state alone.

  1. 3d ago First seen · 97 lines · 14 tokens per session scan A 899abf463ba5

Subscribe to this mod's changes

refactor is a command published in the GitHub repository cameronfreer/lean4-skills (418 stars, last pushed 7d ago), licensed MIT. It adds 14 tokens to every session and 1,212 once invoked, about $0.0001 per session on Opus 5. A static security scan graded it A with 0 findings. No closer match exists in the catalogue, so it is treated as the original; first seen 2026-08-30.