simplify-code

A guide to making code simpler while preserving its behavior. It looks for unnecessary abstractions, unused code, deep nesting, and logic that is harder to follow than needed.

In plain words
What is it for?
Use it to remove dead code, flatten complicated logic, replace needless wrappers or patterns, and simplify over-engineered designs.
Why use it?
It reduces the mental effort required to read, maintain, and change a codebase.

Skill for Claude CodeCodex

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 skills/vudovn/ag-kit/simplify-code
Any agent
npx skills add vudovn/ag-kit --skill simplify-code
Clone the repo
git clone --depth 1 https://github.com/vudovn/ag-kit

Made for: Claude Code, Codex.

Per session 32 Skills are progressive disclosure: only the name and description are preloaded; the body loads when the skill is used.
When invoked 940 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 $0.00032 $0.00940
Opus 5 $0.00016 $0.00470
Sonnet 5 $0.00006 $0.00188
Haiku 4.5 $0.00003 $0.00094

Measured yesterday against content hash 1e2ab8d06593, method: parsed. Prices are Anthropic first-party input rates as of 2026-08-30, from the pricing page.

Security

Grade A, and why

simplify-code 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 yesterday.

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.

.agents/skills/simplify-code/SKILL.md · 133 lines

How it starts

The opening of the file, as written. The whole thing — 133 lines — stays where its author put it; the contents beside it link to each section on GitHub.

Simplify Code — Reduce Unnecessary Complexity

The best code is the code you don't have to write. The second best is the code anyone can read.

Core Principle

Complexity is a cost. Every abstraction, every indirection, every clever pattern
adds cognitive load. Simplify ruthlessly unless complexity serves a clear purpose.

Simplification Checklist

1. Unnecessary Abstractions

Smell Simplification
Wrapper class that just delegates Remove wrapper, use the inner class directly
Factory that creates only one type Replace with direct constructor
Strategy pattern with one strategy Replace with simple function
Interface with one implementation Remove interface, use the class
Abstract class with one child Merge into the child class
Config object for 2 values Use function parameters

2. Dead Code

Smell Action
Unused imports Remove
Unreachable branches Remove (check tests first)
Commented-out code Remove (it's in git history)
Unused variables/functions Remove
TODO comments older than 6 months Remove or create issue
Feature flags for launched features Remove flag, keep the code

3. Deep Nesting

// ❌ Before: 4 levels deep
function process(data) {
  if (data) {
    if (data.items) {
      for (const item of data.items) {
        if (item.active) {
          doSomething(item)
        }
      }
    }
  }
}

// ✅ After: Early returns + filter
function process(data) {
  if (!data?.items) return

  data.items
    .filter(item => item.active)
    .forEach(doSomething)
}

4. Over-Parameterized Functions

// ❌ Before: 8 parameters
function createUser(name, email, age, role, dept, active, verified, avatar) { }

// ✅ After: Object parameter
function createUser(opts: CreateUserOpts) { }

5. Premature Optimization

Smell Simplification
Custom cache for <100 items Remove cache, measure first
Memoization on cheap functions Remove memo
Lazy loading for small modules Use direct import
Complex state machine for 3 states Use simple if/else or switch

Read the full file on GitHub · 133 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. yesterday First seen · 133 lines · 32 tokens per session scan A 1e2ab8d06593

Subscribe to this mod's changes

simplify-code is a skill published in the GitHub repository vudovn/ag-kit (8,160 stars, last pushed yesterday), licensed MIT. It adds 32 tokens to every session and 940 once invoked, about $0.0002 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.

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