Proofreader

Overview

This skill performs careful proofreading and copyediting of prose. It fixes objective errors (grammar, spelling, punctuation, agreement) and improves clarity, concision, and stylistic consistency — without changing the author's meaning, voice, tone, or intent.

Keywords: proofread, copyedit, grammar check, clarity, concision, tighten, polish, style consistency, line edit, readability.

Use it for emails, essays, articles, blog posts, documentation, reports, cover letters, academic writing, and marketing copy. Do not use it to rewrite content from scratch, change the argument, fabricate facts, or alter the author's distinctive style.

The Cardinal Rule

Preserve meaning. Every edit must keep the author's intended message intact. When an edit would shift meaning, emphasis, register, or voice, flag it as a suggestion rather than applying it silently. If a sentence is ambiguous, do not guess — ask or annotate both readings.

Workflow

Follow these steps in order. Do a separate pass for each level rather than fixing everything in one chaotic sweep.

1. Clarify scope. Determine the register and goal: who is the audience, what is the medium (formal email vs. casual blog), and which English variant applies (US/UK/AU/CA). If unknown, default to US English and the tone already present in the text, and note the assumption.

1. Pass 1 — Correctness. Fix unambiguous errors: spelling, typos, subject–verb agreement, verb tense, pronoun agreement, articles, prepositions, and punctuation (commas, apostrophes, semicolons, hyphens vs. en/em dashes). These are non-negotiable and applied directly. See references/grammar-rules.md.

1. Pass 2 — Clarity. Resolve ambiguity, dangling/misplaced modifiers, unclear pronoun references, faulty parallelism, and awkward construction. Convert needless passive voice to active only when it does not change emphasis. Break up overlong run-on sentences.

1. Pass 3 — Concision. Cut redundancies, filler, and wordy phrases without losing nuance. Replace bloated phrases with tight equivalents (see references/concision-cheatsheet.md). Never cut so aggressively that meaning or politeness is lost.

1. Pass 4 — Consistency. Enforce one consistent style throughout: spelling variant, serial (Oxford) comma usage, capitalization, hyphenation, number formatting, date format, quotation style, and terminology. Match whatever the author already does most often unless it is wrong. See references/style-consistency.md.

1. Deliver. Return the corrected text first. Then provide a concise change log grouped by category, distinguishing applied fixes (objective) from suggestions (judgment calls the author should approve). Use the format in templates/edit-report.md.

Decision Framework: Fix vs. Suggest

| Situation | Action | |-----------|--------| | Spelling, typo, agreement, clear punctuation error | Fix silently | | Wordiness, redundancy, obvious filler | Fix, note in log | | Passive→active that keeps emphasis | Fix, note in log | | Passive→active that shifts emphasis/blame | Suggest | | Tone/word choice that affects voice | Suggest | | Reordering for flow that changes emphasis | Suggest | | Ambiguous meaning (two valid readings) | Annotate — do not guess | | Possible factual error or contradiction | Flag — never silently "correct" facts | | Stylistic preference with no clear rule | Leave, optionally mention |

Heuristics

• Read aloud mentally: if you stumble, the reader will too.
• One idea per sentence for clarity; combine only related ideas.
• Strong verbs over nominalizations: "decide" beats "make a decision."
• Cut "that," "very," "really," "just," "in order to" when they add nothing.
• Prefer the shorter word when meaning is identical (use > utilize).
• Keep the author's idioms and personality — polished, not sanitized.
• Don't over-edit. If a sentence is correct and clear, leave it alone. Restraint is a feature.

Best Practices

• Edit in passes; do not mix correctness with style judgments.
• Always separate objective fixes from subjective suggestions in the report.
• Match the existing dominant style instead of imposing your own.
• Preserve formatting, markdown, code blocks, and intentional line breaks.
• Quote the original snippet alongside each suggestion so the author can compare.
• When unsure whether something is intentional (e.g., a sentence fragment for effect), ask or flag rather than "fixing" it.

Common Pitfalls

• Changing meaning while "improving" a sentence — the worst failure.
• Flattening voice into generic corporate prose.
• Over-deleting until nuance, hedging, or politeness disappears.
• Inconsistent fixes (correcting "color" in one place, leaving "colour" elsewhere).
• "Correcting" correct grammar based on myths (splitting infinitives, ending with prepositions, starting with "And").
• Editing code, names, quotes, or citations that must stay verbatim.
• Hypercorrection: "between you and I," "whom" where "who" is right.

See references/grammar-rules.md, references/concision-cheatsheet.md, and references/style-consistency.md for detailed reference material. Use scripts/proof_check.py for a quick automated first-pass scan of common mechanical issues. Use templates/edit-report.md for the deliverable format and examples/sample-edit.md for a full worked example.