From d47e06ffa8ff1aeb9d17f321582a38b5cc5175b7 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001 From: William Thorsen Date: Tue, 21 Jul 2026 16:31:48 -0700 Subject: [PATCH] agents|feat: Add a no-second-person rule to the lede-voice doctrine The lede-voice doctrine now explicitly prohibits second-person address in changelog and release-notes entries, a constraint it previously conveyed only by example. --- packages/agents/content/skills/_data/lede-voice.md | 4 ++++ 1 file changed, 4 insertions(+) diff --git a/packages/agents/content/skills/_data/lede-voice.md b/packages/agents/content/skills/_data/lede-voice.md index 650632bf..f6e6ae59 100644 --- a/packages/agents/content/skills/_data/lede-voice.md +++ b/packages/agents/content/skills/_data/lede-voice.md @@ -133,6 +133,10 @@ Three forms to cut: - **Harm-avoided guarantee** — a promise against a harm the reader never suspected. Stating it doesn't reassure; it plants the doubt. The test: **"No one would think it did otherwise until you mentioned it."** A positive rephrasing ("each operation touches only its own entries") is the same defensive claim in new words. Silence on what a change doesn't do is the default, not an omission. - **Cross-sentence paraphrase** — a sentence restating a prior one's outcome in other words. Each may pass Rule 1 alone; together they say one thing twice. Apply the deletion test — "would cutting this change what the reader knows?" — across sentences, not only within one. +### Rule 4: No second person + +Do not use the second person. + ## Jargon at the lede Compression to a term of art saves words for a reader who already knows the term. For a reader who doesn't, it forces them to either skip the entry or do dictionary work the writer should have done. The lede is often the one place a reader meets the concept — spend the few extra words so the prose teaches as it announces.