Deslop

Clean only the current branch diff before review. Preserve behavior absolutely: this is a narrow pre-review polish pass, never a correctness, safety, or documentation review.

Operating contract

Concern	Rule
Use when	The current branch needs a diff-scoped cleanup of trivial AI-generated slop before code review.
Do not use when	The request is a full correctness or safety review, documentation work (technical-documentation or docs-refactor), or a repo-wide refactor.
Required inputs	A clean understanding of the current branch diff, its merge base with origin/main, and the surrounding code and tests for every changed hunk.
Mutation boundary	Make behavior-neutral edits within the branch diff only; no functional change, no repo-wide sweep, and no analyzer-policy change.
Done when	Re-inspect the diff, .\scripts\Test-DotNetQuality.ps1 is green, and report what changed and what was left for the author.

Workflow

1. Refresh and establish the exact review range before inspecting code:

   git fetch origin main
   git merge-base origin/main HEAD
   git diff origin/main...HEAD
   

   Use origin/main...HEAD when the merge base is origin/main; otherwise inspect the merge-base-to-HEAD diff. Never turn this into a repository-wide search, lint cleanup, or formatting pass.

2. Read every changed hunk with enough surrounding code to determine its local convention and observable contract. Inspect additions for the slop categories below. Let existing analyzer diagnostics stand; this pass finds what analyzers cannot prove.

3. Classify a finding before editing. Remove it inline only if the edit is trivial and demonstrably behavior-neutral. Preserve API shapes, exceptions, execution order, resource lifetime, console output, process arguments, serialization, and PowerShell failure behavior. If any of those could change, leave the code intact and name the concern for the author.

4. For a C# cleanup, preserve the repository analyzer policy. Directory.Build.props enables AnalysisMode=All, build-time code-style analysis, and TreatWarningsAsErrors; rule severities belong in .editorconfig. Never weaken a rule repository-wide to clear one site. A necessary narrow suppression needs a written rationale beside the code.

5. For clawctl output, retain the renderable composition contract in src\OpenClaw.Launcher\ClawCtlConsole.cs: use Spectre.Console renderables such as Grid, Panel, Paragraph, and Rows, with Paragraph.Append for styled text. Do not replace that with interpolated markup strings; it changes escaping and rendering behavior described in docs\clawctl-output-style.md.

6. For tests in the diff, retain observable assertions. Do not add or preserve tests that read source files for implementation-string markers. Keep tests isolated from real user state and deterministic: no sleeps, hardcoded ports, or inter-test ordering dependencies.

7. Do not treat launcher argument handling as cleanup territory. openclaw arguments are OpenClaw-owned: do not add host-only switches, consume --, or rewrite the argument vector.

8. Preserve LF text. Do not use whole-file Set-Content or Out-File rewrites; .gitattributes and .editorconfig require tracked text to stay LF.

9. Verify only after every edit is complete:

   git diff --check
   .\scripts\Test-DotNetQuality.ps1
   dotnet test .\OpenClaw.Gateway.MSIX.slnx --configuration Release --no-restore
   git ls-files --eol
   

   Re-read the final diff against the same merge base. Do not claim a cleanup was safe merely because it compiles.

10. Report in a few sentences: state whether anything changed, name each non-trivial item left for the author, and say that code review remains the required correctness and safety gate.

What to remove, and what to preserve

Real slop in the branch diff	Required pattern that can look like slop
Narrating comments, syntax explanations, or prose that repeats code without explaining a non-obvious reason.	Policy comments that explain why, including the substantial policy rationale in scripts\Get-PackagingRelevance.ps1 and .github\workflows\gateway-msix.yml.
Null guards, try/catch, or existence checks protecting only imagined states that are abnormal for the surrounding type.	$ErrorActionPreference = 'Stop' and explicit $LASTEXITCODE checks after native tools in PowerShell build scripts; these are intentional fail-fast behavior.
Gratuitous object round-trips, unnecessary casts, dynamic, or reflection.	Contract-specific source-generated JsonSerializerContext metadata; reflection is a NativeAOT defect, not a stylistic shortcut.
One-use variables or helpers that add no domain meaning, remove no duplication, and simplify no control flow.	Hash and metadata validation in packaging scripts; this is a release trust boundary and must never be simplified away.
Aliases, retries, or fallback branches with no named shipped contract or removal plan.	Spectre.Console renderable composition (Grid, Panel, Paragraph, Rows, and Paragraph.Append) rather than interpolated markup strings.
Naming, using placement, control flow, or formatting that visibly conflicts with neighboring code.	Local conventions intentionally established by surrounding code, even if a generic cleanup preference differs.

Guardrails

• Run this pass before code review, never instead of it. Review remains the required correctness and safety gate.
• Do not remove validation, error reporting, cleanup, compatibility behavior, or comments whose rationale is not fully understood.
• When an apparent cleanup intersects NativeAOT, packaging trust boundaries, PowerShell native-command handling, output rendering, tests, or argument forwarding, leave it for the author unless equivalence is obvious and proven.