deslop

CLI tool to detect and remove AI writing patterns ("slop") from text.

Catches the telltale signs of AI-generated prose: overused buzzwords, false profundity structures, rhetorical self-questions, empty transitions, and more — based on the tropes catalogued at tropes.fyi.

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Install

pip install deslop
# or with uv:
uv tool install deslop

Or install from source:

git clone https://github.com/rankgnar/deslop
cd deslop
pip install -e .

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Usage

Check a file

deslop check article.md

article.md:12 — "It's not about speed — it's about precision"
  └─ Pattern: negative parallelism  The "It's not X — it's Y" false-profundity frame

article.md:34 — "Let's delve into the details"
  └─ Pattern: overused word  AI vocabulary — these words appear at absurd rates in AI-generated text

article.md:58 — "It's worth noting that the API is deprecated"
  └─ Pattern: empty transition  Filler phrases that pad text without adding meaning

Score: 62/100 (needs work)  —  3 issue(s) found

Check from stdin (pipe-friendly)

cat article.md | deslop check --stdin
echo "We need to leverage robust frameworks." | deslop check --stdin

Score only

deslop score article.md
# → Score: 74/100 (mostly clean)  —  2 issue(s) found

Filter by severity

# Only show moderate/severe issues (severity ≥ 2)
deslop check article.md --min-severity 2

Fix (coming soon)

deslop fix article.md
# ⚠  fix command not yet implemented.

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Detected Patterns

Pattern	Severity	Example
overused word	moderate	"delve", "tapestry", "leverage", "robust", "certainly"
magic adverb	mild	"quietly", "deeply", "truly", "simply"
negative parallelism	severe	"It's not X — it's Y", "not because X, but Y"
dramatic countdown	moderate	"Not a bug. Not a feature. A design flaw."
rhetorical self-question	moderate	"The result? Devastating."
empty transition	mild	"It's worth noting", "Here's the thing", "Here's the kicker"
serves-as dodge	mild	"serves as a reminder", "stands as a testament"
tricolon abuse	moderate	Three-item lists used 3+ times in the same document
punchy fragment	mild	Very short isolated sentences used as standalone paragraphs
anaphora abuse	moderate	Repeated sentence openings ("They could… They could… They could…")
hedge overload	mild	"perhaps the most", "one might argue"
closing platitude	mild	"only time will tell", "the future remains uncertain"

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Score Interpretation

Score	Label
85–100	looks human ✓
70–84	mostly clean
50–69	needs work
30–49	heavy slop
0–29	robot detected 🤖

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Exit Codes

• 0 — no patterns detected (clean)
• 1 — one or more patterns detected

This makes deslop check usable in CI pipelines:

deslop check docs/blog-post.md || echo "Slop detected, please review"

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Roadmap

• deslop fix — LLM-assisted rewrite of flagged phrases
• --format json — machine-readable output
• --ignore pattern_name — suppress specific pattern types
• .desloprc config file
• Pre-commit hook integration

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Sources

Patterns based on tropes.fyi/tropes-md — a catalogue of common AI writing tropes.