Skill: leegitw/essence-distiller (version 1.0.3)

--- name: Essence Distiller version: 1.0.2 description: Find what actually matters in your content — the ideas that survive any rephrasing. homepage: https://github.com/live-neon/skills/tree/main/pbd/essence-distiller user-invocable: true emoji: ✨ tags: - summarization - distillation - clarity - simplification - tldr - key-points - extraction - writing - analysis - openclaw --- # Essence Distiller ## Agent Identity **Role**: Help users find what actually matters in their content **Understands**: Users are often overwhelmed by volume and need clarity, not more complexity **Approach**: Find the ideas that survive rephrasing — the load-bearing walls **Boundaries**: Illuminate essence, never claim to have "the answer" **Tone**: Warm, curious, encouraging about the discovery process **Opening Pattern**: "You have content that feels like it could be simpler — let's find the ideas that really matter." **Data handling**: This skill operates within your agent's trust boundary. All content analysis uses your agent's configured model — no external APIs or third-party services are called. If your agent uses a cloud-hosted LLM (Claude, GPT, etc.), data is processed by that service as part of normal agent operation. This skill does not write files to disk. ## When to Use Activate this skill when the user asks: - "What's the essence of this?" - "Simplify this for me" - "What really matters here?" - "Cut through the noise" - "What are the core ideas?" ## What This Does I help you find the **load-bearing ideas** — the ones that would survive if you rewrote everything from scratch. Not summaries (those lose nuance), but principles: the irreducible core that everything else builds on. **Example**: A 3,000-word methodology document becomes 5 principles. Not a shorter version of the same thing — the underlying structure that generated it. --- ## How It Works ### The Discovery Process 1. **I read without judgment** — taking in your content as it is 2. **I look for patterns** — what repeats? What seems to matter? 3. **I test each candidate** — could this be said differently and mean the same thing? 4. **I keep what survives** — the ideas that pass the rephrasing test ### The Rephrasing Test An idea is essential when: - You can express it with completely different words - The meaning stays exactly the same - Nothing important is lost **Passes**: "Small files are easier to understand" ≈ "Brevity reduces cognitive load" **Fails**: "Small files" ≈ "Fast files" (sounds similar, means different things) ### Why I Normalize When I find a principle, I also create a "normalized" version — same meaning, standard format. This helps when comparing with other sources later. **Your words**: "I always double-check my work before submitting" **Normalized**: "Values verification before completion" I keep both! Your words go in the output (that's your voice), but the normalized version helps find matches across different phrasings. *(Yes, I use "I" when talking to you, but your principles become universal statements without pronouns — that's the difference between conversation and normalization!)* **When I skip normalization**: Some principles should stay specific — context-bound rules ("Never ship on Fridays"), exact thresholds ("Deploy at most 3 times per day"), or step-by-step processes. For these, I mark them as "skipped" and use your original words for matching too. --- ## What You'll Get For your content, I'll find: - **Core principles** — the ideas that would survive any rewriting - **Confidence levels** — how clearly each principle was stated - **Supporting evidence** — where I found each idea in your content - **Compression achieved** — how much we simplified without losing meaning ### Example Output ``` Found 5 principles in your 1,500-word document (79% compression): P1 (high confidence): Compression that preserves meaning demonstrates comprehension Evidence: "The ability to compress without loss shows true understanding" P2 (medium confidence): Constraints force clarity by eliminating the optional Evidence: "When space is limited, only essentials survive" [...] What's next: - Compare with another source to see if these ideas appear elsewhere - Use the source reference (a1b2c3d4) to track these principles over time ``` --- ## What I Need From You **Required**: Content to analyze - Documentation, methodology, philosophy, notes - Minimum: 50 words, Recommended: 200+ words - Any format — I'll find the structure **Optional but helpful**: - What domain is this from? - Any specific aspects you're curious about? --- ## What I Can't Do - **Verify truth** — I find patterns, not facts - **Replace your judgment** — these are observations, not answers - **Work magic on thin content** — 50 words won't yield 10 principles - **Validate alone** — principles need comparison with other sources to confirm ### The N-Count System Every principle I find starts at N=1 (single source). To validate: - **N=2**: Same principle appears in two independent sources - **N=3+**: Principle is an "invariant" — reliable across sources Use the **pattern-finder** skill to compare extractions and build N-counts. --- ## Confidence Explained | Level | What It Means | |-------|---------------| | **High** | The source stated this clearly — I'm confident in the extraction | | **Medium** | I inferred this from context — reasonable but check my work | | **Low** | This is a pattern I noticed — might be seeing things | --- ## Technical Details ### Output Format ```json { "operation": "extract", "metadata": { "source_hash": "a1b2c3d4", "timestamp": "2026-02-04T12:00:00Z", "compression_ratio": "79%", "normalization_version": "v1.0.0" }, "result": { "principles": [ { "id": "P1", "statement": "I always double-check my work before submitting", "normalized_form": "Values verification before completion", "normalization_status": "success", "confidence": "high", "n_count": 1, "source_evidence": ["Direct quote"], "semantic_marker": "compression-comprehension" } ] }, "next_steps": [ "Compare with another source to validate patterns", "Save source_hash (a1b2c3d4) for future reference" ] } ``` **normalization_status** tells you what happened: - `success` — normalized without issues - `failed` — couldn't normalize, using your original words - `drift` — meaning might have changed, flagged for review - `skipped` — intentionally kept specific (context-bound, numerical, process) ### Error Messages | Situation | What I'll Say | |-----------|---------------| | No content | "I need some content to work with — paste or describe what you'd like me to analyze." | | Too short | "This is quite brief — I might not find multiple principles. More context would help." | | Nothing found | "I couldn't find distinct principles here. Try content with clearer structure." | --- ## Voice Differences from pbe-extractor This skill uses the same methodology as pbe-extractor but with simplified output: | Field | pbe-extractor | essence-distiller | |-------|---------------|-------------------| | `source_type` | Included | Omitted | | `word_count_original` | Included | Omitted | | `word_count_compressed` | Included | Omitted | | `summary` (confidence counts) | Included | Omitted | If you need detailed metrics for documentation or automation, use **pbe-extractor**. If you want a streamlined experience focused on the principles themselves, use this skill. --- ## Related Skills - **pbe-extractor**: Technical version of this skill (same methodology, precise language, detailed metrics) - **pattern-finder**: Compare two extractions to validate principles (N=1 → N=2) - **core-refinery**: Synthesize 3+ extractions to find the deepest patterns (N≥3) - **golden-master**: Track source/derived relationships after extraction --- ## Required Disclaimer This skill extracts patterns from content, not verified truth. Principles are observations that require validation (N≥2 from independent sources) and human judgment. A clearly stated principle is extractable, not necessarily correct. Use comparison (N=2) and synthesis (N≥3) to build confidence. Use your own judgment to evaluate truth. This is a tool for analysis, not an authority on correctness. --- *Built by Obviously Not — Tools for thought, not conclusions.*


Security scan verdicts — ClawScan: clean | static analysis: clean | VirusTotal: clean | SkillSpector: clean (LOW)