| title | Size and readability limits | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| summary | Cap file, section, and token-budget size; enforce reading grade and sentence count; flag verbatim copy-paste across files. | |||||
| icon | ruler | |||||
| link | /guides/metrics-tradeoffs/ | |||||
| rules |
|
|||||
| weight | 3 | |||||
| group | Clean, consistent Markdown |
mdsmith enforces five rules that cap the size and readability of a Markdown corpus. They flag long files, dense paragraphs, oversized context-window loads, and verbatim copy-paste between files.
These rules help any team catch bloat early. They are useful whether prose is hand-written or machine-generated.
Three rules are on by default. Two are opt-in.
| Rule | Config key | Default state | Default threshold |
|---|---|---|---|
MDS022 |
max-file-length |
on | max: 300 lines |
MDS023 |
paragraph-readability |
on | max-index: 14.0 ARI, min-words: 20 |
MDS024 |
paragraph-structure |
opt-in | max-sentences: 6, 40 words / sentence |
MDS028 |
token-budget |
on | max: 8000, mode: heuristic |
MDS037 |
duplicated-content |
opt-in | verbatim paragraph match (≥ 200 chars) |
Turn an opt-in rule on by naming it in .mdsmith.yml:
rules:
paragraph-structure:
max-sentences: 6
max-words-per-sentence: 40
duplicated-content: trueDisable all five at once — covers cases where a convention or kind
turned on paragraph-structure or duplicated-content:
rules:
max-file-length: false
paragraph-readability: false
paragraph-structure: false
token-budget: false
duplicated-content: falseA bare false toggles enabled only. Inherited settings stay
intact. A later layer can re-enable the rule without re-stating its
thresholds.
MDS022 caps lines per file. MDS023 scores paragraph reading grade
using ARI. MDS024 flags paragraphs with too many sentences or
over-long sentences. MDS028 estimates the token load of a file with
either a fast heuristic or a tokenizer. MDS037 hashes each
normalized paragraph (default: ≥ 200 characters) and flags
verbatim duplicates that appear in another file in the corpus.
See the metrics trade-offs guide for threshold guidance and the rule directory for the full reference for each rule.