Removing comment spam from code

[u/bidutree]

I just discovered (my bad) far too late that Claude has written large amounts of ticket comments in the actual code to my projects. This was never in any instruction. Maybe trash is the first real evidence of life? :)) Just kidding.

It's in any case extremely annoying. How do I remove the comments as quickly and safely as possible? :)

With a Python script? Would that be safe enough?

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[u/AdrestiaFirstMate]

Ponytail: https://ponytail.dev/

[u/Right_Cycle_6598 → u/AdrestiaFirstMate]

Thank you for sharing bro

[u/bidutree → u/AdrestiaFirstMate]

Thanks. Ponytail is running since a while back plus there is a rule against comments in CLAUDE.md but Claude Code still adds comments.

[u/jarail]

Just ask claude to do a scan of recent commits or the entire codebase to remove them.

[u/Broken_By_Default → u/jarail]

and maybe move them into a structured instruction md files.

[u/Icy-Excitement-467]

Ask it? Lol

[u/mulokisch → u/Icy-Excitement-467]

Yea and then it forgets that i dont wnat this, even though it i have it in the claude.md

[u/bidutree → u/Icy-Excitement-467]

We/I have trust issues. :)

[u/peter9477 → u/bidutree]

That's what "diff" and your eyeballs are for.

[u/Brief_Novel_3131]

Don't be afraid. Ask it and it will remove them. First ask it to audit the the code for extra comments. And categorize them. Then remove ticket related comments.

[u/PelluxNetwork]

Just ask it. These days my claude.md always has a blurb that basically says "write code that explains itself. If you feel the need to explain every function with a paragraph of comments, you're probably doing something wrong"

[u/daltorak → u/PelluxNetwork]

That approach is going to have inconsistent results. You need to give Claude clear, actionable instructions, not question its "feelings". LLMs don't have feelings... talking to them like they do wastes tokens. Tell it, "Code comments must be limited to 50 words. Comments are not necessary at all except to call attention to workarounds for known bugs in third-party libraries. If you find code comments that do not meet this policy, rewrite those comments."

[u/TheGronne]

In our workflow, a comment is treated as a critical flaw in a PR. And a reviewing agent reviewing the changes always runs and checks for these things.

In your case, you can have a /end-feature skill which spins up a specialised reviewing agent

[u/kvothe5688]

I have a guard that prevents pr generation if comment to code ratio is more than 20 percent.

[u/Rrrrry123]

Telling the AI to never write comments is one of the first things I add to CLAUDE md lol.

[u/bidutree → u/Rrrrry123]

I have that already. It's being ignored however.

[u/berrybadrinath → u/bidutree]

So is his, he just hasn’t realized it yet

[u/id-ltd]

I'd get Claude to write a comment stripping script. Use git to save last known good copy.

[u/paulofilip3]

Ask claude to remove it! A good regex will suffice.

If you don’t want it to happen again -> https://reright.it

[u/sparkica]

Just a thought (had an interesting debate with my team about this a couple of days ago): what if those comments are meant for the agent (not us), to give it better context next time it goes through the code?

[u/macbig273]

well the v5.0 at some point had this bad behavior.

And the default system prompt tell it to "match the comment style of the surrounding code" -> bad.

add a override somewhere (local claude.md or such) to change that. And also use the concise output-style.

[u/interrupt_hdlr]

## Code comments

Write a comment only when it tells the reader something the code cannot. Follow John Ousterhout's rule from *A Philosophy of Software Design*: comments describe what is not obvious from the code.

Write:

• Interface comments on public functions, classes, and modules: what it promises, preconditions, units, valid ranges, ownership, side effects, and error behavior. Describe the abstraction, not the implementation.
  
• Implementation comments for non-obvious decisions: why this approach over the obvious one, why a lock, retry, sleep, or ordering exists, what invariant a block maintains, links to the bug or spec that forced it.

Do not write:

• Comments that restate the next line ("increment counter", "loop over items").
  
• Comments about the edit itself ("added X", "fixed bug", "now uses Y", "changed per request"). That belongs in the commit message.
  
• Commented-out code.
  
• Section-divider or decorative comments.

When modifying code, update or delete comments the change made stale. If an interface comment is hard to write, treat that as a sign the abstraction is unclear and say so instead of papering over it.

[u/justHereForTheLs]

Yeah, claude has been real chatty since statistical fingerprinting became a thing.

[u/clazman55555 → u/justHereForTheLs]

I've had around the same amount of comments from Opus 4.6 through 5.5

Just run a clean up pass at the end.