{"slug": "vale", "name": "Vale", "category": "notes", "category_name": "Notes and knowledge", "description": "", "recommenders": 4, "commenters": 7, "warners": 1, "score": 3.501, "rising": 1.35, "first": "2026-01-13", "latest": "2026-09-23", "why": "you can also consider using something deterministic like vale.sh", "why_is_quote": true, "has_verdict": false, "sentiment": {"recommend": 4, "neutral": 2, "compare": 0, "warn": 1}, "spark": [0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 1, 1, 1, 1, 0], "listed": true, "loved": [], "caveat": "", "short_quote": "you can also consider using something deterministic like vale.sh", "kind": "", "icon": true, "domain": "vale.sh", "github_repo": null, "official_url": "https://vale.sh", "pricing": "", "aliases": ["Vale"], "verdict": null, "praise": [{"label": "", "summary": "", "quotes": [{"id": 797079120, "item_id": 49817445, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49817445", "by": "stuxnet79", "date": "2026-09-23", "version": null, "stance": "recommend", "quote": "You might be interested in Val - https://docs.vale.sh/", "excerpt": "> I need to find an old school grammar checker that works on the command line with markdown. You might be interested in Val - https://docs.vale.sh/", "context": "", "use_case": "Command-line prose linting", "switched_from": "", "story": "Grammarly will send unhinged messages to all your users if you try to cancel"}, {"id": 790040736, "item_id": 49377546, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49377546", "by": "Syntaf", "date": "2026-08-20", "version": null, "stance": "recommend", "quote": "you can also consider using something deterministic like vale.sh", "excerpt": "With a whole separate LLM? FWIW you can also consider using something deterministic like vale.sh [1] , it's pretty easy to write prose violation plugins [2] [1] https://vale.sh/ [2] https://github.com/Syntaf/vale-llm-slop", "context": "", "use_case": "prose linting", "switched_from": "", "story": "Clean up Claude 5's token vomit with a separate LLM"}, {"id": 785980816, "item_id": 49123801, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49123801", "by": "tbhb", "date": "2026-07-31", "version": null, "stance": "recommend", "quote": "it does help eliminate a lot of the common tells", "excerpt": "I use it with a rule package that has a variety of Vale styles for AI writing tells (github.com/tbhb/vale-ai-tells). Typically I have it set up in a project and then gate the agent with post tool use hooks and pre-commit hooks. It's far from perfect but it does help eliminate a lot of the common tells.", "context": "", "use_case": "linting AI writing tells", "switched_from": "", "story": "Agent Skill to Force Docs in ASD-STE100 Simplified Technical English"}, {"id": 779613425, "item_id": 48725839, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48725839", "by": "thx67", "date": "2026-06-29", "version": null, "stance": "recommend", "quote": "the author would be advised to use vale", "excerpt": "This is obvious Claude slop writing, the author would be advised to use vale [1] with samples of their own writing as a guide. > Performance begins with the roofline. On the M1 the engine holds about 12 fp16 TFLOP/s of compute against a DRAM-bandwidth ceiling. The roofline has a ridge point near 141 FLOP per byte, a 2 MB working-set threshold, a 0.23 ms floor under any single dispatch, and efficiency near 0.37 picojo", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Apple Neural Engine: Architecture, Programming, and Performance"}]}], "caveats": [{"label": "", "summary": "", "quotes": [{"id": 745772307, "item_id": 46610769, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46610769", "by": "dont__panic", "date": "2026-01-13", "version": null, "stance": "warn", "quote": "don't even get me started on Vale, which generally just annoys the hell out of contributors instead of helping them.", "excerpt": "I love the linux philosophy at work here. Pandoc is an incredible tool that every documentarian knows. Markdown is a great tool that covers 80%+ of docs requirements (admonitions and tabs are not well-defined in vanilla markdown, for instance, but you don't strictly _need_ those). I've worked on docs at quite a few companies at this point. Almost every company I've ever seen has built a Rube Goldberg machine and tota", "context": "has worked on docs at many companies", "use_case": "docs linting", "switched_from": "", "story": "You Don't Need Mintlify"}]}], "who": [], "tags": [], "use_cases": ["prose linting", "command-line prose linting", "linting ai writing tells", "prose style linting", "docs linting"], "compared": [], "makers": [], "threads": [{"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49114639", "title": "Agent Skill to Force Docs in ASD-STE100 Simplified Technical English", "mentions": 2}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49811484", "title": "Grammarly will send unhinged messages to all your users if you try to cancel", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49375996", "title": "Clean up Claude 5's token vomit with a separate LLM", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48702825", "title": "Apple Neural Engine: Architecture, Programming, and Performance", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46677106", "title": "Wikipedia: WikiProject AI Cleanup", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46596823", "title": "You Don't Need Mintlify", "mentions": 1}], "sentiment_by_month": {"2025-11": {}, "2025-12": {}, "2026-01": {"warn": 1, "neutral": 1}, "2026-02": {}, "2026-03": {}, "2026-04": {}, "2026-05": {}, "2026-06": {"recommend": 1}, "2026-07": {"neutral": 1, "recommend": 1}, "2026-08": {"recommend": 1}, "2026-09": {"recommend": 1}, "2026-10": {}}, "versions": [], "version_unnamed": 0, "family_ref": null, "runs_on": null, "lines": [], "quotes": [{"id": 797079120, "item_id": 49817445, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49817445", "by": "stuxnet79", "date": "2026-09-23", "version": null, "stance": "recommend", "quote": "You might be interested in Val - https://docs.vale.sh/", "excerpt": "> I need to find an old school grammar checker that works on the command line with markdown. You might be interested in Val - https://docs.vale.sh/", "context": "", "use_case": "Command-line prose linting", "switched_from": "", "story": "Grammarly will send unhinged messages to all your users if you try to cancel"}, {"id": 790040736, "item_id": 49377546, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49377546", "by": "Syntaf", "date": "2026-08-20", "version": null, "stance": "recommend", "quote": "you can also consider using something deterministic like vale.sh", "excerpt": "With a whole separate LLM? FWIW you can also consider using something deterministic like vale.sh [1] , it's pretty easy to write prose violation plugins [2] [1] https://vale.sh/ [2] https://github.com/Syntaf/vale-llm-slop", "context": "", "use_case": "prose linting", "switched_from": "", "story": "Clean up Claude 5's token vomit with a separate LLM"}, {"id": 785980816, "item_id": 49123801, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49123801", "by": "tbhb", "date": "2026-07-31", "version": null, "stance": "recommend", "quote": "it does help eliminate a lot of the common tells", "excerpt": "I use it with a rule package that has a variety of Vale styles for AI writing tells (github.com/tbhb/vale-ai-tells). Typically I have it set up in a project and then gate the agent with post tool use hooks and pre-commit hooks. It's far from perfect but it does help eliminate a lot of the common tells.", "context": "", "use_case": "linting AI writing tells", "switched_from": "", "story": "Agent Skill to Force Docs in ASD-STE100 Simplified Technical English"}, {"id": 785865232, "item_id": 49116577, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49116577", "by": "jpease", "date": "2026-07-30", "version": null, "stance": "neutral", "quote": "Might give that a try.", "excerpt": "I like the idea, but not sold on the skill. But did lead to me finding https://vale.sh and its various available linters. Might give that a try.", "context": "", "use_case": "prose linting", "switched_from": "", "story": "Agent Skill to Force Docs in ASD-STE100 Simplified Technical English"}, {"id": 779613425, "item_id": 48725839, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48725839", "by": "thx67", "date": "2026-06-29", "version": null, "stance": "recommend", "quote": "the author would be advised to use vale", "excerpt": "This is obvious Claude slop writing, the author would be advised to use vale [1] with samples of their own writing as a guide. > Performance begins with the roofline. On the M1 the engine holds about 12 fp16 TFLOP/s of compute against a DRAM-bandwidth ceiling. The roofline has a ridge point near 141 FLOP per byte, a 2 MB working-set threshold, a 0.23 ms floor under any single dispatch, and efficiency near 0.37 picojo", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Apple Neural Engine: Architecture, Programming, and Performance"}, {"id": 746899328, "item_id": 46681208, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46681208", "by": "cjlm", "date": "2026-01-19", "version": null, "stance": "neutral", "quote": "Turned this into a ruleset[0] for vale.sh[1]", "excerpt": "Turned this into a ruleset[0] for vale.sh[1] [0]: https://ammil.industries/signs-of-ai-writing-a-vale-ruleset/ [1]: https://vale.sh/", "context": "", "use_case": "prose style linting", "switched_from": "", "story": "Wikipedia: WikiProject AI Cleanup"}, {"id": 745772307, "item_id": 46610769, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46610769", "by": "dont__panic", "date": "2026-01-13", "version": null, "stance": "warn", "quote": "don't even get me started on Vale, which generally just annoys the hell out of contributors instead of helping them.", "excerpt": "I love the linux philosophy at work here. Pandoc is an incredible tool that every documentarian knows. Markdown is a great tool that covers 80%+ of docs requirements (admonitions and tabs are not well-defined in vanilla markdown, for instance, but you don't strictly _need_ those). I've worked on docs at quite a few companies at this point. Almost every company I've ever seen has built a Rube Goldberg machine and tota", "context": "has worked on docs at many companies", "use_case": "docs linting", "switched_from": "", "story": "You Don't Need Mintlify"}]}