finding-dedup

Finding Dedup

Identify and resolve duplicate or overlapping security findings.

Prerequisites

Before starting, read skills/finding/SKILL.md to understand finding structure and conventions. That skill defines the format and standards that this workflow relies on for comparison.

Workflow

When this skill is activated, create a todo list from the following steps. Mark each task in_progress before starting it and completed when done.

- [ ] 0. Load finding knowledge (read skills/finding/SKILL.md)
- [ ] 1. Index and compare findings
- [ ] 2. Present duplicates and confirm actions
- [ ] 3. Execute and report

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0. Load Finding Knowledge

Read skills/finding/SKILL.md to internalize finding structure and conventions. This is required before proceeding — the base skill defines the format you will compare against.

1. Index and Compare Findings

Run the indexing script to get the full finding set:

bash skills/finding/scripts/index-findings.sh

If fewer than 2 findings exist, report that there is nothing to deduplicate and stop.

For each pair of findings, compare title, type, context (affected files), and description. Classify each pair as:

• Duplicate — same root cause, same affected component, same impact. One can be deleted without losing information.
• Similar — overlapping root cause or component but different scope or impact. Cannot delete without information loss. May benefit from cross-referencing or merging.
• Distinct — no meaningful overlap. No action needed.

If the finding set is large (>10 findings), group by type first and only compare within groups. Use subagents for parallel comparison if needed.

See skills/finding/examples/dedup-scenario.md for a worked example showing duplicate vs similar classification and the resolution workflow.

2. Present Duplicates and Confirm Actions

Present results:

• Table of duplicate pairs with recommendation (which to keep, which to delete)
• Table of similar pairs with recommendation (merge, cross-reference, or leave as-is)
• List of distinct findings — no action needed

For each duplicate pair: "Delete <file>? [y/n]" For each similar pair: "Merge into <file>? [y/n/skip]"

Never delete or merge without explicit user confirmation.

3. Execute and Report

Perform confirmed deletions and merges. When merging:

• Keep the more complete finding as the base
• Incorporate unique content from the other finding
• Present the merged result for user approval before deleting the source

Re-run the index to show the updated finding set:

bash skills/finding/scripts/index-findings.sh

Suggest /finding-review on any merged findings to verify quality.