Here is a small Camlp4 filter removing exhaustive patterns. It obviously depends on 3.12. open Camlp4.PreCast;; let filter = function | <:patt@_loc< { $p$ } >> -> let rec clean = function | <:patt< _ ; $p$ >> | <:patt< $p$; _ >> -> clean p | <:patt@_loc< $p1$; $p2$ >> -> <:patt< $clean p1$; $clean p2$ >> | p -> p in <:patt< { $clean p$ } >> | t -> t ;; AstFilters.register_str_item_filter (Ast.map_patt filter)#str_item;; (* #step I used to compile and test the code from a freshly compiiled (but not installed) ocaml-3.12 beta : #I build using fastworld.sh (see INSTALL) then `cd _build` ../byterun/ocamlrun -I otherlibs/unix/ camlp4/camlp4orf.byte /tmp/ exhaustive_record_stripper.ml -o /tmp/stripper.ml ../byterun/ocamlrun ./ocamlc -I stdlib -I camlp4 /tmp/stripper.ml -c ../byterun/ocamlrun -I otherlibs/unix/ camlp4/camlp4o.byte /tmp/stripper.cmo -str 'fun {a; b; _} -> c' #output : fun { a = a; b = b } -> c *) Notes : - that the OCaml printer expand sugared { a; b } patters into { a = a; b = b } is necessary for printing backward-compatible code; I'm not sure it's a good idea to rely on this. - as with every camlp4 filters, the code is parsed then pretty-printed; do not expect indentation to stay as is. Comment placement is also going to do weird things (know and nearly-unfixable camlp4 defect) : ocamldoc may not work properly on the output code.