| name | paper-proofreading |
| description | Final-pass proofreading for academic papers before submission. Use when the user says "proofread my paper", "final check before submission", "check for typos", "is this ready to submit", "pre-submission checklist", or "last pass". Also use proactively as the final step in the paper-writing pipeline — after copy-editing is done and the paper is otherwise complete. Catches typos, numbering errors, cross-reference issues, notation inconsistencies, and formatting problems that other skills don't cover.
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Paper Proofreading
The last check before submission. Everything else — structure, writing quality,
references, formatting — should already be handled. This pass catches the small
errors that survive all previous editing.
Proofreading is different from copy-editing: you are not improving the writing,
you are finding mistakes. Read literally and mechanically, not for meaning.
Proofreading Checklist
Work through these systematically. Don't skip around — methodical coverage catches
more than quick scanning.
1. Spelling and Typos
- Read each section looking specifically for misspelled words. LaTeX doesn't
spellcheck by default, so typos are common.
- Watch for correctly-spelled-but-wrong-word errors that spellcheckers miss:
"form" vs "from", "though" vs "through", "their" vs "there", "then" vs "than",
"compliment" vs "complement", "affect" vs "effect".
- Check proper nouns: model names (BERT not Bert unless the authors style it that
way), dataset names (ImageNet not Imagenet), people's names.
- Check consistency of British vs American spelling: "optimisation" vs "optimization".
Pick one and stick to it (most CS venues use American).
2. Figure and Table References
This is where errors hide most often.
- Every figure/table is referenced in text — Search for
\ref{fig: and
\ref{tab: and compare against all defined \label{fig: and \label{tab:}.
Every float should be referenced at least once.
- References point to the right float — "As shown in Figure 3" should actually
show what the text describes. Read the caption, glance at the figure, check the
claim. This catches label-swap errors.
- Numbering is sequential — Figures should be referenced in order (Figure 1
before Figure 2). Same for tables. Out-of-order references confuse readers.
- Captions are complete — Every figure and table needs a caption that is
self-contained (a reader should understand the figure from the caption alone,
without reading the body text).
3. Equation References
- Every numbered equation that is referenced later should use
\eqref or
(\ref{eq:...}), not a hardcoded number.
- Check that equation numbers in the text match the actual equations.
- Unnumbered equations (using
\[...\] or equation*) should not be referenced
by number anywhere.
4. Notation Consistency
Build a notation table as you read:
| Symbol | Meaning | First defined |
|---|
| $x$ | input | Section 2.1 |
| $f$ | model | Section 2.2 |
Check for:
- Same symbol, different meaning in different sections
- Same concept, different symbol — if the loss is $\mathcal{L}$ in Section 3
and $L$ in Section 4, that's an error
- Undefined symbols — every symbol should be defined before or immediately
after its first use
- Subscript/superscript consistency — $x_i$ vs $x^{(i)}$ for the same index
5. Number and Unit Formatting
- Thousands separator — Large numbers should be readable: 10,000 or 10{,}000,
not 10000
- Decimal consistency — Don't mix "0.5" and ".5"; don't mix "92.3%" and "92.30%"
within the same table
- Units — Use consistent spacing: "10 GB" not "10GB". Use
\, or ~ in LaTeX
for non-breaking spaces between numbers and units.
- Percentage — Pick "%" or "percent" and be consistent. "92.3%" in LaTeX
(escaped backslash).
6. Cross-Reference Mechanics
- Search the compiled PDF or
.log for ?? — these are broken \ref or \cite
commands.
- Check that
\label comes after \caption in floats (placing it before can cause
wrong numbering).
- Section references: "Section 3" not "section 3" at the start of a sentence; be
consistent about capitalization elsewhere.
7. Formatting and Layout
- Orphan/widow lines — A single line of a paragraph stranded at the top or
bottom of a page. Fix with
\looseness=-1 on the paragraph or minor rewording.
- Page limits — Count pages. If over the limit, flag which sections are longest.
- Margin violations — Text or figures that extend into margins. Check the PDF
visually.
- Consistent spacing — No double spaces, no inconsistent spacing around math.
- Hyphenation — Check that LaTeX's automatic hyphenation hasn't produced
awkward breaks (e.g., "the-rapist" for "therapist"). Use
\hyphenation{} in
the preamble to fix.
8. Abstract and Metadata
- Abstract length — Check against venue requirements (typically 150–250 words).
- Keywords — If required by the venue, are they present and well-chosen?
- Author list — Correct names, affiliations, and order. (Don't change these —
just flag if something looks off.)
- Paper title — Matches between the PDF title, LaTeX title command, and any
submission system entry.
9. Supplementary Material
If the paper has appendices or supplementary material:
- References from the main paper to appendix sections are correct
- Appendix numbering is correct (Appendix A, B, C or A.1, A.2)
- The supplement is self-contained enough to be useful
Output Format
Report findings grouped by severity:
## Must Fix
- Page 3, line 7: "form" should be "from"
- Figure 4 is never referenced in the text
- Equation (5) references $\alpha$ but it's not defined until Section 4
## Should Fix
- Inconsistent notation: $\mathbf{x}$ in Section 2 vs $x$ in Section 3 for the same vector
- Table 2 caption doesn't explain the bold numbers
- "optimisation" on page 2 but "optimization" everywhere else
## Nice to Fix
- Orphan line at top of page 7
- Double space after period on page 4, line 12
Workflow Tips
Read backwards — For catching typos, read sentences in reverse order (last
sentence first). This breaks your brain's tendency to auto-correct familiar text.
Check one category at a time — Don't try to catch typos and check figure
references simultaneously. Focused passes are more reliable.
Use the LaTeX log — Compile the paper and check the .log file for warnings.
It catches undefined references, multiply-defined labels, overfull hboxes, and
font substitution issues automatically.
Run chktex — A LaTeX linter that catches common issues automatically:
intersentence spacing (~ after abbreviations), wrong quote characters, mismatched
delimiters, and deprecated commands. Run chktex main.tex and review the output
before starting manual proofreading — it eliminates a class of mechanical errors
so you can focus on the things only a human eye catches.
What This Skill Does NOT Do
- Does not improve writing quality (use
paper-copy-editing)
- Does not restructure content (use
research-paper-writing)
- Does not verify citation data (use
reference-checking)
- Does not fix LaTeX compilation errors (use
latex-paper-formatting)
