paper-proofreading

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.

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)