| name | restyle |
| description | Switch the manuscript's citation style (APA 7, IEEE, Chicago, Vancouver, Harvard, MLA 9, or a custom CSL) after drafting has already started, based on user feedback or a venue change. An INSTRUCTION to change this project's style — a QUESTION about what a style requires, or about what switching one involves, belongs to citation-styles. Triggers on: 'switch to APA', 'change citation style', 'use IEEE instead', 'restyle references', 'atıf stilini değiştir'. |
| disable-model-invocation | true |
| argument-hint | <apa7|mla9|chicago-author-date|chicago-notes|ieee|vancouver|harvard|csl:<file>> |
/restyle — Switch Citation Style Without Touching Drafts or the Bibliography
The kit's citation-styles skill already guarantees this is a one-config-line
change (Golden Rule 3: bib/references.bib stays untouched, in-text citations
are always pandoc [@key] syntax, style is applied only at render time via CSL).
This command is the safe, single-step wrapper around that mechanism — it exists
because users legitimately change their mind on style mid-project (a common
request: "I usually use APA, but let's see what other options make sense").
Never hand-edit bib/references.bib or any draft file for a style change.
If either seems necessary to satisfy the request, stop — that means the request
is not actually a style switch (e.g. a genuinely non-CSL-expressible convention),
and the citation-styles skill's Common Pitfalls table should be consulted instead.
Procedure
1. Parse and Validate the Target Style
- Take the argument as the target style key. If empty, ask the user to pick
from the same 7-option list
new-project's wizard uses (APA 7 / IEEE /
Chicago Author-Date / Vancouver-AMA / Harvard / MLA 9 / custom CSL).
- Validate the key against
.claude/skills/citation-styles/SKILL.md's "CSL
File Mapping" table. Valid enum keys: apa7, mla9, chicago-author-date,
chicago-notes, ieee, vancouver, harvard, or csl:<file> for a
user-supplied CSL.
- Unrecognized key (e.g. a common misspelling or a style the kit doesn't
ship, like "nature" or "acs") → do NOT guess a filename. Report the valid
key list and ask the user to pick one, or to use
/ingest-template first
if they have the exact CSL file for their venue.
2. Resolve and Confirm the CSL File Exists
- Resolve the key to its
.csl filename via the mapping table (never derive
it by lowercasing/reformatting the key — apa7 is not apa7.csl).
- For an enum key: confirm
templates/csl/<file>.csl exists in this project.
Missing → this is a kit installation problem, not a user error; report it
plainly rather than silently proceeding with the old style.
- For
csl:<file>: confirm the user-supplied path exists (relative to project
root, typically under templates/ingested/ if it came from /ingest-template
— TEMPLATE SUPREMACY still applies if templates/ingested/template-profile.md
exists, so warn the user if their /restyle choice conflicts with an ingested
template's own citation-style rule).
3. Read Current Style and Report the No-Op Case
- Read PROJECT.md's
- **Citation style:** bullet.
- If it already equals the target key: report "Already using
<key> — nothing
to change" and stop. Do not touch the file or trigger a rebuild for a no-op.
4. Apply the Change
- Edit PROJECT.md (Edit tool, in this session — PROJECT.md is not one of
the hook-protected data files) to change only the
- **Citation style:** bullet value, keeping the rest of the line's
Markdown comment intact.
- Do not touch
bib/references.bib, any file under drafts/, or
outline/outline.md. A style switch changes rendering only.
5. Sanity-Check, Don't Re-Verify
A style switch cannot introduce a missing/fabricated citation (the underlying
[@key] references and bib/references.bib entries are unchanged), so do
not re-run citation-verifier or /verify-citations — that would be pure
token waste for a change that cannot affect their result. Do run the cheap,
already-fast structural check to catch the one thing a style switch can
break — a target style with stricter/different required fields than the
bibliography currently satisfies:
python scripts/bib_doctor.py --bib bib/references.bib
Report any new field-completeness gaps (e.g. Vancouver expects PMID/volume
conventions some entries may lack) as advisory, non-blocking notes — these are
pre-existing bibliography gaps the switch merely makes newly relevant, not
something this command caused or must fix.
6. Offer to Rebuild
If build/paper.pdf or build/paper.docx already exists (a prior build under
the old style), tell the user the existing artifact still reflects the OLD
style and ask whether to rebuild now. If yes, dispatch format-engineer exactly
as /submit-check Step 6 does (same build/docx/pdf mode, same artifacts
directory) — this command does not build directly, to avoid duplicating that
agent's build-time cross-reference and numbering checks.
7. Report
Citation style: [old-key] -> [new-key]
CSL file: templates/csl/[resolved-file].csl
bib/references.bib: unchanged (47 entries)
Drafts: unchanged
Bibliography hygiene: ✓ clean (or: N advisory field-completeness notes)
Rebuild: [triggered format-engineer -> build/paper.pdf] | [skipped — no prior build found] | [declined by user]
Common Mistakes This Command Prevents
| Mistake | Why /restyle avoids it |
|---|
Manually rewriting [@key] citations into (Author, 2024) for the new style | In-text syntax never changes; only render-time CSL does. |
Re-fetching or editing bib/references.bib entries | The bibliography is style-agnostic; only the CSL file changes how it renders. |
| Re-running the full citation-verifier gate | A style switch cannot create a fabricated/missing citation — nothing there to re-check. |
| Guessing a CSL filename from the style name | Always resolve via the citation-styles mapping table; never lowercase-derive. |
| Forgetting an already-built PDF/DOCX still shows the old style | Step 6 explicitly flags a stale prior build and offers to rebuild. |
See Also
.claude/skills/citation-styles/SKILL.md — the underlying mechanism and full CSL mapping table..claude/agents/format-engineer.md — the build agent this command may dispatch.scripts/bib_doctor.py — the only check this command re-runs.
