deposit

name	deposit
description	Two moments either side of publication. --preprint assembles an arXiv/SSRN/TechRxiv/OSF deposit: title and abstract against the SERVER's own limits, the licence/category/journal-policy/version/co-author decisions recorded rather than guessed, and the preprint disclosure sentence the cover letter will need. --corrigendum takes an error found in a published paper and lists everywhere that number went — drafts, the figures and tables named beside it, the run records, the evidence cards — then gives the letter's skeleton. Use before posting a preprint, or when a mistake surfaces after publication.
disable-model-invocation	true
argument-hint	--preprint <arxiv|ssrn|techrxiv|osf|biorxiv> | --corrigendum

/deposit — posting it early, and fixing it late

A. The preprint

python scripts/deposit_pack.py --preprint arxiv

The limits file, and the five decisions

{
  "server": "arXiv",
  "source_url": "https://info.arxiv.org/help/",
  "read_on": "2026-08-15",
  "title_max_chars": 240,
  "abstract_max_chars": 1920,
  "categories": ["eess.SP", "cs.LG"],
  "decisions": {
    "target_journal_policy": "…",
    "licence": "…",
    "category": "…",
    "version_posted": "…",
    "coauthor_consent": "…"
  }
}

The limits come from the server's own help page. The five decisions are the questions the kit asks and will not answer:

1. Does the target journal permit this? Read the journal's own preprint policy. It differs between imprints of the same publisher, and it is not recalled here. Some venues treat a posted preprint as prior publication.
2. Which licence? CC-BY permits redistribution and adaptation with attribution; CC-BY-NC forbids commercial reuse; arXiv's non-exclusive licence permits distribution only. A posted licence is effectively irreversible — servers do not un-license a paper.
3. Which category? Wrong classification is the most common reason a preprint is quietly unread.
4. Which version — submitted, accepted, or published? Usually only one of the three is permitted.
5. Have all co-authors agreed? Posting is a publication act.

Leaving one undecided is a finding, not a note: exit 2 until each is recorded. Printing five questions and exiting 0 would make an undecided deposit read exactly like a checked one.

After posting

The command produces the disclosure sentence with visible blanks:

A preprint of this manuscript has been posted at <server> under <licence> (<URL>).

Fill it and add it to exports/submission/cover-letter.md — most venues require the letter to say a preprint exists, and /submission-pack will ask.

B. The corrigendum

Describe the error first — the letter is the easy half:

{
  "source_url": "https://doi.org/10.1234/published",
  "wrong_value": 0.91,
  "correct_value": 0.87,
  "what_happened": "the held-out split was reported before the leakage fix"
}

python scripts/deposit_pack.py --corrigendum

What it actually gives you

The hard half of a correction is the question nobody asks in the right order: what else did that number touch.

found_in_drafts        results.md:3, results.md:5
artefacts_nearby       Table 2, Figure 3
run_records            RUN-0007 (f1=0.91, DS-0001, seed 1)
evidence_cards         EV-0090 "F1 reaches 0.91"

Values are matched across decimal conventions, so 0,91 in a Turkish section and 0.91 in an English one are one value, not two misses.

A run record still holding the wrong value is its own finding: a corrigendum that leaves the register saying the old number makes the replication package disagree with the correction — and the package is what a reader checks.

The letter

The skeleton the command prints has six steps; two of them are the ones authors skip:

• What does not change. State it. A reader's first question is whether the conclusion survives, and silence reads as "they are not saying".
• Who found it. If a reader did, say so.

After the letter

python scripts/experiment_db.py trace 0.87      # the run that produced the right number
python scripts/consistency_check.py             # narrated vs presented, re-run
python scripts/replication_pack.py --build      # the deposit, rebuilt from the corrected register

What this does not do

• It does not decide that a correction is needed, or that it is enough. Corrigendum, erratum or retraction is between the authors and the editor.
• It does not know a server's limits or a journal's policy. Both are files you fill.
• It does not post anything. No upload, no API token, no account.

Reference

• Script: python scripts/deposit_pack.py (--preprint <server>, --corrigendum --error <file>)
• Reads: drafts/, PROJECT.md, analysis/runs.jsonl, evidence/cards.jsonl
• Writes: nothing — the files you fill live in exports/deposit/
• Related: /submission-pack (the disclosure it needs), /replication-package (the deposit of code and data), /journal-check (the venue whose policy decides the preprint question)

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A preprint licence is a decision you make once and cannot revisit. A correction is a decision you would rather have made earlier. Both are worth a checklist.