| name | paper-explainer |
| description | Read academic papers from local raw/papers entries, arXiv/HTML/PDF sources, or provided URLs; create detailed Japanese Markdown explanations with formulas, figures, experimental results, limitations, and Obsidian/MathJax compatibility checks. Use when the user asks to read, explain, summarize, or turn a paper into an Obsidian-ready Markdown note. |
Paper Explainer
Create a detailed Japanese paper explanation note from a local paper stub, arXiv page, HTML paper, PDF, or URL. Optimize the final Markdown for Obsidian reading.
Workflow
1. Identify the Paper
- Inspect
raw/papers recursively first when the user says they added a paper there; paper stubs may live in subdirectories such as raw/papers/inbox/.
- Prefer the newest or explicitly named file, but verify by reading the file and checking title, URL, abstract, and modification time.
- If the local file only contains metadata or an abstract, fetch the full HTML/PDF from the cited source.
- Use official or primary sources where possible: arXiv abs/html/pdf, publisher HTML, project page, or paper PDF.
- Resolve local source paths from the paper stub's directory first. For example, if
raw/papers/foo.md says HTML: ../../sources/foo.html, interpret that path relative to raw/papers/foo.md, not the shell's current working directory.
2. Read the Full Paper
- Read the HTML version when available because it preserves headings, tables, equations, figure captions, and references better than a raw abstract.
- Extract at least: title, authors, date/version, abstract, problem setting, method, key equations, algorithms, experiments, ablations, results, qualitative examples, and limitations.
- Treat figure captions and tables as first-class evidence; do not rely only on the abstract.
- When the paper is long, inspect the table of contents first, then read method, experiment, and appendix sections relevant to implementation details and numeric claims.
3. Collect Figures
- Use figures when text or equations alone would be hard to visualize.
- For arXiv HTML, extract
img src paths and download only useful figures into raw/papers/images/.
- For local HTML, resolve relative
img src paths from the HTML file's directory, then copy useful figures into raw/papers/images/.
- Name images deterministically with a paper slug, for example
elf_x3.png or method_pipeline.png.
- Verify every downloaded image with
file or equivalent; if a saved “image” is HTML, fix the URL and redownload.
- Link images with relative Markdown paths from the paper note, for example
.
4. Write the Markdown Note
Update the existing paper stub in place, even when it is nested under raw/papers/, unless the user asks for a new file. Use this structure by default:
# Paper Title
- 情報源: <HTML URL> ／ <abs/PDF URL>
- 著者: ...
- 日付: ...
- 主題: ...
---
## 要旨
## 何が新しいのか
## 背景: なぜ難しいのか
## 提案手法の全体像
## 中核数式の意味
## 実験設定
## 実験結果
## ablation で分かったこと
## 直感的な理解
## この論文の読みどころ
## 限界と注意点
## まとめ
Adapt headings to the paper, but keep the progression: overview -> motivation -> method -> math intuition -> evidence -> critique.
Writing Style
- Write in Japanese.
- Explain what the paper claims, why the problem matters, how the method works, and what evidence supports it.
- Include concrete numeric results in tables when the paper reports them.
- Explain equations with nearby plain-language intuition.
- Compare against prior work when the paper positions itself that way.
- Separate observed facts from interpretation. Use phrases like
論文では... for paper claims and 読み方としては... for interpretation.
- Include limitations and evaluation caveats even if the paper has no explicit limitations section.
Obsidian Compatibility
- Use
$...$ for inline math and $$...$$ blocks on their own lines with blank lines around them.
- Avoid LaTeX macros that commonly fail in Obsidian MathJax. Replace
\bm{...} with \boldsymbol{...}.
- Keep standard Markdown tables simple; avoid raw HTML.
- Keep image paths relative to the note location. If images are stored in
raw/papers/images/ and the note is raw/papers/inbox/foo.md, link as ../images/<name>.png, not images/<name>.png.
- If the user wants full Obsidian-native formatting, use the
obsidian-formatter skill after drafting.
Final Verification
Before final response, use the checklist in references/checklist.md.
