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pre-submission-check

Checks a manuscript against the journal's author guidelines and lists what is missing.

  • Recipe: Write, review and teach
  • Output check: Machine-checkable Each item names the guideline it comes from, so a person can check it in seconds.
  • Status: brief

Make your own version

This skill depends on local details, so the site publishes a brief instead of one institute's skill. Copy the brief and give it to your agent. If your agent has a skill-creation skill, such as Anthropic's skill-creator, it will use it. The agent asks you the questions under "Local details", builds the skill, and runs it once on the test case.

An agent that can read web pages can also fetch the brief itself from https://aiforscientists.eu/skills/pre-submission-check/brief.md.

# Skill brief: pre-submission-check

Source: https://aiforscientists.eu/skills/pre-submission-check/
Recipe: Write, review and teach (https://aiforscientists.eu/recipes/09-write-review-teach/)

Build a skill for my own setting from this brief.
If you have a skill-creation skill or tool, use it.
Before you write anything, ask me each question under "Local details", one at a time.
Do not guess an answer; if I do not know one, leave a marked TODO in the skill.
Keep every rule under "Never" in the skill you write.
Write the check under "How to check the output" into the skill, so that it runs every time.
Then run the skill once on the test case and show me the result.

## Purpose

Checks a manuscript against the journal's author guidelines and lists what is missing.

## Inputs

- The manuscript, with figures, tables and supplements.
- The journal's author guidelines for the article type.

## Output

- A checklist with one line per guideline item: met, not met, or unclear, with the location in the manuscript.
- A list of required statements and files that are missing.

## Steps

1. Extract every checkable requirement from the guidelines: word and reference limits, sections, statements, figure formats, data and code availability.
2. Check the manuscript against each requirement.
3. Quote the guideline for each item that is not met.
4. List required declarations, such as competing interests and AI use.

## Local details

1. Which journals and article types do you submit to most often?
2. Where do you keep manuscripts, and in which format (Word, LaTeX, Markdown)?
3. Which institutional requirements apply, such as affiliation wording, funder acknowledgements or open-access policies?

## Never

- Never upload a manuscript to a service whose terms do not allow it.
- Never rewrite the scientific content; report, do not edit.

## How to check the output

Each item names the guideline it comes from, so a person can check it in seconds.

## Test case

A published paper from your group, checked against the guidelines of the journal that published it. Expect few or no missing items.

Local details

Your version needs answers to these questions:

  1. Which journals and article types do you submit to most often?
  2. Where do you keep manuscripts, and in which format (Word, LaTeX, Markdown)?
  3. Which institutional requirements apply, such as affiliation wording, funder acknowledgements or open-access policies?

Never

  • Never upload a manuscript to a service whose terms do not allow it.
  • Never rewrite the scientific content; report, do not edit.

Local versions

No local version is published yet. If you built one, share it as an example for others.

Discussion

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