citation-audit

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Run a pre-submission citation and reference audit for LaTeX academic papers. Use this skill whenever the user wants to verify that BibTeX entries are correct, every citation key in TeX resolves, every figure/table/equation/section reference is valid, DOI/arXiv/OpenReview/proceedings metadata matches the cited work, citation claims are supported by the cited paper, or a paper is ready for submission with clean references.

2installs

Sourcea-green-hand-jack/ml-research-skills

Added on2026-05-02

NPX Install

npx skill4agent add a-green-hand-jack/ml-research-skills citation-audit

SKILL.md Content

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Citation Audit

Run a pre-submission audit of citations, BibTeX entries, and LaTeX cross-references. This skill is for checking correctness before submission, not for broad literature discovery.

Use this skill when a paper already has draft citations and the user wants confidence that:

every
```
\cite{...}
```
key in TeX exists in BibTeX
every BibTeX entry is syntactically valid and not duplicated

every

\ref{...}

,

\cref{...}

,

\eqref{...}

,

\autoref{...}

target exists

every
```
\label{...}
```
is unique and follows the local naming convention
DOI, arXiv, OpenReview, URL, title, author, year, and venue metadata match the real paper
citation claims in nearby prose are actually supported by the cited work
bibliography style is submission-ready

Pair this with

submit-paper

for the broader submission checklist. Pair it with

research-project-memory

when citation correctness issues should become blocking paper risks or actions.

Skill Directory Layout

text

<installed-skill-dir>/
├── SKILL.md
├── scripts/
│   └── audit_latex_refs.py
└── references/
    ├── citation-claim-audit.md
    ├── metadata-verification.md
    └── report-template.md

Progressive Loading

Always run
```
scripts/audit_latex_refs.py
```
for deterministic TeX/BibTeX/reference checks.
Read
```
references/metadata-verification.md
```
when checking DOI, arXiv, OpenReview, proceedings, or publisher metadata.
Read
```
references/citation-claim-audit.md
```
when the user asks whether citations support the claims made in the paper, or when doing a full pre-submission audit.
Use
```
references/report-template.md
```
for the final audit report.

Step 1 - Locate Paper Sources

Determine:

paper root
main TeX file
all included TeX files
BibTeX files referenced by
```
\bibliography{...}
```
or
```
\addbibresource{...}
```
target venue and submission mode if obvious

Useful local checks:

bash

find . -maxdepth 4 -name "*.tex" -o -name "*.bib"
find . -maxdepth 3 -name "main.tex" -o -name "paper.tex"

If the user provides a paper directory, use it. If no main file is provided, prefer

main.tex

, then

paper.tex

, then the TeX file containing

\begin{document}

.

Step 2 - Run Deterministic Local Audit

Run:

bash

python3 <citation-audit-skill-dir>/scripts/audit_latex_refs.py --paper-dir "$PAPER_DIR" --main "$MAIN_TEX"

Use an absolute path to the installed skill script. Do not assume a Claude-specific install path.

The script checks:

included TeX file discovery

citation keys in

\cite

,

\citet

,

\citep

,

\citealp

,

\citeauthor

,

\citeyear

,

\textcite

,

\parencite

BibTeX keys and basic syntax
missing citation keys
unused BibTeX entries
duplicate BibTeX keys
missing bibliography files
duplicate labels
undefined references
labels that are never referenced
unresolved LaTeX placeholders such as
```
??
```
and citation placeholders such as
```
[?]
```

If the script reports blocking issues, fix or report those before doing web metadata checks. Metadata validation is much less useful if the TeX/BibTeX graph is broken.

Step 3 - Classify Findings

Use this severity model:

```
blocking
```
: missing cited key, duplicate BibTeX key, undefined ref, duplicate label, invalid BibTeX structure, broken DOI for a cited work
```
important
```
: metadata mismatch, wrong venue/year, likely duplicate entry, citation claim not supported, arXiv cited when peer-reviewed version should be cited
```
warning
```
: unused BibTeX entry, unreferenced label, inconsistent key naming, missing optional DOI/URL
```
note
```
: style cleanup, capitalization, field normalization, BibTeX key rename suggestion

Do not treat unused BibTeX entries as blocking unless the target venue or user requires a minimal bibliography.

Step 4 - Verify Metadata

Read

references/metadata-verification.md

.

For every cited key, verify the best available identifier:

DOI through publisher/CrossRef/doi.org
arXiv ID through arXiv
OpenReview URL or forum ID through OpenReview
proceedings URL for NeurIPS, ICML, ICLR, ACL Anthology, CVF, ACM, IEEE, Springer, or PMLR

Check:

title
author list or first author + author count
year
venue or publication status
DOI/arXiv/OpenReview/proceedings URL
whether a peer-reviewed version exists

When metadata cannot be verified, mark it explicitly instead of guessing.

Step 5 - Audit Citation Claims

Read

references/citation-claim-audit.md

for full guidance.

For each citation context, classify what the prose asks the citation to support:

background fact
prior method existence
closest related work
empirical result
theoretical result
dataset or benchmark
negative claim or limitation
comparison or state-of-the-art claim

Then check whether the cited paper actually supports that role. For high-risk claims, inspect the abstract, introduction, method/result section, and if needed the PDF.

High-risk contexts:

"first", "only", "state-of-the-art", "significantly", "provably", "guarantees"
claims about a paper's results or limitations
citations used to justify a baseline choice
citations used for theory assumptions
citations in contribution bullets or problem motivation

Do not silently rewrite scientific claims. If a citation does not support a claim, propose one of:

replace citation
weaken claim
add a more specific citation
move the claim to related work
mark as needing author confirmation

Step 6 - Fix Safe Issues

Safe auto-fixes:

add missing
```
.bib
```
extension resolution in the report
remove obvious duplicate BibTeX entries only after confirming they are truly identical
normalize capitalization braces in titles
add missing DOI/arXiv/URL fields when verified
fix BibTeX field spelling
rename labels or citation keys only if all TeX call sites are updated consistently

Never auto-fix:

citation claims whose support is ambiguous
substitution of one cited paper for another without explaining the scientific difference
venue status when multiple versions exist
author order if sources disagree

For any edit, keep the smallest possible diff.

Step 7 - Write the Audit Report

Use

references/report-template.md

.

The final report should include:

files checked
local TeX/BibTeX graph status
metadata verification status
citation-claim support status
blocking fixes required before submission
recommended non-blocking cleanup
unresolved items requiring author judgment

If the user asks for a saved report and gives no path, use:

text

docs/reports/citation_audit_YYYY-MM-DD.md

Step 8 - Final Sanity Check

Before finalizing:

all cited keys resolve to exactly one BibTeX entry
all required TeX references resolve to exactly one label
blocking citation/reference problems are tracked as actions when project memory exists

Step 9 - Write Back to Project Memory

If the project uses

research-project-memory

, update:

```
memory/risk-board.md
```
: blocking or important citation, metadata, label, reference, or citation-claim risks
```
memory/action-board.md
```
: concrete fixes for missing keys, metadata corrections, unsupported claims, or broken refs
```
memory/claim-board.md
```
: claims that must be weakened because citations do not support them
```
paper/.agent/paper-status.md
```
: citation-audit status and unresolved author decisions

Use

observed

for deterministic TeX/BibTeX graph findings and

needs-verification

for metadata or claim-support issues not fully checked.

every blocking metadata issue is fixed or explicitly listed
high-risk citation claims have been audited
unresolved citation correctness questions are not hidden
the final answer distinguishes deterministic script findings from web/semantic verification findings