Imported from angadhn/botference (.claude/skills/paper-review/SKILL.md). Install upstream with npx skills add angadhn/botference --skill paper-review. Copyright stays with the author.

paper-review — GDocs-style review of rendered sources, with bots

The engine is built and battle-tested. Canonical engine: $BOTFERENCE_HOME/frontends/review/ (ships with botference). Architecture, decision history, and the unbuilt roadmap (CI rounds, cloud version): design.md next to this file. This file tells you how to USE the system.

Setting up a new project ("set up paper review in ")

Preferred: botference review [dir] — one command does all of the below (engine copy, detection via scripts/review-detect.mjs with an echoed summary, gitignore, build, serve; --share, --hosted, --port N, --no-agents, --upgrade). Use the manual steps only when the launcher isn't available:

1. Copy the engine from the reference implementation into <dir>/review/: build.mjs, server.mjs, chat.mjs, apply.mjs, submit.mjs, init-config.mjs, bridge-system-prompt.md, SCHEMA.md, assets/ (review.js, style.css). Never copy review.config.json, state/, suggestions.json, or site/ — those are per-project.
2. Run node review/init-config.mjs from <dir> (it inspects the directory: master file via \documentclass, sections via \input/\include order, bib, abbreviations, todo macros, figures dir, a free port, and the bridge block). Show the user what was detected and get their confirmation before proceeding — never guess the master file silently.
3. Add the gitignore block (see reference repo): review/site/ and review/state/* ignored EXCEPT state/users/ and state/threads.json; suggestions.json tracked. Conversation must travel through the repo; runtime files must not.
4. node review/build.mjs, then commit review/ ("Add review interface"). Requires pandoc on PATH — check and tell the user if missing.

Running it

Sync note: the workspace copies of this skill at <vault>/botference/.claude/skills/paper-review/SKILL.md and <vault>/botference/.agents/skills/paper-review/SKILL.md are plain copies of this file — when you edit it (either copy in botference-main or those), update all four.

• botference review — build + serve; agents are on by default when the machine can run them (python3 + a claude/codex CLI on PATH — the launcher prints agents: on (…) or an agents: off explanation). --no-agents forces off; --agents forces on (clear error if impossible).
• botference review --share — hosted mode behind a cloudflared quick tunnel: respects REVIEW_PASSWORD or generates one, prints share this: <url> password: <pw>; Ctrl-C stops server + tunnel together. Missing cloudflared → install hint, keeps serving locally.
• Manual (no launcher): node review/server.mjs — static + comment mirror, no bots; --chat adds the bot bridge (needs BOTFERENCE_HOME or the config's bridge.core_dir); --hosted adds the REVIEW_PASSWORD gate, rate limits, and owner-gated summons. The gate asks for a name and the password together (a name is not a credential — it only picks which users/<handle>.json the guest writes; asking on the gate is what makes hosted mode work on a phone, where the sidebar picker is inside a drawer). The server serves ONLY review/site/ + the figures dir (path-traversal guarded) — keep it that way.
• Collaborator options: the owner's --share URL (read + comment; their agent summons queue for the owner to release), or clone the repo and run the identical botference review (agents auto-detected; without the CLIs they still read and comment), or plain node review/server.mjs — then node review/submit.mjs [--push] (commits only their own state/users/<handle>.json).
• The server is long-lived and owned by the human; don't leave your own test servers running.

The interface contract (don't regress these)

• Comments are the only surface for discussing the document. There is no chat-about-the-paper panel and there will not be one: it was tried, it was confusing, it is rejected. Anything about the text is an anchored margin thread. The one exception, added deliberately, is the task console — a bottom-docked, collapsible, owner-only, desktop-only bar for document-level instructions that have no anchor text: "apply all", "commit", "restructure section 3", "verify every citation resolves". Same strict routing (no @claude/@codex/@all, no agent). The Changes widget lives inside it, because committing is itself a document-level task. Interrupts (permissions/choices) render on the card, in the console for console-issued turns, or as sidebar toasts when off-page (120s default-deny).
• Strict-but-social routing. @claude routes to Claude alone; the free-form footer handoff is disabled on review turns. To involve the other agent, @-tag it in your thread reply — the server converts that into a visible mention turn (depth cap 1 per thread per round). @all engages both.
• Mentions fire only on explicit confirm (Done/Enter), never while composing.
• Every author is visually distinct (stable accent color; Claude coral, Codex blue, humans hashed hues); resolved comments live in a reopenable resolved tab — and ANYONE may resolve/reopen ANY thread, attributed as "resolved by " (server-mediated; ownership boundary intact); humans can edit/delete their own entries (edited: true — treat an edited entry newer than your ack as new input); author filter chips; light/dark/system theme toggle.
• Changes widget (inside the task console, owner-only) is the commit workflow: accept → ⚡ Apply (gathers every participant's accepts; the owner's explicit decision wins conflicts) → read → ✓ Commit (or ↩ Revert). Apply is deterministic AND author-agnostic (apply.mjs: unique-span replacement over bot cards and human suggestions, atomic bib append, JSON-aware edits for config-key targets, needs_manual_resolution on drift — never guessed). Apply and commit are always separate actions. Out-of-band source edits surface in the widget with a commit action.
• Everything is commentable. Paragraphs, figures, headings, list items, block quotes, captions, table cells and the masthead title all carry a data-cid. blk-N is a POSITIONAL index over #paper p, #paper figure and every existing comment is anchored to one — so that selector is frozen, and each newly anchorable type has its own namespace (-hd-N, -misc-N). Never widen the blk selector.
• Humans suggest too. The composer has Comment and Suggest modes. A human suggestion is an entry in that human's own users/<handle>.json (suggestions.json stays bot-owned), renders inline as del/ins in that human's colour through the same path as a bot card, and flows through the same accept → Apply → Commit. Its source span is resolved to something UNIQUE at compose time — widened with context if ambiguous, anchored on the enclosing macro for headings, aimed at the config title key when the masthead comes from there — and the UI shows what it locked onto. See SCHEMA.md.
• Presence is coarse and private. Humans + agents in the top-right cluster; state computed from real interaction, in server memory only, never written to disk, symmetric for everyone, desktop-only.
• Three tiers, not two. state/grants.json (owner-written) can let a named handle summon agents within a visible daily cap. Apply, Commit, Revert, model switching and permission answers stay owner-only forever — a grant never confers them.
• Never invent a quota number. Neither provider exposes subscription (Pro/Max, ChatGPT plan) quota to anything scriptable; the Settings panel says so and points at /usage. Do not reverse-engineer internal endpoints to fake it.
• Calm UI: no prompt()/alert()/confirm(), no scroll-jumps, layout reflows (nothing overlays content), engine files stay 100% document-agnostic (all specifics in review.config.json).

File ownership (never write another writer's file)

Round protocol (when summoned — by an @tag or "read my comments")

1. Read all users/*.json, diff against your ack.json entry (include entries with edited:true newer than your ack). Those files now also carry humans' own user-suggestion entries — read them as proposals, and do not duplicate one a human already made. A DOCUMENT-LEVEL turn from the task console says so in its envelope: answer in the turn text, do not write a thread entry for it.
2. Reply to each new comment in threads.json — length case-by-case, never more than 6–8 sentences, no restating, no preamble. If a text change is warranted, add a suggestion card (current_text/proposed_text, reply_to) — see SCHEMA.md.
3. Rejected cards get exactly one follow-up (concede or your single best counter-argument).
4. Never edit document sources during a round. Source changes go through the user's Apply/Commit buttons only. Site styling/engine fixes the user asks for directly may be made in review/ files and committed with a clear message.
5. Update ack.json last (crash mid-round → the round re-triggers).

Verification bar for any engine change

node --check all touched JS; rebuild; confirm served assets updated; never kill the human's running server (verify on a throwaway port); grep engine files clean of document-specific strings; if a change touches document sources, compile the document (e.g. latexmk -pdf) and inspect the output before claiming done.

Long-lived processes (servers, tunnels)

To serve or tunnel anything that must outlive your turn, use botference service start <name> -- <command…> — or the one-shot botference review --share --service / botference plan --share --service, which run the whole share (server + tunnel) as a managed service, print the share this: <url> password: <pw> line, and return control. Never bare background processes (&, nohup, setsid by hand): they die with your turn's process-group teardown. Manage what you started with botference service list|logs|stop.