# Manuscript Typography > Audit academic manuscripts for typographic design conventions: booktabs table style, caption placement, dashes/quotes, units and numbers, cross-reference style, page layout, typographic hierarchy, professional polish. Triggers on: "check typography", "fix formatting", "polish my paper", "check my LaTeX", "typographic review", "make it look professional", "check tables", "fix captions". Companion… - **Type:** Skill - **Install:** `agentstack add skill-mathews-tom-armory-manuscript-typography` - **Verified:** Yes — security-reviewed for prompt injection and unsafe behavior - **Seller:** [Mathews-Tom](https://agentstack.voostack.com/s/mathews-tom) - **Installs:** 0 - **Category:** [Agent Skills](https://agentstack.voostack.com/c/agent-skills) - **Latest version:** 0.1.0 - **License:** MIT - **Upstream author:** [Mathews-Tom](https://github.com/Mathews-Tom) - **Source:** https://github.com/Mathews-Tom/armory/tree/main/skills/manuscript-typography - **Website:** https://mathews-tom.github.io/armory/ ## Install ```sh agentstack add skill-mathews-tom-armory-manuscript-typography ``` Requires the [AgentStack CLI](https://agentstack.voostack.com/docs/cli). Works with Claude Code, Cursor, and any MCP-compatible agent. ## About # Manuscript Typography Audit **Pipeline position:** Phase 2b (polish audit). Runs in parallel with manuscript-provenance. Depends on: content settled after Phase 1 fixes. See `/manuscript-pipeline` for full execution order. ## Purpose Audit a LaTeX manuscript for widely-accepted academic typographic conventions that directly affect readability and professional appearance. These are not venue-specific formatting rules — they are cross-venue norms from decades of academic publishing that experienced readers and reviewers notice. A paper with solid content but poor typography signals inexperience. Reviewers form impressions from visual presentation before reading a single sentence. ## Relationship to Other Skills | Concern | manuscript-review | manuscript-typography (this) | arxiv-preflight | |---------|-------------------|------------------------------|-----------------| | Table content | Data quality, significant figures (§12) | Design: booktabs, alignment, headers, caption placement | Format compliance | | Figure content | Colorblind, axis labels, chartjunk (§12) | Design: font matching, backgrounds, subfigure style | Format/size compliance | | Rendered output | Legibility, float proximity, page breaks (§23) | Layout: widows, column balance, spacing, float specifiers | N/A | | Math notation | Notation consistency, operator formatting (§15) | Spacing, delimiter sizing, display vs inline choices | N/A | | Cross-refs | Citation hygiene (§11) | Reference style consistency, non-breaking spaces | N/A | | Typography | N/A | Dashes, quotes, units, micro-typography | N/A | | Polish | N/A | TODOs, placeholders, metadata, bookmarks | N/A | **Rule:** This skill audits design and typography. manuscript-review audits content and communication. arxiv-preflight audits submission compliance. No overlap — each reads different signals from the same document. ## Workflow ### 1. Ingest Read all `.tex` files (main + `\input`/`\include` targets). Identify: - Document class and loaded packages - Two-column vs single-column layout - Target venue (if identifiable from class/template) If compiled PDF is available, use it for rendered inspection checks. ### 2. Audit Passes For each check: - **FAIL** — convention violated (document file, line, specific fix with LaTeX code) - **WARN** — debatable but worth considering - **PASS** — convention followed - **N/A** — not applicable --- ### Pass 1 — Table Design **1.1 Rule structure** - Use `booktabs` package: `\toprule`, `\midrule`, `\bottomrule` - No `\hline` (replace with booktabs equivalents) - No vertical rules (`|` in column spec) — vertical lines in tables are a hallmark of amateur typesetting - No double horizontal rules - Exception: if the document class mandates a specific table style, note but don't flag ```latex % BAD \begin{tabular}{|l|c|r|} \hline Method & Accuracy & F1 \\ \hline\hline Ours & 0.94 & 0.91 \\ \hline \end{tabular} % GOOD \begin{tabular}{lcr} \toprule Method & Accuracy & F1 \\ \midrule Ours & 0.94 & 0.91 \\ \bottomrule \end{tabular} ``` **1.2 Column alignment** - Numeric columns: right-aligned or decimal-aligned (`S` column from `siunitx`) - Text columns: left-aligned - Center alignment: only for single characters or very short labels - Header alignment: matches column alignment or centered **1.3 Header formatting** - Headers visually distinct from body (bold is standard: `\textbf{}`) - No ALL CAPS headers (use bold or small caps) - Units in headers: parenthesized or bracketed — `Latency (ms)` not `Latency ms` **1.4 Best-result indication** - If highlighting best results: consistent method across all tables (bold, underline, or marker) - Define the convention in the first table's caption or a footnote - Do not mix bold-for-best and underline-for-best across tables **1.5 Table notes** - Footnotes/notes below the table, not in the caption - Use `\tablenotes` (threeparttable) or manual footnotes with consistent markers **1.6 Caption placement** - Table captions ABOVE the table (universal convention) - `\caption{}` before `\begin{tabular}` - Not below — below is for figures **1.7 Caption formatting** - Caption label ("Table 1:" / "Table 1.") in **bold** or **small caps** — visually distinct from the description text - Caption description text smaller than body text — `\small` (one step down) is standard; `\footnotesize` acceptable - Use the `caption` package to control this consistently: ```latex \usepackage[font=small, labelfont=bf]{caption} % label ("Table 1:") = bold, description = \small % applies uniformly to all figures AND tables ``` - Never caption text at full body size — it visually competes with the main text and makes the document look untypeset - Never caption text below `\footnotesize` — becomes unreadable - Consistent across ALL captions (tables and figures use the same size/weight scheme) **1.8 Caption style** - Consistent prefix: "Table 1:" or "Table 1." — not mixed (controlled by `labelsep` in `caption` package) - First sentence describes what the table shows - Caption is self-contained (interpretable without body text) **1.9 Spacing** - `\addlinespace` (booktabs) for logical row groups, not empty rows - No `\\[6pt]` manual spacing hacks inside tables - Column separation adequate — use `@{\hspace{...}}` or `\setlength{\tabcolsep}` if too compressed **1.10 Long tables** - Tables exceeding one page: use `longtable` or `supertabular` - Repeated headers on continuation pages - No font-size reduction to force a table onto one page (below `\small` is unreadable) --- ### Pass 2 — Figure Design **2.1 Caption placement** - Figure captions BELOW the figure (universal convention) - `\caption{}` after `\includegraphics` - Not above — above is for tables **2.2 Caption formatting** - Same size/weight scheme as table captions — the `caption` package applies uniformly - Caption label ("Figure 1:") bold or small caps (matches table label style) - Caption description text at `\small` or `\footnotesize` (matches table caption size) - If not using `caption` package: verify manually that figure and table captions use identical formatting **2.3 Caption style** - Consistent prefix: "Figure 1:" or "Figure 1." or "Fig. 1:" — pick one for all figures - Matches table caption style (if tables use "Table 1:", figures use "Figure 1:") - Caption self-contained **2.4 Subfigure labeling** - Consistent style: (a), (b), (c) — not mixed with (i), (ii), (iii) or a), b), c) - Use `subcaption` or `subfigure` package — not manual lettering - Subfigure labels referenced consistently in text: "Figure 1(a)" not "Figure 1a" or "Figure 1 (a)" mixed **2.5 Font consistency** - Text within figures (axis labels, annotations, legends) uses a font that complements the body text - Matching the body serif (Computer Modern, Times) or a clean sans-serif (Helvetica, CMSans) is standard - Matplotlib/R/MATLAB default fonts are visually distinct from LaTeX body text — flag when obvious - Font size in figures after scaling: readable at rendered size (cross-reference with manuscript-review §23) - Figure-internal text should be comparable to caption text size — not larger than body text, not smaller than footnotes **2.6 Background** - White or transparent background — no gray plot backgrounds (matplotlib default `axes.facecolor`) - No colored frame/border unless it serves a purpose **2.7 Aspect ratio** - Plots not stretched or compressed - Standard aspect ratios: 4:3, 16:9, golden ratio, or square - All panels in a multi-panel figure use the same aspect ratio **2.8 Consistent framing** - All figures use the same border/frame approach (all framed or all unframed) - Consistent padding/margins around figure content --- ### Pass 3 — LaTeX Typography **3.1 Dashes** - Hyphen (`-`): compound words (well-known, state-of-the-art) - En-dash (`--`): number ranges (10--20, pages 5--12, 2020--2023). Common error: hyphen used for ranges ("10-20" → "10--20"). - Em-dash (`---`): parenthetical asides and emphatic breaks. Em-dashes are accepted by CMOS 18, APA 7, and MLA 9 in academic prose — flag the following instead of banning the character: - **Spacing inconsistency:** CMOS/APA/MLA use closed em-dashes (`text---text`); journalistic AP style uses spaced (`text --- text`). Pick one and apply uniformly. Mixed usage = FAIL. - **Overuse:** more than ~1 em-dash per paragraph or ~3 per page tips into conversational register. Flag clusters as WARN; suggest restructuring to commas/colons/parentheses. - **Misuse for ranges:** em-dash where en-dash belongs (`pages 5---12` should be `pages 5--12`) = FAIL. - **AI-tell heuristic (advisory only, MEDIUM):** dense em-dash usage combined with other AI-pattern markers can indicate unedited LLM output. Defer to `manuscript-review` Pass 7b for that judgment, do not flag em-dashes alone as AI tells. **3.2 Quotation marks** - Opening: ` `` ` (backticks) - Closing: `''` (straight single quotes) - Not `"straight quotes"` — renders incorrectly in TeX - Nested: `` `inner' `` inside `` ``outer'' `` **3.3 Ellipsis** - `\ldots` or `\dots` — not three periods (`...`) - `\ldots` produces properly spaced ellipsis **3.4 Non-breaking spaces** - Before `\ref`: `Figure~\ref{fig:x}`, `Table~\ref{tab:x}`, `Section~\ref{sec:x}` - Before `\cite`: `previous work~\cite{smith2020}` - Between number and unit: `10~ms` or `10\,ms` - Prevents line breaks that separate a label from its referent **3.5 Ties and thin spaces** - Thin space between number and unit: `10\,ms`, `5\,GB`, `100\,K` (use `siunitx` for consistency) - No space inside parenthetical citations: `\cite{x}` not `\cite{ x }` - No double spaces in source (harmless but untidy) **3.6 Semantic markup** - `\emph{text}` over `{\it text}` or `\textit{text}` — `\emph` nests correctly - `\textbf{}` for bold, not `{\bf }` - New-style font commands (`\textbf`, `\textit`, `\textsf`) over old-style (`\bf`, `\it`, `\sf`) - `\textrm{}` for roman text inside math mode, not manual font switches **3.7 Micro-typography** - `\usepackage{microtype}` — enables character protrusion and font expansion - Dramatically improves line breaking and margin alignment with zero effort - If not loaded, recommend adding it **3.8 Special characters** - `\&` not `&` in text - `\%` not `%` in text - `\#` not `#` in text - `\_` not `_` in text - Degree symbol: `$^\circ$` or `\textdegree` — not `°` (Unicode) - Multiplication: `$\times$` — not `x` **3.9 Ligatures** - ff, fi, fl, ffi, ffl must render as proper ligatures (default in CM/Latin Modern fonts) - Flag if `\DisableLigatures` or `microtype` `ligatures=false` is set globally without reason - Some fonts break ligatures — if text renders "find" as "f ind" or similar, the font config is wrong - Ligatures should NOT cross morpheme boundaries in some compound words (e.g., "shelfful") — minor, WARN only **3.10 Italic usage — three distinct purposes** - **Emphasis:** `\emph{important}` — for stress within a sentence - **Foreign words:** `\textit{in vivo}`, `\textit{a priori}` — for non-English terms not yet naturalized - **Terms being defined:** `\textit{A convolutional layer is...}` — for the first occurrence of a technical term being introduced - Using bold, ALL CAPS, or colored text for emphasis in running prose = FAIL - Consistent: if "in vitro" is italicized on page 3, it must be italicized everywhere (or nowhere if treated as naturalized) **3.11 No color for emphasis** - Colored text in running prose for emphasis (red for important, blue for terms) = FAIL - Color belongs in figures, tables, and hyperlinks — not in body text - Exception: `hyperref` link colors for cross-references and URLs **3.12 Sentence spacing** - LaTeX default: extra space after periods (end-of-sentence). This is traditional TeX behavior. - `\frenchspacing` disables it (uniform spacing). Both are acceptable — but be deliberate. - If using abbreviations with periods (e.g., "et al.", "Fig.", "vs.") without `\frenchspacing`, add `\ ` or `~` after the period to prevent LaTeX from treating it as end-of-sentence: `et al.\ ` or use `\@.` before a true sentence-ending period after a capital letter. - Common bug: "...by Dr. Smith" — LaTeX adds extra space after "Dr." thinking it's end-of-sentence. Fix: `Dr.\ Smith` **3.13 Display vs inline math** - Expressions with fractions (`\frac`), sums (`\sum`), products (`\prod`), integrals, or matrices should be displayed, not inline — inline rendering compresses them and disrupts line spacing - Short expressions (single variables, simple subscripts, brief equalities like `$x = 5$`) stay inline - Rule of thumb: if the expression changes the line height, display it - Display equations that are part of a sentence still need proper punctuation - `\[ ... \]` or `equation` environment — not `$$ ... $$` (which is plain TeX, not LaTeX, and has incorrect spacing) **3.14 URL handling** - URLs in `\url{}` or `\href{}` — never bare text or `\texttt{}` - `\url{}` enables line breaking at appropriate characters (/, ., -, etc.) - `\texttt{https://...}` does NOT break across lines → overfull boxes - Load `url` or `hyperref` package (hyperref includes url functionality) - If `hyperref` is loaded: verify `breaklinks=true` is set in `\hypersetup` - Long URLs in bibliography entries need additional break points. Check for `\UrlBreaks`: ```latex \makeatletter \g@addto@macro{\UrlBreaks}{\UrlOrds} \makeatother ``` - Without this, URLs with long path segments (common in blog posts and documentation) will overflow margins in the bibliography even when wrapped in `\url{}` --- ### Pass 4 — Units and Numbers **4.1 Number-unit spacing** - Space between number and unit: "10 ms" not "10ms" - Best: `siunitx` package — `\SI{10}{\milli\second}` or `\qty{10}{ms}` - Consistent across the entire document - Exception: percentages and degrees can touch the number (convention varies — pick one and stick to it) **4.2 Unit typography** - Units in upright/roman font, not italic: "10 ms" not "10 *ms*" - In math mode: `$t = 10\,\mathrm{ms}$` not `$t = 10\,ms$` (italic) - Compound units: `m/s` or `m\,s$^{-1}$` — consistent style **4.3 Number formatting** - Consistent decimal separator (period in English) - Large numbers: consistent thousands separator (comma, thin space, or none) - Ranges: en-dash (`10--20`) not hyphen (`10-20`) - Negative numbers: proper minus (`$-5$`) not hyphen (`-5`) in running text **4.4 Significant figures** - Same metric → same number of decimal places across all tables and text - Cross-reference with manuscript-review §12 (content consistency) - Precision should not exceed measurement precision **4.5 Percentages** - Consistent: "14.3%" or "14.3 %" — pick one - "Percentage points" vs "percent" distinction when comparing percentages **4.6 Inline fractions** - In running text: `\nicefrac{1}{2}` or `\sfrac{1}{2}` (from `xfrac`) — not `$\frac{1}{2}$` - `$\frac{}{}$` inline disrupts line spacing by creating a tall element - Display fractions (`\frac`) are correct in display math and equations - Alternative: "1/2" is acceptable in informal contexts — consistent style across document --- ### Pass 5 — Cross-References and Citations **5.1 Reference abbreviation consistency** - Pick one and use it everywhere: - Full: "Figure", "Table", "Section", "Equation" - Abbreviated: "Fig.", "Tab.", "Sec.", "Eq." - Mixed within the same category is a FAIL - Common convention: abbreviated in parentheticals, full in running prose ("As shown in Fig. 1" but "Figure 1 shows...") **5.2 Non-breaking spaces** - `Figure~\ref{fig:x}` — prevents "Figure" at end of line, "3" at start of next - `Eq.~\eqref{eq:x}` — same - This is the single most common LaTeX typography mistake … ## Source & license This open-source skill is cataloged on AgentStack and links to its original source — we do not rehost the code. - **Author:** [Mathews-Tom](https://github.com/Mathews-Tom) - **Source:** [Mathews-Tom/armory](https://github.com/Mathews-Tom/armory) - **License:** MIT - **Homepage:** https://mathews-tom.github.io/armory/ Install and usage instructions live in the source repository linked above. ## Pricing - **Free** — Free ## Security capabilities Automated source analysis of v0.1.0 — what this tool can access: - **Network access:** no - **Filesystem access:** no - **Shell / process execution:** no - **Environment & secrets:** no - **Dynamic code execution:** no *"Yes" means the capability is present in the source — more access means more to trust, not that it is unsafe.* ## Versions - **0.1.0** — security scan: passed — Imported from the upstream source. ## Links - Listing page: https://agentstack.voostack.com/l/skill-mathews-tom-armory-manuscript-typography - Seller: https://agentstack.voostack.com/s/mathews-tom - Browse the marketplace: https://agentstack.voostack.com/browse --- Listed on AgentStack — the marketplace for AI agent skills and MCP servers. 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