pdf-reading

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Read local PDFs to extract and verify exact numbers (counts, percentages, tables, figure captions) for papers/questions in this repository. Use this when asked to “read a PDF”, “extract results from the paper”, “verify a statistic”, or “find the exact wording in the paper”.

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[Document Data Extraction]

When & Why to Use This Skill

The PDF Reading skill for Claude is a specialized tool designed for high-precision data extraction and verification from local PDF documents. It excels at retrieving exact numbers, tables, and figure captions from academic papers and technical reports, ensuring data integrity by capturing verbatim evidence and performing manual calculations to validate reported statistics.

Use Cases

  • Extracting exact benchmark results, percentages, and sample sizes from academic research papers for meta-analysis.
  • Verifying the accuracy of statistical claims in technical reports by cross-referencing raw data found in complex PDF tables.
  • Locating specific figure captions and verbatim quotes within multi-column layouts to ensure high-fidelity documentation and traceability.
  • Automating the retrieval of quantitative data from local repositories to populate research databases without relying on external network fetches.
  • Handling common PDF extraction pitfalls such as hyphenation, line breaks, and messy table structures to maintain data precision.
namepdf-reading
descriptionRead local PDFs to extract and verify exact numbers (counts, percentages, tables, figure captions) for papers/questions in this repository. Use this when asked to “read a PDF”, “extract results from the paper”, “verify a statistic”, or “find the exact wording in the paper”.

Goal

When you need facts from a paper PDF (counts, percentages, benchmark numbers, claims, limitations), extract verbatim evidence from the PDF and compute derived values yourself.

This repository’s content often depends on exact values from tables/figures (not abstracts). Always bias toward precision and traceability.

Process

  1. Locate the PDF

    • Search the repo for .pdf files.
    • If a paper directory contains a source PDF, prefer that.
    • If the only PDF is in tmp/ or the repo root, confirm it corresponds to the paper in question before using it.

  2. Extract text locally (no network fetches)

    • Prefer a local text extraction flow:
      • Use .github/skills/pdf-reading/extract_pdf_text.py to create a plain-text copy in tmp/.
      • If extraction fails, try a different backend (pypdf vs pdftotext) or fall back to manual inspection.

  3. Search within the extracted text

    • Use targeted queries first (unique phrases, table titles, “Table 2”, “Appendix”, metric names).
    • For numbers, search patterns like n=, N=, (, %), Table, Figure.

  4. Verify statistics (repo requirement)

    • Prefer raw counts (e.g., “31/50”) over percentages when available.
    • If the paper gives counts, compute percentages yourself: $\text{pct} = 100 \times \frac{\text{numerator}}{\text{denominator}}$.
    • If a value is ambiguous (multiple similar tables/ablations), capture the surrounding label/context.

  5. Handle common PDF pitfalls

    • Hyphenation and line breaks: words may be split across lines; search both with and without hyphens.
    • Tables: extracted text may be messy; search by row/column headers and unique tokens.
    • Scanned PDFs: text extraction may fail; use manual reading if needed.

Output expectations

  • When updating a question/paper, report the exact extracted phrase/value and where it came from (section/table/figure name).
  • If you cannot reliably extract the needed value, explicitly say so and propose next steps (e.g., manual verification).

Commands

  • Extract text:

    • python3 .github/skills/pdf-reading/extract_pdf_text.py path/to/paper.pdf

  • Extract to a specific file:

    • python3 .github/skills/pdf-reading/extract_pdf_text.py path/to/paper.pdf --out tmp/paper.txt

Repository conventions to respect

  • Keep diffs minimal and consistent with existing patterns.
  • Park derived artifacts under tmp/ (gitignored).
  • Don’t add new dependencies unless explicitly requested; prefer optional tooling or clear fallbacks.