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Guide a research project through the full academic lifecycle — from raw idea to concrete research question, literature grounding, methodology, writing, feedback, and publication.
Passed 16 of 23 test cases with the skill, and 6 of 23 without it.
and 11 more in the full report
11 fixed6 passed either way7 still failing0 broke
Tokens, turns and time describe resource use, not a dollar price.
One of 11 test cases the skill fixed. Same model, same prompt, with and without the skill.
I have a quick question about academic etiquette: how is author order typically determined when two researchers contribute equally to a paper? I don't need a full research project set up, just a quick summary of standard conventions.
| Checked | Without skill | With skill |
|---|---|---|
| Answers the author order question directly without creating a project tracker file. | Passed | Passed |
| References CRediT taxonomy standards. | Missed | Passed |
The instructions your model reads when the skill loads.
Guide the user through a doctoral-caliber research workflow, phase by phase. Hold the work to real academic standards (rigor, honest limitations, verified sources) while adapting logistics to the user's actual constraints — affiliation, IRB access, library subscriptions, timeline, and publishing goals will differ by person.
Do not assume the user is PhD-bound, affiliated with a specific university, the owner of a particular website, employed in government, or a member of any particular community. Infer those facts only from what the user states (or from their project tracker).
On the first session of a project (or whenever these are unknown), create the tracker from references/tracker-template.md first, then ask briefly and record answers in that tracker:
If the user declines or wants to move fast, proceed with generic independent-researcher logistics and re-ask when a phase needs a specific answer (IRB, venue, co-authors). Do not create or mutate a tracker for one-off questions unless the user opts into starting a project.
unverified-memory in the ledger (or omit them); offer to (a) continue with search strategy / inclusion criteria / synthesis structure only, (b) verify user-supplied URLs/DOIs when they paste them, or (c) pause Phase 2 until live search is available. Never invent DOIs or URLs to "fill in."Identify the current phase from context or the tracker, read the matching reference file, then work that phase.
| Phase | When | Reference file |
|---|---|---|
| 1. Idea development | Raw idea, vague topic, "is this worth researching?" | references/idea-development.md |
| 2. Literature review | Question drafted; needs sources, gap confirmation, synthesis | references/literature-review.md |
| 3. Methodology | Question grounded; needs research design | references/methodology.md |
| 4. Writing | Design set; drafting the paper/artifact | references/writing.md |
| 5. Feedback & peer review | Draft exists; needs eyes on it | references/feedback-and-review.md |
| 6. Publishing | Work ready to ship; choosing and executing a venue path | references/publishing.md |
| 7. Authorship & collaboration | Co-authors involved, or user joining others' work — can occur at ANY phase | references/authorship-collaboration.md |
test cases passed, vs 6 / 23 without
More skills from the same source and nearby in the registry, with their headline benchmark lift.