jxtse Paper Reading
Structured workflow for reading academic papers efficiently.
When to Use
- User shares an arXiv link or PDF and asks to read/summarize it
- User asks about a specific paper's contributions, methods, or results
- User wants a reading digest for their records
- User asks to compare a paper against related work
Reading Levels
Level 1: Quick Skim (2 min)
When: User just wants to know if a paper is worth reading
Output:
- Paper title, authors, venue, year
- One-paragraph summary (what problem, what method, what result)
- Key contribution in one sentence
- Relevance assessment to user's work
- Recommendation: Read / Skip / Skim only
Level 2: Standard Read (10 min)
When: User wants to understand the paper's approach
Output:
- Problem: What gap does this address?
- Method: How do they solve it? (with key technical details)
- Key innovation: What's genuinely new vs. incremental?
- Results: Main numbers + comparison to baselines
- Limitations: What they don't do, acknowledged or not
- Connections: How does this relate to user's active projects?
Level 3: Deep Analysis (30 min)
When: User is seriously considering building on this paper
Output:
- Everything from Level 2, plus:
- Detailed methodology: Step-by-step technical walkthrough
- Reproducibility assessment: Can you implement this from the paper alone?
- Experimental design critique: Are the baselines fair? Metrics appropriate?
- Hidden assumptions: What are they not saying?
- Extension opportunities: How could this be improved or adapted?
- Key equations/algorithms: Extracted and explained
- Figure analysis: What do the key figures actually show?
Workflow
Step 1: Obtain Paper
arXiv link → Download PDF, extract text
PDF file → Extract text directly
Paper title → Search Semantic Scholar → get arXiv link → download
Zotero item → Get from local library
Step 2: Read at Requested Level
Follow the appropriate level template above. When in doubt, start with Level 2.
Step 3: Store Digest
After reading, save the digest:
- Store structured summary to local dashboard
- If user confirms, add/update Zotero entry with notes
Step 4: Connect to Context
- Link to user's active projects if relevant
- Suggest follow-up papers (from references or "cited by")
- Note if this paper supports or contradicts prior reads
Reading Heuristics
For ML/AI papers:
- Jump to Table 1 (main results) first — if the numbers aren't impressive, calibrate expectations
- Check the ablation study — it reveals what actually matters in their method
- Read the limitations/future work section — often more honest than the intro
- Look at Appendix — important details are often buried there
For methods papers:
- Focus on Figure 1 (method overview) + Section 3 (method) + Table 1 (results)
- Skip related work on first pass — come back only if you need positioning context
For empirical papers:
- Focus on experimental setup, metrics, and statistical significance
- Check if baselines are fairly implemented (same hyperparameter search budget?)
- Look for cherry-picked examples in qualitative analysis
Paper Comparison Mode
When user asks to compare two papers:
| Aspect | Paper A | Paper B |
|--------------|------------------|------------------|
| Problem | | |
| Method | | |
| Data | | |
| Key metric | | |
| Advantage | | |
| Limitation | | |