Sync LaTeX Edits to QMD

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Transfers prose edits from latex/index.tex (Overleaf) back into index.qmd. Use after pulling LaTeX edits from a collaborator.

Instructions available. Your AI can read the instructions. Execution depends on the setup they require.

Add ahel to your AI once: Claude, ChatGPT, Cursor, Claude Code or Codex. Then ask it to use this.

Then ask your AI: use the Sync LaTeX Edits to QMD skill

What this skill tells your AI

The instructions your AI receives, as published by brycewang-stanford/auto-empirical-research-skills in skills/29-quarcs-lab-project20XXy/dot-claude/skills/sync-tex/SKILL.md and read by ahel’s review.

Transfer prose changes made by collaborators in latex/index.tex (e.g., via Overleaf) back into index.qmd.

Prerequisites

  • latex/.baseline.tex must exist (auto-created by bash scripts/render.sh)
  • latex/index.tex must contain collaborator edits (pulled from Overleaf / GitHub)

Steps

  1. Read these three files:

    • latex/.baseline.tex — the LaTeX snapshot from the last render (before edits)
    • latex/index.tex — the LaTeX after collaborator edits
    • index.qmd — the current QMD manuscript source
  2. Compare latex/.baseline.tex vs latex/index.tex to identify changes. Focus on the document body only (everything between \begin{document} and \end{document}). Ignore the preamble (lines before \begin{document}) — these are auto-generated by Quarto.

  3. For each section (identified by \section{...}\label{...} and \subsection{...}\label{...} markers), check if the prose text changed between baseline and modified.

  4. For each changed section, apply the edits to the corresponding section in index.qmd:

    • Convert LaTeX formatting to QMD equivalents:
      • \textbf{...} → **...**
      • \textit{...} or \emph{...} → *...*
      • \href{url}{text} → [text](url)
      • Section~\ref{sec-id} → @sec-id
      • Figure~\ref{fig-id} → @fig-id
      • Table~\ref{tbl-id} → @tbl-id
      • \cite{key} or \citep{key} → [@key]
      • \citet{key} → @key
      • Footnotes: \footnote{...} → ^[...]
    • CRITICAL: Preserve all {{< embed >}} shortcodes exactly as they are in the QMD. Do NOT replace them with \includegraphics, \begin{figure}, \begin{longtable}, or any LaTeX equivalents. These shortcodes pull live outputs from notebooks and must remain intact.
    • If a collaborator edited a figure/table caption in LaTeX (\caption{...}), note the change in the summary report but do NOT modify the embed shortcodes — captions are defined in the notebook source cells.
  5. After applying all changes, show a summary:

    • List each section that was modified
    • For each, show a brief description of what changed (e.g., "Added two sentences to Introduction", "Rewrote paragraph 2 in Methods")
    • Note any changes that could NOT be transferred (e.g., caption edits, preamble changes, new LaTeX packages)
  6. Render the manuscript with bash scripts/render.sh to verify the round-trip is clean (no warnings, no errors).

Error handling

  • If latex/.baseline.tex does not exist, tell the user to run /project:render first.
  • If latex/.baseline.tex and latex/index.tex are identical, report "No changes detected" and stop.
  • If a section label in the LaTeX does not match any section in index.qmd, flag it and skip.

Signals

GitHub stars
4k
Forks
531
Last commit
Sep 2026
Advanced
Item type
skill
Key
sync-tex
Source
github.com/brycewang-stanford/auto-empirical-research-skills