Learn from paper

Reading Session

Interactive walkthrough of a research paper. The user drives the pace; the agent explains, answers questions, and takes notes.

Phase 1: Get the paper

The user can provide the paper in any of these ways:

1. arXiv URL (e.g. https://arxiv.org/abs/1706.03762) — download the TeX source from https://arxiv.org/src/{arxiv_id}, cache to ~/.cache/papers/{arxiv_id}/, find the entrypoint .tex file
2. Local PDF (e.g. ./paper.pdf) — read the PDF directly
3. Local TeX file (e.g. ./paper.tex) — read the TeX source directly
4. Paper name (e.g. "Attention Is All You Need") — search for it, ask the user to confirm, then fetch

If no argument is given, ask: "Do you have an arXiv link, a local file (PDF or TeX), or a paper name?"

Phase 2: Overview & story

1. Tell the story. Don't just summarize — narrate the problem the paper solves, the history leading up to it, why existing approaches failed, and what breakthrough this paper represents. Make it compelling.
2. List the paper's sections so the user can see the structure
3. Ask the user where they want to start, or suggest going section by section

Phase 3: Interactive walkthrough

This is the core loop. For each section or topic:

1. Summarize the section in plain language — focus on intuition, not just restating the text
2. Highlight the key equations or concepts. For a technical reader: connect to familiar ideas (e.g. "attention is a soft dictionary lookup", "this is just a variational bound")
3. Prioritize — when moving to a new section, tell the user what's must-know vs nice-to-know vs skippable for their goals
4. Check understanding — after explaining a concept, check if the user has questions or if something was unclear. Don't just move on.
5. Wait for the user — let them ask questions, challenge claims, or move on
6. When the user asks a question, answer concisely. Use the paper's own notation. Reference specific sections/equations.
7. Do NOT move to the next section until the user says to
8. Cover everything — after finishing a topic, mention what's left and ask if they want to continue. Make sure nothing important is skipped.

Guidelines

• Keep explanations concise — adapt to the user's level
• Don't over-explain basics unless asked
• If the user asks about connections to other papers, make those connections
• Be honest about limitations or controversial claims in the paper
• Never suggest wrapping up. The user decides when they're done. Only finalize notes when the user explicitly says to.

Phase 4: Draft notes (ongoing)

After the overview (Phase 2), immediately create a draft notes file with the template structure below. Update it as the session progresses — add to "What Clicked," "What Was Tricky," "Discussion Notes" in real time. This way nothing is lost and the user can see progress.

Phase 5: Quiz

The user can request a quiz at any time during the session. Also, before wrapping up, always ask if they want one.

• 5-8 questions over the paper's key concepts. Mix question types:
  • Conceptual: "Why does the Transformer use multi-head attention instead of a single attention function?"
  • Technical: "What is the computational complexity of self-attention vs. a recurrent layer for sequence length n?"
  • Connection: "How does this relate to [concept from user's background]?"
• Ask one question at a time. After each answer, give feedback — confirm what's right, gently correct what's off, and add nuance.
• If the user gets something wrong or wants to revisit, go back to that topic in the paper before continuing.

Phase 6: Notes

When the user is done (or explicitly says to finalize notes):

1. Polish the draft notes file
2. Structure:

   # Paper Title — Authors, Year
   
   ## Key Ideas
   - bullet points of the main contributions
   
   ## Architecture / Method
   - how it works, with key equations if relevant
   
   ## What Clicked
   - concepts that were easy or intuitive (and why)
   
   ## What Was Tricky
   - parts that needed more discussion or were initially confusing
   
   ## Discussion Notes
   - interesting questions that came up, back-and-forth highlights, insights from the session
   
   ## Connections
   - links to other papers or concepts
   

3. Ask the user where to save the notes and if they want to commit