Files
paperspec/docs
alexmandClaude 88379d152c feat!: one paperspec command with subcommands, help and examples
The six console scripts (paperspec-check, -build, -validate, -load,
-stress, -site) become subcommands of a single `paperspec` command:
paperspec validate, load, check, build, stress and site. `python -m
paperspec COMMAND` runs the same thing.

- paperspec/cli/main.py builds the whole parser, apart from the commands,
  so `paperspec --help` and `paperspec COMMAND --help` work without a
  checkout or the tools extra; a command's module is imported only when
  it runs.
- `paperspec` with no command prints the overview: what each command does,
  examples, and which work anywhere (validate, load) and which need a
  checkout (check, build, stress, site). Each command's help has a
  description with advice, and worked examples; a misspelled command gets
  a suggestion (argparse suggest_on_error); `--version` prints the version
  and the pinned Unicode version.
- Each command module exposes run(args) and returns the exit status.
  Arguments that parse but do not fit together raise UsageError, which
  prints the command's usage and exits 2: load now also refuses
  --built-from or --store without --bundle.
- The failure messages say what to do: install paperspec[tools], clone the
  repository, rerun stress with the printed seed, or run paperspec build
  when the rebuild check differs. check and stress say how many failures
  they did not list.
- check runs the rebuild as `python -m paperspec build`.
- pyproject installs one script, `paperspec`; the pixi tasks and the docs
  use the subcommands.

pixi run check passes (run here as `python -m paperspec check` with src/ on
the path); the rebuild is byte-identical. pixi.lock still needs
`pixi lock`.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5.5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
2026-10-15 09:28:30 -04:00
..

Guides

These guides explain paperspec to someone meeting it for the first time. They serve three readers: a newcomer who has not seen the problem before, an implementer who will write a reader, writer, converter or checker, and an expert who knows the neighboring standards. The specification says exactly what each format is. The guides say what each format is for, with examples drawn from the fixtures.

Guide For
Overview What paperspec is, who it serves, and how its parts fit together.
Concepts The ideas behind the formats, one at a time, each with a real example.
Walkthrough One paper, from a flawed first reading to a corrected, reviewed and signed document.
Examples Things to run: checking hashes by hand, reading a package with a few lines of Python, querying a database.
Rationale Why the formats look the way they do, and the questions they leave open.
Comparison How paperspec compares with JATS, TEI, W3C Web Annotation and other schemas.
FAQ Short answers to the questions people ask first.
Glossary Every term, in a sentence.

Reading orders

Newcomer. Spend a first afternoon on the overview, then the walkthrough with the fixture open beside it, then the examples. Read the concepts when a term in the walkthrough needs more than the glossary gives.

Implementer. Start with the specification's reading paths, which list the chapters to read for a reader, a converter, a store and a validator. Chapters 0, 1, 3, 4 and 5 are needed for any of them. Next, run the section "Test your implementation against a vector" in the examples. Check your work against the vectors and the fixtures. Chapter 22 of the specification defines conformance.

Expert. Read the overview for scope and for what paperspec is not, then the comparison for how it differs from existing standards. After that, read the rationale for the reason behind each rule and the questions it leaves open. It ends with a list of limits. Section 0.4 of the specification and registry/formats.json give the status of each format: the version is 0.1.0, and each format is candidate or provisional.