Tools

Anthropic's document skills, the implementation behind Claude's file features: create, edit and analyze Word, Excel, PowerPoint and PDF files, including tracked changes, comments, formulas and form filling. Source-available, not under an open-source license.

Modern markup-based typesetting system, a LaTeX alternative for papers, reports and resumes. Fast incremental compilation; typst compile outputs a PDF in one command and watch mode recompiles automatically.

MuseScore 4 command-line wrapper from CLI-Anything: lets agents transpose scores, extract parts, add or remove instruments, inspect score info and export PDF, MIDI, MusicXML, MP3 or braille. Handy for music teachers preparing scores in bulk. Needs MuseScore 4 and Python 3.10+.

Free, open-source offline OCR desktop app for screenshots, batch images, scanned PDFs and QR codes, callable via the umi-ocr CLI or an HTTP API (the CLI relies on the app's local HTTP service, on by default). Windows and Linux only.

Official remote MCP for the open-source resume builder Reactive Resume: agents draft and edit resumes and cover letters, export PDFs and track applications; job-based scoring and tailoring need an AI provider set in the app. Needs a free rxresu.me account or a self-hosted instance.

Translates full PDF papers while preserving formulas, charts and layout (command pdf2zh), outputting monolingual and side-by-side bilingual PDFs. Uses Google Translate by default and can switch to DeepL, OpenAI and others; also runs as an MCP server.

Distills technical books, doc folders or paper collections (PDF, EPUB, DOCX, Markdown and more) into an agent skill with a core framework, on-demand chapter files, glossary and cheat sheet for lookup while working. Extraction needs local Python; poppler or docling optional for PDFs.

Open-source e-book manager whose command-line tools (ebook-convert, ebook-meta, calibredb) batch-convert between EPUB, MOBI, AZW3, PDF, DOCX and more and manage library metadata. The install command is Linux-only; on macOS and Windows use the installer.

From Firecrawl: converts Word, PowerPoint, Excel, PDF, EPUB, RTF and more into clean Markdown locally in milliseconds, keeping headings, tables, footnotes and formulas so agents can read attachments. Needs Node.js; optional Firecrawl cloud OCR for scans uploads the whole file.

Write your resume in YAML and render a cleanly typeset PDF from the command line: multiple themes, fine control of margins, colors and fonts, strict field validation and multi-language support. A companion agent skill is available. Needs Python 3.12+.

PDF translation CLI for research papers that preserves formulas and layout as much as possible, producing bilingual side-by-side or translation-only PDFs. Needs an OpenAI-compatible API (local Ollama works too); currently focused on English to Chinese.

Open-source alternative to NotebookLM's podcast feature: turns web pages, PDFs, images, YouTube videos or text into two-host conversational audio, useful for lecture notes or articles. Uses Gemini and OpenAI API keys by default, or local models plus free Edge TTS.

Self-contained modern TeX/LaTeX engine based on XeTeX and TeX Live that downloads and caches support files on first build, compiling .tex to PDF in one command without installing a full TeX distribution.

Converts PDFs to editable Word files, keeping paragraphs, tables, images and layout as closely as possible, and can extract tables alone, handy when a contract or exam only exists as PDF. Needs Python; digital PDFs only, OCR scans first. No longer actively maintained by Artifex.

Recognizes images or whole PDFs (including scans) with math formulas and tables into Markdown and LaTeX, strong on English and Chinese and supporting 80+ languages, handy for digitizing exams, lecture notes and study notes. An open-source Mathpix alternative that runs locally with Python.

PDFMathTranslate 2.x (command pdf2zh_next), built on BabelDOC: translates papers and other PDFs while keeping formulas, charts, TOC and annotations, outputting translated and bilingual side-by-side versions. Uses a free translation channel by default, or your own OpenAI, DeepSeek or other API key.

Unified search across 20+ academic sources including arXiv, PubMed, bioRxiv, Semantic Scholar and OpenAlex, returning deduplicated, normalized results and downloading full text via open-access channels first. Most sources need no API key.

Local text-to-speech CLI built on the open Kokoro model: batch-converts TXT, EPUB and PDF to MP3 or WAV by chapter, with multiple languages, voice blending and speed control; handy for audio versions of course materials. Needs Python 3.11-3.12 and two model files downloaded first.

Recommends daily papers from arXiv and Semantic Scholar by research interest, reads them and writes illustrated Obsidian notes and a paper graph; can also search venues like CVPR and NeurIPS. Needs Python 3, Obsidian, a vault path and an interests config; the web app needs an Anthropic API key.

Turns a paper (arXiv link or PDF) into method diagrams, slides with a generated image per page (PPTX/PDF export) and an in-depth HTML explainer with formulas, for lab meetings and lectures. No API key; images use Codex's built-in generator or, in Claude Code, a separate image skill.

Two companion skills: /tutor-setup turns PDFs, lecture notes or a codebase into an Obsidian study vault with concept notes and practice questions, and /tutor quizzes you with multiple-choice questions on weak spots and tracks mastery. For students reviewing or self-studying; best viewed in Obsidian.

Local LLM-powered document translator for PDF, Word, Excel, EPUB, SRT subtitles and more; Word and Excel keep their formatting, glossaries can be built automatically, and agents can submit jobs via MCP. Needs uv and an OpenAI-compatible API key; translated PDFs lose the original layout.

Pulls new papers from Hugging Face Daily Papers and arXiv, scores them by research area into a recommendation page, and writes deep-read Obsidian notes for key ones; can also batch-read Zotero collections. Needs Python 3, Obsidian and poppler; copy the whole skills folder per the README.

Turns a paper (title, DOI, arXiv ID or local PDF) into a structured Obsidian note covering the research question, method, key formulas, figures and limitations; can read local Zotero items first and includes a glossary-card skill. Needs Python 3.10+ and PyMuPDF.