citationslisted

# Citations Rules for any output that cites sources: technical articles, reports, papers, and READMEs alike. Attribution is critical wherever a claim rests on a source. ## The two spine rules - **Cite nothing you did not open.** Every reference comes from a source actually read during the session, through the `web-browsing` skill, or supplied by the user as a file or excerpt. Fabricated and unverified references are the signature failure of AI-assisted writing. A citation without a visit is a bug. - **Cite nothing the reader cannot access.** The author must be able to read and obtain every source cited. The ladder below defines accessible. ## Style APA, latest edition. Parenthetical author-date citations in text and a References list at the end. Include access dates for web sources. When the target venue mandates its own citation format, the venue wins. When the project defines a reference ledger (a repo-side vault-sync file, such as an RIS ledger for EndNote), append every newly cited reference to it in the ledger's format, at the time it is cited. ## The source ladder 1. **Freely accessible web sources.** The default. Found by web search, verified by visiting. Prefer these. 2. **The user's own library.** Cited from excerpts or page references the user supplies. Print status is irrelevant. Owned is accessible. 3. **Academic databases the user has institutional access to.** Ask whether this tier applies when it becomes relevant. User-supplied P