Deadlines & rebuttals

Review → Deadlines & reviews tracks due dates, to-dos and reviewer points. The rebuttal itself is written in the Response view, beside the LaTeX, when the paper is in the Rebuttal phase (see Paper phases).

Create a deadline with a type such as abstract, submission, rebuttal, camera-ready, revision or internal. Add the date and, when known, time and zone. AoE means UTC−12. A zoned deadline without an explicit time uses the end of that date in the selected zone.

The countdown shows days, then more precise timing near the deadline; local time is displayed alongside the stated zone where available. Mark a deadline Met to remove it from active counting without deleting the record.

Always record the actual edition/track and deadline source when organizing a submission. An abstract registration date and full-paper date are different obligations. Unconfirmed venue dates should remain unconfirmed.

Create to-dos with optional due dates and file links. Click a file chip to open the relevant source. Done items can be folded away.

When the tracker contains work, a status-bar chip shows the nearest deadline or the open reviewer points. Click it to open the corner dock, which summarizes the nearest deadline, open/overdue tasks and reviewer progress; expand it to tick tasks or open the full tracker. Closing the dock returns the reminder to the chip; it does not delete the tasks. The venue you chose in Submission rehearsal appears among the deadlines with its own date and time zone.

Use the manuscript board for section-level planning and research plans for ordered dependencies. A short to-do list is better suited to discrete remaining actions.

Import reviews (in the Reviews tab of the side panel, or at the top of the Response view) takes the whole OpenReview page of your paper: select all (⌘A), copy, and paste. VersoFold finds each official review, the reviewer's rating and confidence, and splits it into labelled points: W1 for weaknesses, Q1 for questions, L1 for limitations, C1 for other comments. The preview shows what will be added; untick a point to leave it out, or switch its severity between major and minor. The reviewers' text is kept word for word.

Paste the page again later in the discussion: what is already imported is recognised and skipped, a changed rating is updated, and a reviewer's new comments become follow-ups of the current discussion round, threaded under the point they reply to. Your own replies on the page are left out.

A review that is not from OpenReview (an email, a journal's report) can be pasted on its own; it is split into points the same way. When a page is unusual, Tidy with the agent asks the agent to read the paste and import it in the same format, still quoting the reviewers exactly.

The paste is read on your computer. Nothing is sent anywhere unless you ask the agent to tidy it.

The Response view shows each reviewer comment as a card with your answer under it, in order:

• General response, the message to all reviewers (a summary of the main changes, for instance).

• For each reviewer: an optional opening note, then each point with your answer, then their follow-ups.

Click under a card and write. Answers are Markdown, $…$ maths included. The response is the file rebuttal/response.md in the paper folder, so it behaves like the LaTeX: coauthors write in it at the same time and you see their cursors, tracked changes and history work, and an agent can write in it too. The cards themselves are read-only, so the reviewers' text cannot be edited by accident.

The formatting bar above the answers writes the Markdown OpenReview reads: bold (⌘B), italic (⌘I), inline code (⌘E), a link (⇧⌘K), bulleted and numbered lists (⇧⌘8, ⇧⌘7), a quote (⇧⌘.), an inline equation $…$ (Control-M on a Mac, Ctrl+M elsewhere) and a display equation, $ on lines of their own (Control-Shift-M, or Ctrl+Shift+M). Each wraps the selection or opens at the caret, and comes off when used again. The α menu inserts common LaTeX at the caret: fractions, sub- and superscripts, Greek letters, \mathbb, \operatorname{argmax}, \mathcal{O}(\cdot). While the caret is in an equation, it is shown rendered just above it, or with the LaTeX error if it does not compile. Enter in a list item starts the next one.

Each card has:

• Status (Open, Drafted, Addressed, Declined) and Decision (Revise the paper, Clarify, Disagree, No change). Writing an answer marks the point Drafted.

• Assign, to give the point to a coauthor. Mine in the toolbar shows only the points assigned to you; Unanswered shows the ones still empty.

• Draft with agent: the agent reads the reviews and the paper and writes that one answer, without touching the others. With no model connected, the request waits in the agent's message box. Read and edit what the agent wrote; the answer is yours to send.

• Link a passage: tie the point to the manuscript passage that answers it, so Camera-ready can check that the promised change is there.

The reviewer's header counts the characters of the whole reply to that reviewer against the reply limit (5,000 by default, as on OpenReview). The count turns amber when a reply is over; nothing is cut. Set the limit and the discussion round in the phase menu (Rebuttal or revision).

The left sidebar's Outline tab lists the reviewers and their points with their state; click one to go to it.

The Response view can have a window of its own, like the PDF or the LaTeX: drag its Response button out of the toolbar, or use the pop-out button at the end of its toolbar. In that window, Draft with agent goes to the main window's agent, and the main window's Outline scrolls the Response window. See Windows and layouts.

In Rebuttal, edits since the submitted version show in colour: insertions and deletions in the LaTeX, and the changed words highlighted on the PDF. The Changes chip in the PDF toolbar switches between Off, Highlight, and Marked PDF, which builds a latexdiff version of the paper with every insertion and deletion marked, ready to download for a journal. The submitted version is the one saved by Mark as submitted; choose another under Changes are measured from in the phase menu.

Make the manuscript change first when one is required, then describe what changed and where. A draft answer is not proof that the edit exists.

Copy for OpenReview copies, as Markdown ready to paste:

• the General response;

• the reply to each reviewer: the opening note and every answer, each starting with the point's label;

• in later rounds, the round reply to a reviewer: only the answers to that round's follow-ups.

For a journal revision (choose Journal revision in the phase menu), the toolbar offers Download letter instead: the whole response letter as Markdown, LaTeX or HTML, with the reviewers' comments quoted.

The gear in the Response view opens the rebuttal details: each point's request and rationale, linked passages and checks, overlaps between reviewers, and Saved exports, which freeze the response with a manuscript version so you can retrieve exactly what was sent after later edits. VersoFold never submits anything to a venue.

Related: paper phases, comments and review, versions, submission rehearsal.