Link Verification

The Iron Law

NO DRAFT APPROVAL WITH BROKEN LINKS OR MISMATCHED QUOTES

Every URL must return 200 OK. Every quote must exist verbatim in its source. No exceptions.

Purpose

Ensure all content maintains link integrity and quote accuracy by:

• Validating URL accessibility (no 404s, 403s, timeouts)
• Verifying quoted text exists verbatim in sources
• Detecting placeholder links (example.com, TODO, etc.)
• Confirming source attribution accuracy

When to Use This Skill

Activate automatically when:

• Verifying content before publication
• Draft completion with

  content-drafting

  workflow
• Explicit verification step with

  content-verification

  workflow
• User requests link checking

• citation-compliance

  skill invokes this for URL validation

Validation Requirements

1. URL Accessibility

Requirement: All URLs must be accessible with successful HTTP response

Acceptable responses:

• 200 OK (success)
• 301/302 Redirect (follow to final destination)

Failure responses:

• 404 Not Found
• 403 Forbidden
• 500 Internal Server Error
• Timeout (>10 seconds)
• Connection refused
• DNS resolution failure

Validation process:

1. Extract all URLs from draft content
2. For each URL:
   • Use WebFetch to request the URL
   • Record response status
   • Follow redirects to final destination
   • Verify final status is 200 OK
3. Report all failures with specific error codes

2. Quote Verbatim Verification

Requirement: All quoted text must match source content exactly

Quote formats to detect:

> "Quoted text in blockquote"
"Inline quoted text"[^1]
"Quoted text with attribution" — Author Name

Validation process:

1. Extract all quoted text from draft
2. Identify source reference for each quote (footnote, inline link, citation ID)
3. Fetch/read the source content
4. Search for exact match in source
5. Flag mismatches (paraphrasing, summarization, missing quotes)

Pass example:

# Draft
> "Seasonality impacts email engagement by up to 40% during peak periods"
Source: research-source.md

# Source content (research-source.md)
... analysis shows that seasonality impacts email engagement by up to 40% during peak periods such as Black Friday...

✓ Exact match found

Fail example:

# Draft
> "Seasonality significantly affects email performance during holidays"
Source: research-source.md

# Source content (research-source.md)
... seasonality impacts email engagement by up to 40% during peak periods...

✗ Quote not found verbatim (paraphrased)

3. Placeholder Detection

Forbidden placeholder patterns:

• example.com

  ,

  example.org

• TODO

  ,

  FIXME

  ,

  TBD

• http://localhost

  ,

  http://127.0.0.1

• [insert link]

  ,

  [link here]

• Broken markdown links:

  [text]()

  (empty href)

Validation process:

1. Scan draft for placeholder patterns
2. Report any matches
3. Fail verification if placeholders present

4. Attribution Accuracy

Requirement: Source attribution must match actual source metadata

Validation for citations with attribution:

> "Quote text" — Author Name, Publication Title (2024)

Validation process:

1. Extract attribution details (author, title, date)
2. Read source metadata
3. Verify author matches
4. Verify title matches
5. Verify date matches (if provided)
6. Flag mismatches

Validation Process

1. Load Draft and Sources

Read:

• Draft content:

  datasets/marketing/content/{date}_{type}_{slug}/drafts/draft_v{n}.md

• Citations:

  datasets/marketing/content/{date}_{type}_{slug}/citations/sources.json

• Referenced source files

2. Extract URLs and Quotes

URLs:

https?://[^\s\)]+

Quotes:

> "([^"]+)"
"([^"]+)"\[[\^\d+]\]

3. Validate URLs

For each URL:

1. WebFetch URL
2. Record status code
3. If 301/302: Follow to final URL and validate
4. If 200 OK: PASS
5. Otherwise: FAIL with error code

4. Validate Quotes

For each quote:

1. Identify source reference (footnote, inline link, citation ID)
2. Read source content
3. Search for exact quote match
4. If found verbatim: PASS
5. If paraphrased or missing: FAIL

5. Generate Report

If all pass:

# Link Verification Report: PASS

## URL Validation
✓ 12 URLs validated successfully
  - https://example.com/article1 (200 OK)
  - https://example.com/article2 (200 OK)
  - [... all URLs listed ...]

## Quote Verification
✓ 8 quotes verified verbatim
  - "Quote 1" → Source: research-file.md (match confirmed)
  - "Quote 2" → Source: https://source.com (match confirmed)
  - [... all quotes listed ...]

## Placeholder Check
✓ No placeholders detected

**Status**: All links and quotes verified

If any fail:

# Link Verification Report: FAIL

## URL Validation
✗ 2 URLs failed:
  - https://broken-link.com/article (404 Not Found)
  - https://timeout-site.com/page (Timeout after 10s)

✓ 10 URLs passed:
  - https://working-link.com/article (200 OK)
  - [... other passing URLs ...]

## Quote Verification
✗ 1 quote mismatch:
  - "Paraphrased quote text"
    - Source: research-file.md
    - Expected: Exact match not found
    - Action: Verify quote accuracy or remove quote marks

✓ 7 quotes verified

## Placeholder Check
✗ 1 placeholder detected:
  - Line 42: "TODO: Add citation here"

**Required fixes**:
1. Fix or remove broken URL: https://broken-link.com/article
2. Fix timeout URL or use archive: https://timeout-site.com/page
3. Verify quote accuracy or remove quote formatting
4. Replace placeholder with actual citation

**Status**: NEEDS_FIX

6. Block or Approve

If PASS:

• All links accessible
• All quotes verified verbatim
• No placeholders present
• Draft can proceed to publication

If FAIL:

• Broken links detected
• Quote mismatches found
• Placeholders present
• Workflow status set to "NEEDS_FIX"
• Must address violations before resuming

Integration with Workflows

Citation Compliance Integration

Invoked by:

• citation-compliance

  quality gate (for URL validation portion)

Relationship:

• citation-compliance

  handles overall source integrity

• link-verification

  specializes in URL accessibility and quote accuracy
• Works as sub-skill when needed

Content Verification Integration

Invoked by:

• content-verification

  workflow (explicit verification step)

• content-drafting

  workflow (before marking draft complete)

Blocking behavior:

• If link verification fails → draft blocked
• User must fix broken links and mismatched quotes
• Workflow cannot proceed to snippets or publication

Retry Logic

For transient failures:

If URL fails with timeout or 5xx error:

1. Retry once after 3-second delay
2. If second attempt succeeds: PASS
3. If second attempt fails: FAIL (report as unreliable)

Do not retry:

• 404 Not Found (permanent)
• 403 Forbidden (permission issue)
• DNS failure (domain issue)

Success Criteria

Link verification passes when:

• All URLs return 200 OK (or 301/302 to 200 OK)
• All quoted text exists verbatim in sources
• Zero placeholders detected
• All attributions match source metadata
• Verification report shows PASS status

Common Mistakes

Mistake	Fix
Ignoring 301 redirects	Follow redirect and verify final destination
Accepting paraphrased quotes	Find verbatim match or remove quote formatting
Leaving placeholder links	Replace with actual sources
Skipping retries for timeouts	Retry once, then report if still failing
Not checking attribution accuracy	Verify author/title match source metadata

Related Skills

• citation-compliance: Invokes this skill for URL validation
• content-verification: Uses this skill for explicit verification step
• source-integrity: Validates source metadata (complementary concern)

Anti-Rationalization Blocks

Common excuses that are explicitly rejected:

Rationalization	Reality
"Link worked yesterday"	Verify every time. No assumptions.
"Quote is close enough"	Verbatim or not a quote.
"Placeholder is obvious"	Replace with actual source.
"One broken link is fine"	Zero tolerance. Fix or fail.
"We'll verify later"	Verify now or block workflow.