optica
Use when targeting Optica or deciding whether an optics-and-photonics manuscript fits this venue. Encodes the journal's fit, the high-impact concise-advance bar, measurement and characterization rigor, house style, the Optica-vs-specialty-journal routing, official-submission re-check, and desk-reject heuristics.
Profile →npx skills add brycewang-stanford/Awesome-Journal-Skills --skill optica --agent claude-code
Same command for any agent — swap --agent for codex, cursor, copilot.
Weekly change comes from our own snapshots, not the repository page — it measures attention, not adoption.
# Optica (optica) ## Journal positioning Optica is the Optica Publishing Group (formerly OSA) flagship for the highest-impact research across the whole of optics and photonics, presented in a deliberately concise high-impact format. The journal selects for **significant, broadly interesting advances** — a result that moves a subfield and is appreciated by the wide optics community — rather than thorough but incremental progress that belongs in a specialty title. Selectivity and brevity are the defining traits: a paper must earn space by combining genuine novelty with broad interest, and a complete-but-narrow study is a poor fit even when technically sound. This skill is a **fit / venue-selection / re-framing** tool. It does not replace the journal's current official author guidelines. Before submitting, re-check the live Optica author information on the Optica Publishing Group site. ## When to trigger - The author names Optica as the target for an optics or photonics result and wants a fit/framing and breadth check. - A technically strong photonics result must be re-framed from a specialty-depth report into a concise, broadly significant Optica advance. - The author is choosing bet
- Journal positioning
- When to trigger
- Scope & topic fit
- Method & evidence bar
- Structure & house style
- Official-submission checklist
- Pre-submission self-check
- Common desk-reject triggers
- Re-routing decision
- Output format
What does the optica skill do?
Use when targeting Optica or deciding whether an optics-and-photonics manuscript fits this venue. Encodes the journal's fit, the high-impact concise-advance bar, measurement and characterization rigor, house style, the Optica-vs-specialty-journal routing, official-submission re-check, and desk-reject heuristics.
How do I install it?
Run `npx skills add brycewang-stanford/Awesome-Journal-Skills --skill optica --agent claude-code` — it drops the skill into your project so the agent can pick it up. Swap the --agent value for codex, cursor or copilot if you use one of those.
Where does this skill come from?
From brycewang-stanford/Awesome-Journal-Skills, a repository with 984 stars. We read it straight from the repository tree rather than a submitted listing, so what you see here is what is actually published.
Is a popular skill a good skill?
Not necessarily. Stars measure attention, not adoption — a repository can trend for a week and be abandoned. That is why we show the weekly change from our own snapshots next to the total, instead of a single flattering number.