--- title: "HLCE vs academic-research-skills" type: "comparison" canonical_url: "https://www.graphcanon.com/compare/humanity-s-last-code-exam-hlce-vs-imbad0202-academic-research-skills" tools: ["humanity-s-last-code-exam-hlce", "imbad0202-academic-research-skills"] --- # HLCE vs academic-research-skills *GraphCanon updated Jul 15, 2026* ## Verdict Pick HLCE when tags unique to HLCE: benchmark, codegen, codellm, llm; pick academic-research-skills when tags unique to academic-research-skills: academic-pipeline, academic-writing, ai-research, claude. [HLCE](https://humanity-s-last-code-exam.github.io/website/) reports 96 GitHub stars, 8 forks, and 1 open issues, last pushed Aug 21, 2025. [academic-research-skills](https://buymeacoffee.com/crucify020v) has 37k stars, 3.0k forks, and 9 open issues, last pushed Jul 11, 2026. Figures are from public GitHub metadata via [HLCE's repository](https://github.com/Humanity-s-Last-Code-Exam/HLCE) and [academic-research-skills's repository](https://github.com/Imbad0202/academic-research-skills). | | [HLCE](/tools/humanity-s-last-code-exam-hlce.md) | [academic-research-skills](/tools/imbad0202-academic-research-skills.md) | | --- | --- | --- | | Tagline | (EMNLP 2025 Findings) Source Evaluation scripts for Humanity's Last Code Exam | Academic Research Skills for Claude Code: research → write → review → revise → finalize | | Stars | 96 | 37,300 | | Forks | 8 | 3,043 | | Open issues | 1 | 9 | | Language | Python | Python | | Adopt for | - | - | | Persona | - | - | | Runtime | - | - | | License | - | Other | | Categories | Evaluation & Observability, LLM Frameworks | Data & Retrieval, LLM Frameworks | ## Trust and health _Sourced signals - not a safety guarantee. No winner column._ | | [HLCE](/tools/humanity-s-last-code-exam-hlce.md) | [academic-research-skills](/tools/imbad0202-academic-research-skills.md) | | --- | --- | --- | | Maintenance | Slowing (36%) | Very active (96%) | | Days since push | 328d | 0d | | Open issues (now) | 1 | 9 | | Owner type | Organization | User | | Full report | [trust report](/tools/humanity-s-last-code-exam-hlce/trust.md) | [trust report](/tools/imbad0202-academic-research-skills/trust.md) | ## Choose when ### Choose HLCE if… - Tags unique to HLCE: benchmark, codegen, codellm, llm. - Also covers Evaluation & Observability. - Leaner open-issue backlog (1). ### Choose academic-research-skills if… - Tags unique to academic-research-skills: academic-pipeline, academic-writing, ai-research, claude. - Also covers Data & Retrieval. - More GitHub stars (37k vs 96) - visibility, not fit. ## When NOT to use HLCE - Last GitHub push was 328 days ago (slowing maintenance, Aug 21, 2025). Validate activity before betting a new project on HLCE. - Evaluation & Observability: Defer heavyweight eval infra only until you have real traffic - never skip it once users depend on answers. - LLM Frameworks: Avoid a framework for a single prompt-and-retrieve call; the abstraction can cost more than it saves. ## When NOT to use academic-research-skills - Data & Retrieval: Skip a heavy ingestion framework when your corpus is small and static; a script plus the embedding API is enough. - LLM Frameworks: Avoid a framework for a single prompt-and-retrieve call; the abstraction can cost more than it saves. ## Common questions ### What is the difference between HLCE and academic-research-skills? HLCE: (EMNLP 2025 Findings) Source Evaluation scripts for Humanity's Last Code Exam. academic-research-skills: Academic Research Skills for Claude Code: research → write → review → revise → finalize. See the comparison table for live GitHub stats and shared categories. ### When should I choose HLCE over academic-research-skills? Choose HLCE over academic-research-skills when Tags unique to HLCE: benchmark, codegen, codellm, llm; Also covers Evaluation & Observability; Leaner open-issue backlog (1). ### When should I choose academic-research-skills over HLCE? Choose academic-research-skills over HLCE when Tags unique to academic-research-skills: academic-pipeline, academic-writing, ai-research, claude; Also covers Data & Retrieval; More GitHub stars (37k vs 96) - visibility, not fit. ### When should I avoid HLCE? Last GitHub push was 328 days ago (slowing maintenance, Aug 21, 2025). Validate activity before betting a new project on HLCE. Evaluation & Observability: Defer heavyweight eval infra only until you have real traffic - never skip it once users depend on answers. LLM Frameworks: Avoid a framework for a single prompt-and-retrieve call; the abstraction can cost more than it saves. ### When should I avoid academic-research-skills? Data & Retrieval: Skip a heavy ingestion framework when your corpus is small and static; a script plus the embedding API is enough. LLM Frameworks: Avoid a framework for a single prompt-and-retrieve call; the abstraction can cost more than it saves. ### Is HLCE or academic-research-skills more popular on GitHub? academic-research-skills has more GitHub stars (37,300 vs 96). Stars measure visibility, not whether either tool fits your constraints. ### Are HLCE and academic-research-skills open source? Yes - both are open-source projects on GitHub. ### Where can I find alternatives to HLCE or academic-research-skills? GraphCanon lists graph-backed alternatives at [HLCE alternatives](/tools/humanity-s-last-code-exam-hlce/alternatives) and [academic-research-skills alternatives](/tools/imbad0202-academic-research-skills/alternatives) ([HLCE markdown twin](/tools/humanity-s-last-code-exam-hlce/alternatives.md), [academic-research-skills markdown twin](/tools/imbad0202-academic-research-skills/alternatives.md)), ranked by typed relationship edges rather than popularity votes. ### Is there a machine-readable version of this comparison? Yes. The markdown twin at [this comparison](/compare/humanity-s-last-code-exam-hlce-vs-imbad0202-academic-research-skills.md) mirrors this page for agents and LLM crawlers, with the same stats table and FAQ answers. ### Which is better maintained, HLCE or academic-research-skills? HLCE: Slowing. academic-research-skills: Very active. Compare maintenance labels, days since push, and release cadence in the trust section below - stars alone do not measure maintenance. ### Where are the full trust reports for HLCE and academic-research-skills? GraphCanon publishes per-repo trust reports with dated maintenance, provenance, and scan summaries: [HLCE trust report](/tools/humanity-s-last-code-exam-hlce/trust); [academic-research-skills trust report](/tools/imbad0202-academic-research-skills/trust). --- **Machine-readable endpoints** - JSON: [`/api/graphcanon/graph?tool=humanity-s-last-code-exam-hlce`](/api/graphcanon/graph?tool=humanity-s-last-code-exam-hlce) - LLM index: [/llms.txt](/llms.txt) - Full corpus: [/llms-full.txt](/llms-full.txt) _GraphCanon - The knowledge graph for AI development. https://www.graphcanon.com/_