docx-format-replicator_skill

Overview

This skill extracts formatting from existing .docx Word documents and applies that format to new documents with different content. It lets you capture styles, numbering, tables, headers/footers, and other layout details into a reusable format configuration. Use it to maintain consistent corporate or template-based document appearance across many generated files.

How this skill works

The skill reads a template .docx and serializes style definitions, paragraph/character styles, numbering schemes, table structures, and header/footer settings into a JSON format configuration. You prepare a content JSON that follows the content schema (sections like headings, paragraphs, tables, page breaks). A generator applies the format JSON to the content JSON and produces a new .docx with the same visual structure but different text and data.

When to use it

• Generate multiple reports, proposals, or specifications with identical formatting
• Replicate a corporate template for consistency across teams
• Create many variants of a document (e.g., research tasks) from a single template
• Automate document production where layout and styles must be preserved
• Batch-generate documents for different products, projects, or customers

Best practices

• Extract the format once from a stable template and reuse the format JSON across documents
• Start with simple content (headings and paragraphs) to validate the format before adding complex tables or numbering
• Validate content JSON against the content schema to avoid generation errors
• Keep extracted format configs under version control so formatting changes are auditable
• Ensure referenced fonts and custom styles exist on target systems to avoid render differences

Example use cases

• Company templates: extract corporate template and produce monthly reports with consistent branding
• Technical docs: generate multiple product specifications from one spec template with consistent multi-level numbering
• Research task series: clone a research task document format and generate separate task files with different metadata and tables
• Batch generation: script a loop to produce dozens of formatted documents from different content JSON files