Say what this hand is, and how to build one

[correll]

The repository had the parts but not the instructions: eight STLs with no picture of what they are, a shopping list with no assembly order, and a README that was an install snippet. Someone arriving from the paper could not tell whether this was a hand they could build.

What changed

• README — what the hand is and what it can do, with the figures from the paper (mechanism, force control, the two demonstrations), the module map, and the citation at the end.
• docs/build.md — print, buy, commission the servos, assemble, wire, calibrate, first grasp, and what to check when it does not work. The step order is reconstructed from the paper's exploded view, the bill of materials and the driver code, and says so at the top: the fastener call-outs in §4 are inference from the BOM counts and are worth a second pair of eyes.
• docs/bom.md — the old parts.md as a costed table (git mv, so its history follows), with the substitutions that actually matter.
• docs/paper/ — the paper, so the repository carries its own reference (recompressed from 17 MB to 1.5 MB; arXiv has the original). Plus CITATION.cff.
• Pointers to the hardware repository. The mechanical design has moved on to correlllab/magpie_assembly, so the pointer goes next to the spec table, in the printed-set section, at the top of the build guide, and in the repository layout — the four places a builder actually looks. The matching pointer back is in Make the build readable without downloading anything magpie_assembly#1.

The renders are generated, not drawn

tools/render_stl.py rasterises the STLs (numpy + Pillow, no CAD kernel) so the pictures follow the parts if a part is revised, and tools/extract_paper_figures.py cuts the paper figures out of the PDF in docs/paper/. Both write transparent PNGs, which is what keeps them legible on GitHub's dark theme as well as its light one.

docs/img/printed/ rather than docs/img/parts/ because the Python .gitignore this repository inherits ignores any directory named parts/.

🤖 Generated with Claude Code