claimkit 0.4.0

A claim-level provenance framework for scientific research

ClaimKit

ClaimKit is a claim-level provenance framework for scientific research.

It makes every scientific claim, numerical result, figure, and table traceable to the evidence that supports it. A claim registered in ClaimKit has a well-defined provenance, can be validated against its current evidence, and is flagged as stale when that evidence changes. ClaimKit is designed to be both human- and agent-friendly, with stable machine-readable interfaces throughout.

ClaimKit does not replace workflow managers, experiment trackers, version control, or manuscript tools — it links to and builds on them.

Core concepts

• Claim — a scientific assertion with a stable id and a validation status.
• Evidence — a link from a claim to an artefact (code, data, a run, literature, …) that supports, refutes, or contextualises it.
• Activity — a process (computation, measurement, analysis, review) that consumed and produced artefacts.
• ProvenanceRelation — a typed, directed edge connecting claims, evidence, activities, artefacts, and agents into a graph.
• ProvenanceGraph — the container of nodes and edges; supports traversal, validation, staleness detection, and reporting.

A claim's status is one of unresolved, valid, invalid, stale, or needs_review.

Installation

pip install claimkit

Requires Python 3.12+.

Command-line quickstart

Build a graph, link evidence, and check it — all from the terminal:

claimkit init graph.json
CLAIM=$(claimkit add-claim graph.json "Half-life measured at 5.2 days." --tag decay)
claimkit add-evidence graph.json "$CLAIM" \
    --kind workflow --reference run-42 --digest sha256:abc123

claimkit validate graph.json            # resolve status from evidence
claimkit stale graph.json               # flag claims whose artefacts changed
claimkit report graph.json              # human-readable Markdown report
claimkit export graph.json -o prov.json # export to W3C PROV-JSON
claimkit import prov.json restored.json # import PROV-JSON back into a graph

validate and stale accept --json for machine-readable output; report and export accept -o to write to a file. Run claimkit --help for the full command list.

Python quickstart

from claimkit import (
    Claim, Evidence, EvidenceKind, NodeType,
    ProvenanceGraph, ProvenancePredicate, ProvenanceRelation,
    validate_claim, render_report,
)

graph = ProvenanceGraph()
graph.add_claim(Claim(statement="Half-life measured at 5.2 days.", id="c1"))
graph.add_evidence(
    Evidence(claim_id="c1", kind=EvidenceKind.WORKFLOW, reference="run-42", id="e1")
)
graph.add_relation(
    ProvenanceRelation(
        subject_type=NodeType.CLAIM, subject_id="c1",
        predicate=ProvenancePredicate.SUPPORTED_BY,
        object_type=NodeType.EVIDENCE, object_id="e1",
    )
)

result = validate_claim(graph, "c1")
print(result.status, "—", result.reason)   # valid — supported by 1 piece(s) of evidence
print(render_report(graph))

Interoperability

ClaimKit graphs serialise to a versioned JSON format for storage (save_graph / load_graph) and export to / import from W3C PROV-JSON (to_prov / from_prov) for interchange with the wider provenance ecosystem.

License

BSD 3-Clause. See LICENSE.