Agent skill

exa-search

Use when searching for concepts, ideas, or similar content without exact keywords; when user asks "find similar to...", needs semantic discovery, research across perspectives, or explicitly mentions exa

View SKILL.md on GitHub Repository
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Install this agent skill to your Project

npx add-skill https://github.com/mhagrelius/dotfiles/tree/main/.claude/skills/exa-search

SKILL.md

Exa Semantic Search

Overview

Exa.ai provides neural semantic search optimized for AI consumption. Use when meaning matters more than keywords.

Decision Flowchart

dot
digraph exa_decision {
    rankdir=TB;
    node [shape=box];

    start [label="Need to search the web?" shape=diamond];
    known_url [label="Do you have\na specific URL?" shape=diamond];
    semantic [label="Is this semantic/conceptual?\n(meaning > keywords)" shape=diamond];
    recent [label="Need very recent\nnews/events?" shape=diamond];
    code [label="Is this a coding/\nAPI question?" shape=diamond];

    webfetch [label="WebFetch" shape=box style=filled fillcolor=lightblue];
    websearch [label="WebSearch" shape=box style=filled fillcolor=lightgreen];
    exa_web [label="mcp__exa__web_search_exa" shape=box style=filled fillcolor=lightyellow];
    exa_code [label="mcp__exa__get_code_context_exa" shape=box style=filled fillcolor=lightyellow];

    start -> known_url [label="yes"];
    start -> known_url [label="no" style=invis];
    known_url -> webfetch [label="yes"];
    known_url -> semantic [label="no"];
    semantic -> code [label="yes"];
    semantic -> recent [label="no"];
    code -> exa_code [label="yes"];
    code -> exa_web [label="no"];
    recent -> websearch [label="yes"];
    recent -> websearch [label="no"];
}

Quick Reference

Scenario Tool Why
"Find papers on emergent AI behavior" mcp__exa__web_search_exa Semantic discovery
"Companies similar to Anthropic" mcp__exa__web_search_exa Similar content
"How to use React hooks" mcp__exa__get_code_context_exa Coding context
"Latest news on X" WebSearch Recency matters
"Read this URL: [link]" WebFetch Known URL
"error: module not found XYZ" WebSearch Exact keyword match
"CVE-2024-12345" WebSearch Specific identifier

Tool Usage

mcp__exa__web_search_exa

query: "semantic query describing concepts"
numResults: 8 (default, adjust as needed)
type: "auto" | "fast" | "deep"

mcp__exa__get_code_context_exa

query: "React useState hook examples" | "Express middleware patterns"
tokensNum: 5000 (default, 1000-50000 range)

Integration Patterns

Discovery + Extraction:

  1. Exa finds relevant sources semantically
  2. WebFetch extracts full content from best URLs

Multi-perspective research:

  1. Exa: "academic perspectives on X"
  2. Exa: "industry implementation of X"
  3. Exa: "critiques of X"
  4. Synthesize

Fallback:

  1. Try Exa for semantic search
  2. If results poor, fall back to WebSearch with keywords

Anti-Patterns

Don't Do Instead
"python pandas filter dataframe" Use WebSearch (keyword query)
Run 10 similar queries Consolidate into 2-3 well-crafted queries
"what is React" Use knowledge or WebSearch
"breaking news today" Use WebSearch

When Results Are Poor

  1. Switch search type: auto vs fast vs deep
  2. Rephrase: more semantic/descriptive
  3. Add domain filters via allowed_domains
  4. Fall back to WebSearch for keyword matching

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