add exa research search, use category in search card title, update readme

Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 4.6 <noreply@anthropic.com>

README.md

@@ -68,6 +68,7 @@ To enable voice notes (optional), add a Deepgram API key in ~/.rowboat/config/de
 ```
 ### Web search
 To use Brave web search (optional), add the Brave API key in ~/.rowboat/config/brave-search.json (same format as above).
+To use Exa research search (optional), add the Exa API key in ~/.rowboat/config/exa-search.json (same format as above).
 
 ## What it does
 

apps/x/apps/renderer/src/App.tsx

@@ -2216,6 +2216,27 @@ function App() {
           />
         )
       }
+      if (item.name === 'research-search') {
+        const input = normalizeToolInput(item.input) as Record<string, unknown> | undefined
+        const result = item.result as Record<string, unknown> | undefined
+        const rawResults = (result?.results as Array<{ title: string; url: string; highlights?: string[]; text?: string }>) || []
+        const mapped = rawResults.map(r => ({
+          title: r.title,
+          url: r.url,
+          description: r.highlights?.[0] || (r.text ? r.text.slice(0, 200) : ''),
+        }))
+        const category = input?.category as string | undefined
+        const cardTitle = category ? `${category.charAt(0).toUpperCase() + category.slice(1)} search` : 'Researched the web'
+        return (
+          <WebSearchResult
+            key={item.id}
+            query={(input?.query as string) || ''}
+            results={mapped}
+            status={item.status}
+            title={cardTitle}
+          />
+        )
+      }
       const errorText = item.status === 'error' ? 'Tool error' : ''
       const output = normalizeToolOutput(item.result, item.status)
       const input = normalizeToolInput(item.input)

apps/x/apps/renderer/src/components/ai-elements/web-search-result.tsx

@@ -16,6 +16,7 @@ interface WebSearchResultProps {
   query: string;
   results: Array<{ title: string; url: string; description: string }>;
   status: "pending" | "running" | "completed" | "error";
+  title?: string;
 }
 
 function getDomain(url: string): string {
@@ -26,7 +27,7 @@ function getDomain(url: string): string {
   }
 }
 
-export function WebSearchResult({ query, results, status }: WebSearchResultProps) {
+export function WebSearchResult({ query, results, status, title = "Searched the web" }: WebSearchResultProps) {
   const isRunning = status === "pending" || status === "running";
 
   return (
@@ -34,7 +35,7 @@ export function WebSearchResult({ query, results, status }: WebSearchResultProps
       <CollapsibleTrigger className="flex w-full items-center justify-between gap-4 p-3">
         <div className="flex items-center gap-2">
           <GlobeIcon className="size-4 text-muted-foreground" />
-          <span className="font-medium text-sm">Searched the web</span>
+          <span className="font-medium text-sm">{title}</span>
         </div>
         <ChevronDownIcon className="size-4 text-muted-foreground transition-transform group-data-[state=open]:rotate-180" />
       </CollapsibleTrigger>

apps/x/packages/core/src/application/assistant/instructions.ts

@@ -164,6 +164,7 @@ When a user asks for ANY task that might require external capabilities (web sear
 - \`addMcpServer\`, \`listMcpServers\`, \`listMcpTools\`, \`executeMcpTool\` - MCP server management and execution
 - \`loadSkill\` - Skill loading
 - \`slack-checkConnection\`, \`slack-listAvailableTools\`, \`slack-executeAction\` - Slack integration (requires Slack to be connected via Composio). Use \`slack-listAvailableTools\` first to discover available tool slugs, then \`slack-executeAction\` to execute them.
+- \`web-search\` and \`research-search\` - Web and research search tools (available when configured). **You MUST load the \`web-search\` skill before using either of these tools.** It tells you which tool to pick and how many searches to do.
 
 **Prefer these tools whenever possible** — they work instantly with zero friction. For file operations inside \`~/.rowboat/\`, always use these instead of \`executeCommand\`.
 

apps/x/packages/core/src/application/lib/builtin-tools.ts

@@ -1364,4 +1364,117 @@ export const BuiltinTools: z.infer<typeof BuiltinToolsSchema> = {
             }
         },
     },
+
+    // ============================================================================
+    // Research Search (Exa Search API)
+    // ============================================================================
+
+    'research-search': {
+        description: 'Use this for finding articles, blog posts, papers, companies, people, or exploring a topic in depth. Best for discovery and research where you need quality sources, not a quick fact.',
+        inputSchema: z.object({
+            query: z.string().describe('The search query'),
+            numResults: z.number().optional().describe('Number of results to return (default: 5, max: 20)'),
+            category: z.enum(['company', 'research paper', 'news', 'tweet', 'personal site', 'financial report', 'people']).optional().describe('Filter results by category'),
+        }),
+        isAvailable: async () => {
+            try {
+                const homedir = process.env.HOME || process.env.USERPROFILE || '';
+                const exaConfigPath = path.join(homedir, '.rowboat', 'config', 'exa-search.json');
+                const raw = await fs.readFile(exaConfigPath, 'utf8');
+                const config = JSON.parse(raw);
+                return !!config.apiKey;
+            } catch {
+                return false;
+            }
+        },
+        execute: async ({ query, numResults, category }: { query: string; numResults?: number; category?: string }) => {
+            try {
+                const homedir = process.env.HOME || process.env.USERPROFILE || '';
+                const exaConfigPath = path.join(homedir, '.rowboat', 'config', 'exa-search.json');
+
+                let apiKey: string;
+                try {
+                    const raw = await fs.readFile(exaConfigPath, 'utf8');
+                    const config = JSON.parse(raw);
+                    apiKey = config.apiKey;
+                } catch {
+                    return {
+                        success: false,
+                        error: 'Exa Search API key not configured. Create ~/.rowboat/config/exa-search.json with { "apiKey": "<your-key>" }',
+                    };
+                }
+
+                if (!apiKey) {
+                    return {
+                        success: false,
+                        error: 'Exa Search API key is empty. Set "apiKey" in ~/.rowboat/config/exa-search.json',
+                    };
+                }
+
+                const resultCount = Math.min(Math.max(numResults || 5, 1), 20);
+
+                const body: Record<string, unknown> = {
+                    query,
+                    numResults: resultCount,
+                    type: 'auto',
+                    contents: {
+                        text: { maxCharacters: 1000 },
+                        highlights: true,
+                    },
+                };
+                if (category) {
+                    body.category = category;
+                }
+
+                const response = await fetch('https://api.exa.ai/search', {
+                    method: 'POST',
+                    headers: {
+                        'x-api-key': apiKey,
+                        'Content-Type': 'application/json',
+                    },
+                    body: JSON.stringify(body),
+                });
+
+                if (!response.ok) {
+                    const text = await response.text();
+                    return {
+                        success: false,
+                        error: `Exa Search API error (${response.status}): ${text}`,
+                    };
+                }
+
+                const data = await response.json() as {
+                    results?: Array<{
+                        title?: string;
+                        url?: string;
+                        publishedDate?: string;
+                        author?: string;
+                        highlights?: string[];
+                        text?: string;
+                    }>;
+                };
+
+                const results = (data.results || []).map((r) => ({
+                    title: r.title || '',
+                    url: r.url || '',
+                    publishedDate: r.publishedDate || '',
+                    author: r.author || '',
+                    highlights: r.highlights || [],
+                    text: r.text || '',
+                }));
+
+                return {
+                    success: true,
+                    query,
+                    results,
+                    count: results.length,
+                };
+            } catch (error) {
+                return {
+                    success: false,
+                    error: error instanceof Error ? error.message : 'Unknown error',
+                };
+            }
+        },
+    },
 };