hermes-skills/search-key/SKILL.md

name, description, version, author, license, metadata

name	description	version	author	license	metadata
search-key	Tool selection guide for research tasks. Maps every search/research tool to when and how to use it. Load this before any research task to pick the right tool.	1.0.0	Hermes + Claude Opus	MIT	hermes tags always_load triggers research search tool-selection reference true search research look up find paper literature scrape news transcribe PDF document RAG embedding citation

Search & Research Tool Key

This skill loads the comprehensive tool selection reference at search_key.md in the research profile directory. When any research or search task is requested, consult this reference to pick the right tool.

Quick Load

The full reference is at: /home/n8n/.hermes/profiles/research/search_key.md

It contains:

1. Decision Matrix — 35-row table: task type → primary tool → fallback → why
2. Tool Profiles — every tool with what/when/not-for/example
3. Composed Workflows — 7 multi-tool chains (literature review, OSINT, news monitoring, document Q&A, YouTube research, web analysis, full research report)
4. Search Strategy — decision tree + SearXNG category selection
5. Anti-Patterns — 14 common mistakes with corrections
6. Full Tool Trigger Map — references/full-tool-triggers.md: every user question pattern → exact tool to use, covering all 42 tools

Core Rules

1. Always search first — never answer from memory when factual accuracy matters
2. SearXNG is the only search interface — all external queries go through the self-hosted proxy at 10.0.0.8:8888. External engines see SearXNG IP, not yours.
3. Match tool to task — don't use LDR for simple facts, don't use scrapy for 3 pages
4. Parallel when possible — SearXNG year + all-time, multiple categories simultaneously
5. Privacy tier awareness — 20 tools are fully local (zero network). 21 tools fetch from target URLs (target sees VPN IP). LDR uses SearXNG for search (pseudonymous) but LLM privacy depends on model choice. No tools send queries to third-party profiling APIs.
6. OSINT tools available — maigret, holehe, theHarvester, and Spiderfoot are installed. Use with explicit intent only; they blast queries to many sites.

Hermes Built-in vs MCP Search Tools

Hermes has TWO search tool surfaces. Both are fully functional in this profile.

Built-in (web toolset) — ENABLED

• web_search — uses SearXNG as backend (configured in config.yaml)
• web_extract — NOW WORKING. Uses self-hosted Firecrawl Docker at localhost:3002. No API key needed. Set via web.extract_backend: firecrawl + FIRECRAWL_API_URL=http://localhost:3002 in .env.

MCP SearXNG (always available, no toolset gating)

• searxng_web_search — primary search. Richer than built-in web_search (relevance scores, more params).
• searxng_web_url_read — fetches any URL and returns markdown. Alternative to web_extract.
• searxng_search_suggestions — autocomplete suggestions for query refinement.
• searxng_instance_info — discover available categories, engines, locales.
• searxng_list_resources / searxng_read_resource — server config introspection.

Rule: prefer MCP SearXNG for search, either for extraction. searxng_web_search is richer than web_search. For extraction, web_extract (Firecrawl) and searxng_web_url_read both work — use whichever is more convenient.