CNKI Basic Search

SkillSearch

Lets your agent search China National Knowledge Infrastructure (CNKI) for academic papers by keyword.

Use CNKI Basic Search in Claude, ChatGPT or Ahel Desktop

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Also: Claude Code · Cursor · Codex

Then ask your AI: use the CNKI Basic Search skill

Details

Instructions available. Your AI can read the instructions. Execution depends on the setup they require.

Add ahel to your AI once: Claude, ChatGPT, Cursor, Claude Code or Codex. Then ask it to use this.

CNKI Basic SearchStart free
About this skill

Search CNKI (中国知网) for papers by keyword. Use when the user wants to find academic papers on a topic.

What this skill tells your AI

The instructions your AI receives, as published by cookjohn/cnki-skills in skills/cnki-search/SKILL.md and read by ahel’s review.

Search CNKI for papers using keyword(s). Returns result count and structured result list (titles, URLs, authors, journal, date) in a single call.

Arguments

$ARGUMENTS contains the search keyword(s) in Chinese or English.

Steps

1. Navigate

Use mcp__chrome-devtools__navigate_page → https://kns.cnki.net/kns8s/search

2. Search + extract results (single evaluate_script, NO wait_for)

Replace YOUR_KEYWORDS with actual search terms:

async () => {
  const query = "YOUR_KEYWORDS";

  // Wait for search input (replaces wait_for)
  await new Promise((r, j) => {
    let n = 0;
    const c = () => { if (document.querySelector('input.search-input')) r(); else if (++n > 30) j('timeout'); else setTimeout(c, 500); };
    c();
  });

  // Check captcha (only if visible on screen, not hidden SDK at top:-1000000)
  const outer = document.querySelector('#tcaptcha_transform_dy');
  if (outer && outer.getBoundingClientRect().top >= 0) return { error: 'captcha' };

  // Fill and submit (verified selectors: input.search-input, input.search-btn)
  const input = document.querySelector('input.search-input');
  input.value = query;
  input.dispatchEvent(new Event('input', { bubbles: true }));
  document.querySelector('input.search-btn')?.click();

  // Wait for results
  await new Promise((r, j) => {
    let n = 0;
    const c = () => { if (document.body.innerText.includes('条结果')) r(); else if (++n > 30) j('timeout'); else setTimeout(c, 500); };
    c();
  });

  // Check captcha again
  const outer2 = document.querySelector('#tcaptcha_transform_dy');
  if (outer2 && outer2.getBoundingClientRect().top >= 0) return { error: 'captcha' };

  // Extract current page results (merged parse-results)
  const rows = document.querySelectorAll('.result-table-list tbody tr');
  const checkboxes = document.querySelectorAll('.result-table-list tbody input.cbItem');
  const results = Array.from(rows).map((row, i) => {
    const titleLink = row.querySelector('td.name a.fz14');
    const authors = Array.from(row.querySelectorAll('td.author a.KnowledgeNetLink') || []).map(a => a.innerText?.trim());
    const journal = row.querySelector('td.source a')?.innerText?.trim() || '';
    const date = row.querySelector('td.date')?.innerText?.trim() || '';
    const citations = row.querySelector('td.quote')?.innerText?.trim() || '';
    const downloads = row.querySelector('td.download')?.innerText?.trim() || '';
    return {
      n: i + 1,
      title: titleLink?.innerText?.trim() || '',
      href: titleLink?.href || '',
      exportId: checkboxes[i]?.value || '',
      authors: authors.join('; '),
      journal,
      date,
      citations,
      downloads
    };
  });

  return {
    query,
    total: document.querySelector('.pagerTitleCell')?.innerText?.match(/([\d,]+)/)?.[1] || '0',
    page: document.querySelector('.countPageMark')?.innerText || '1/1',
    results
  };
}

3. Report

Present results as a numbered list:

Searched CNKI for "$ARGUMENTS": found {total} results (page {page}).

1. {title}
   Authors: {authors} | Journal: {journal} | Date: {date}
   Citations: {citations} | Downloads: {downloads}

2. ...

4. Follow-up: navigate to a paper

When the user wants to open or download a specific paper, use navigate_page with the result's href URL directly — do NOT click the link (clicking opens a new tab and wastes 3 extra tool calls for tab management).

Captcha detection

Check #tcaptcha_transform_dy element's getBoundingClientRect().top >= 0. Tencent captcha SDK preloads DOM at top: -1000000px (off-screen, not active). Only return error: 'captcha' when top >= 0 (actually visible to user).

Verified selectors

ElementSelectorNotes
Search inputinput.search-inputid=txt_search, placeholder "中文文献、外文文献"
Search buttoninput.search-btntype="button"
Result count.pagerTitleCelltext "共找到 X 条结果"
Page indicator.countPageMarktext "1/300"
Result rows.result-table-list tbody trEach row = one paper
Title linktd.name a.fz14Paper title with href
Authorstd.author a.KnowledgeNetLinkAuthor name links
Journaltd.source aJournal/source link
Datetd.datePublication date text
Citationstd.quoteCitation count
Downloadstd.downloadDownload count

Batch export to Zotero

When user wants to save results to Zotero, use batch export directly from the results page — do NOT navigate to each detail page. The exportId in results equals the detail page's #export-id. Call cnki-export skill with batch mode (Step 1B). See cnki-export SKILL.md for details.

Tool calls: 2 (navigate + evaluate_script)

Signals

GitHub stars
972
Forks
82
Last commit
Mar 2026
Advanced
Item type
skill
Key
cnki-skills-cnki-search
Source
github.com/cookjohn/cnki-skills