rSearch helps developers search, fetch, and download arXiv papers from the terminal

One sentence: This repo provides a Node/TypeScript CLI for arXiv search, metadata fetch, downloads, category browsing, and URL output.

Last updated: 2026-01-07

Table of contents

• Doc requirements
• Prerequisites
• Quickstart
• Common tasks
• Risks and assumptions
• Troubleshooting
• Reference
• Acceptance criteria
• Evidence bundle

Doc requirements

• Audience: Developers and researchers using the CLI to search, fetch, and download arXiv papers.
• Scope: Installation, core commands, verification steps, and usage constraints.
• Non-scope: Contribution workflow, security reporting, and internal architecture (see CONTRIBUTING.md, SECURITY.md, docs/ADR-001-architecture.md).
• Doc owner: jscraik.
• Review cadence: Each release.
• Required approvals: 1 maintainer.

Prerequisites

• Required: Node.js 20+, npm
• Optional: Git, a POSIX shell

Quickstart

1) Install or set up

npm install
npm run build

2) Run it

node dist/cli.js search "cat:cs.AI" --max-results 5

3) Verify

Expected output:

• A list of results with IDs and titles.

Pro tip: install @brainwav/rsearch and you can run rsearch search "cat:cs.AI" --max-results 5 instead of node dist/cli.js.

Common tasks

Search arXiv by query

• What you get: titles and IDs (plus URLs in JSON output).
• Steps:

node dist/cli.js search "cat:cs.LG" --max-results 10

• Verify: output shows Total results and a list of entries.

Filter search results to entries with license metadata

• What you get: only results that include license metadata in arXiv records.
• Steps:

node dist/cli.js search "cat:cs.AI" --require-license --max-results 10

• Verify: summary mentions filtered results when license metadata is missing.

Fetch metadata by arXiv ID

• What you get: full metadata including abstract, authors, and PDF URL.
• Steps:

node dist/cli.js fetch 2002.00762 --json

• Verify: JSON includes absUrl and pdfUrl.

Download PDFs

• What you get: a PDF per ID in the output directory.
• Steps:

node dist/cli.js download 2002.00762 --out-dir ./papers

• Verify: ./papers/2002.00762.pdf exists.

Export Markdown or JSON with extracted text

• What you get: Markdown or JSON output with text extracted from the PDF.
• Steps:

node dist/cli.js download 2002.00762 --format md --out-dir ./papers
node dist/cli.js download 2002.00762 --format json --out-dir ./papers

• Verify: ./papers/2002.00762.md or ./papers/2002.00762.json exists.

Enforce license metadata on downloads

• What you get: downloads fail if arXiv does not provide license metadata.
• Steps:

node dist/cli.js download 2002.00762 --format json --require-license --out-dir ./papers

• Verify: failures are reported with License metadata missing when unavailable.

Keep PDF while exporting text formats

• What you get: both the text export and the PDF.
• Steps:

node dist/cli.js download 2002.00762 --format md --keep-pdf --out-dir ./papers

• Verify: both 2002.00762.md and 2002.00762.pdf exist.

Return URLs for agents

• What you get: abstract and PDF URLs per result.
• Steps:

node dist/cli.js urls "cat:cs.AI"
node dist/cli.js urls --ids 2002.00762 2101.00001
node dist/cli.js urls "cat:cs.AI" --require-license

• Verify: each line includes an abs URL and PDF URL.

Browse categories

• What you get: the arXiv category taxonomy.
• Steps:

node dist/cli.js categories tree
node dist/cli.js categories list --group "Computer Science"

• Verify: group names and category IDs are listed.

Risks and assumptions

• Assumes arXiv API availability and that users respect rate limits.
• Assumes users review license metadata before reuse; the CLI does not grant rights.
• PDF text extraction may fail on scanned or complex layouts.
• Output files overwrite only when --overwrite is used; verify output paths before running batch downloads.

Troubleshooting

Symptom: “Provide a search query” or “Provide arXiv IDs”

Cause:

• Missing positional argument or stdin input. Fix:

node dist/cli.js search "cat:cs.AI"
node dist/cli.js fetch 2002.00762

Symptom: “arXiv API request failed (429/5xx)”

Cause:

• Rate limiting or transient server errors. Fix:
• Re-run; the CLI already retries with backoff. Lower --max-results if needed.

Symptom: “Failed to fetch taxonomy”

Cause:

• arXiv taxonomy endpoint unavailable or network blocked. Fix:
• Re-run later or use --refresh once connectivity is restored.

Reference

• Repo: https://github.com/jscraik/rSearch.git
• Commands:
  • search, fetch, download, urls, categories, config, help
• Constraints:
  • Default API delay: 3s
  • Retry defaults: max-retries=3, retry-base-delay=500ms (--no-retry to disable)
  • page-size <= 2000
  • max-results <= 30000
• Output schema:
  • schemas/cli-output.schema.json
  • schemas/cli-error.schema.json
• License use:
  • arXiv content is licensed by the authors. The CLI may expose a license URL when provided, but it does not grant rights. Always verify permitted use on the arXiv abstract page.
• Usage policy:
  • Be courteous to arXiv: include contact info (--contact) and keep rate limits conservative (--rate-limit).
• Docs:
  • docs/index.md
  • CHANGELOG.md
  • SECURITY.md
  • SUPPORT.md
  • CODE_OF_CONDUCT.md
  • CONTRIBUTING.md
  • docs/cli-reference.md
  • docs/configuration.md
  • docs/release-policy.md
  • docs/troubleshooting.md
  • docs/faq.md
• docs/roadmap.md
• docs/ADR-001-architecture.md

Acceptance criteria

• Doc requirements reflect current CLI scope and ownership.
• Examples match available commands and scripts in this repo.
• License and usage policy notes are present and accurate.
• Risks and assumptions are explicit and up to date.
• Links resolve to existing files or URLs.

Evidence bundle

• Standards mapping: CommonMark structure, accessibility (descriptive links), security/privacy guidance for license usage.
• Brand compliance: Documentation signature added; assets present in brand/.
• Automated checks: vale run on 2026-01-07 (0 errors, 0 warnings).
• Review artifact: Self-review completed on 2026-01-07.
• Deviations: None.

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