papi-ask

Use papi ask for questions requiring synthesis across papers or cited answers.

Cost-Aware Retrieval

Before using RAG, consider cheaper alternatives:

1. Literal match: papi search --rg "query" (fast, no LLM)
2. Regex or OR match: papi search --rg --regex "term one|term two" (--regex is required)
3. Ranked search: papi search "query" (BM25)
4. Direct read: papi show <paper> -l eq|tex|summary (when you know the paper)

Use papi ask only when:

• User explicitly requests RAG/synthesis
• Question spans multiple papers
• Search/show cannot answer

Commands

# PaperQA2 (default) — full RAG with citations
papi ask "question"

# LEANN — faster semantic search + LLM
papi ask "question" --backend leann

# Structured output for programmatic use
papi ask "question" --format evidence-blocks

MCP Tools (if available)

For quick retrieval without full RAG:

• leann_search(index_name, query, top_k) — fast semantic search
• retrieve_chunks(query, index_name, k) — PaperQA2 chunks with citations

Check available indexes: leann_list() or list_pqa_indexes()

Output

RAG answers include:

• Synthesized response
• Citations with page/section references
• Confidence indicators

For general CLI commands, see /papi.