zoekt

name	zoekt
description	Reference for zoekt trigram-based code search syntax. Use this skill whenever the user wants to search code with zoekt, write a zoekt query, filter by language/file/repo/branch, use regex in zoekt, or asks how to search for symbols, archived repos, forks, or branches in zoekt. Trigger on any mention of "zoekt", "zoekt query", or questions like "how do I search for X in zoekt".

Zoekt Search Syntax

Zoekt is a trigram-based code search engine. Here's the full query syntax:

Basic search

Query	Meaning
needle	Search for "needle" (case insensitive by default)
thread or needle	Files containing either "thread" or "needle"
class needle	Files containing both "class" and "needle"
class Needle	"class" case-insensitively AND "Needle" case-sensitively
class Needle case:yes	Both "class" and "Needle" case-sensitively
"class Needle"	Exact phrase "class Needle"

Negation

Query	Meaning
needle -hay	Files with "needle" but NOT "hay"
-(Path File) Stream	"Stream", excluding files containing both "Path" and "File"
-Path\ file Stream	"Stream", excluding files containing "Path File"

File filters

Query	Meaning
path file:java	"path" in files whose name contains "java"
path -file:java	"path" excluding files whose name contains "java"
f:\.c$	Files whose name ends with ".c" (regex)

Language filter

Query	Meaning
needle lang:python	"needle" in Python source files

Repository filters

Query	Meaning
phone r:droid	"phone" in repos whose name contains "droid"
phone archived:no	"phone" in non-archived repos
phone fork:no	"phone" in non-fork repos
phone public:no	"phone" in non-public repos

Branch filters (Git)

Query	Meaning
phone b:master	"phone" in branches whose name contains "master"
phone b:HEAD	"phone" in the default (HEAD) branch

Symbol search

Query	Meaning
sym:data	Symbol definitions containing "data"

Regex

Any query term that looks like a regex is treated as one:

Query	Meaning
foo.*bar	Files matching regex foo.*bar
f:\.c$	Files with names matching regex \.c$

Tips

• Unquoted terms are AND-ed together by default
• Use or between terms for OR logic
• Wrap phrases in double quotes for exact match
• Prefix with - to negate a term or group
• case:yes makes ALL terms in the query case-sensitive
• Uppercase letters in a term make that term case-sensitive automatically
• sym: searches symbol definitions, not arbitrary text
• file: / f: accept regex patterns
• r: filters by repository name (also accepts regex)