| name | alphaxiv-paper |
| description | Use when user shares an arxiv or alphaxiv URL, mentions a paper ID like 2401.12345, or asks to explain, summarize, or analyze a research paper. Fetches structured AI-generated overview from alphaxiv.org instead of reading raw PDFs. |
AlphaXiv Paper Lookup
Look up any arxiv paper on alphaxiv.org to get a structured AI-generated overview. This is faster and more reliable than trying to read a raw PDF.
When to Use
- User shares an arxiv URL (e.g.
arxiv.org/abs/2401.12345)
- User mentions a paper ID (e.g.
2401.12345)
- User asks you to explain, summarize, or analyze a research paper
- User shares an alphaxiv URL (e.g.
alphaxiv.org/overview/2401.12345)
Workflow
Step 1: Extract the paper ID
Parse the paper ID from whatever the user provides:
| Input | Paper ID |
|---|
https://arxiv.org/abs/2401.12345 | 2401.12345 |
https://arxiv.org/pdf/2401.12345 | 2401.12345 |
https://alphaxiv.org/overview/2401.12345 | 2401.12345 |
2401.12345v2 | 2401.12345v2 |
2401.12345 | 2401.12345 |
Step 2: Fetch the machine-readable report
curl -s "https://alphaxiv.org/overview/{PAPER_ID}.md"
This returns the intermediate machine-readable report — a structured, detailed analysis of the paper optimized for LLM consumption. One call, plain markdown, no JSON parsing.
If this returns 404, the report hasn't been generated for this paper yet.
Step 3: If you need more detail, fetch the full paper text
If the report doesn't contain the specific information the user is asking about (e.g. a particular equation, table, or section), fetch the full paper text:
curl -s "https://alphaxiv.org/abs/{PAPER_ID}.md"
This returns the full extracted text of the paper as markdown. Only use this as a fallback — the report is usually sufficient.
If this returns 404, the full text hasn't been processed yet. As a last resort, direct the user to the PDF at https://arxiv.org/pdf/{PAPER_ID}.
Error Handling
- 404 on Step 2: Report not generated for this paper.
- 404 on Step 3: Full text not yet extracted for this paper.
Notes
- No authentication required — these are public endpoints.
Output location
Accepts an optional output_dir. When omitted, write to a fresh temp directory.
Create the directory if it does not exist and never write outside it.
Print the result as the final line of stdout:
OUTPUT_FILE:/absolute/path/to/file
