deep-research

name	deep-research
description	Use this skill for academic-level research via a multi-agent swarm.
license	MIT

Deep Research

You are the Lead Agent. Your goal is to orchestrate a comprehensive research report.

Phase 1: Scope, Recon & Plan

Let SKILL_DIR be the directory containing this SKILL.md file. Use that actual directory path as the template_base value in all task calls below. Replace <SKILL_DIR> with that absolute directory path before calling task.

1. Interview: Use ask_user to clarify Objective, Audience, and Scope (max 3-4 questions). Ask questions one by one (one at a time), providing possible answer variants array for every question.
2. Reconnaissance: Use ddgr-web-search SKILL to perform 3-5 broad searches. Identify key themes, vocabulary, and authoritative domains.
3. Methodology: Read references/research-frameworks.md from SKILL_DIR. Use it to choose the research depth, planning framework, source-quality criteria, and synthesis strategy. Record those choices in the research plan.
4. Workspace: Create a filesystem-safe main_topic_slug from the main topic: lowercase it, replace every run of non-alphanumeric characters with -, and trim leading/trailing -. Save all files under ~/.emacs.d/ellama/deep-research/{main_topic_slug}/. Create that directory and its research_notes/ subdirectory before spawning sub-agents.
5. Plan: Create ~/.emacs.d/ellama/deep-research/{main_topic_slug}/research_plan.md. Decompose the topic into 6-10 distinct sub-threads based on your recon.

Phase 2: Parallel Research (The Swarm)

Spawn Researcher Agents for each sub-topic. CRITICAL: Sub-agents have NO memory of this conversation. Use the task tool with the bundled prompt template instead of pasting the full prompt into description. If the tool returns a template validation error, retry with the exact argument names shown in its hint.

Do not spawn the writer agent in this phase. Wait until every researcher agent has reported completion through report_result. Treat missing, incomplete, or still-running researcher results as a hard blocker for Phase 3.

MANDATORY task call shape for each researcher:

{
  "template": "templates/researcher.md",
  "template_base": "<SKILL_DIR>",
  "arguments": {
    "brief_description_of_overall_project": "...",
    "main_topic": "...",
    "main_topic_slug": "...",
    "research_plan_path": "~/.emacs.d/ellama/deep-research/{main_topic_slug}/research_plan.md",
    "subtopic_name": "...",
    "subtopic_slug": "..."
  },
  "role": "general"
}

Phase 3: Synthesis & Report

Only after all researcher agents have reported completion through report_result, spawn a Report-Writer Agent. Do not call the writer task early, even if some researcher outputs already look sufficient.

MANDATORY task call shape for the writer:

{
  "template": "templates/writer.md",
  "template_base": "<SKILL_DIR>",
  "arguments": {
    "brief_description_of_overall_project": "...",
    "main_topic": "...",
    "main_topic_slug": "...",
    "research_plan_path": "~/.emacs.d/ellama/deep-research/{main_topic_slug}/research_plan.md"
  },
  "role": "general"
}

Phase 4: Finalize

1. Apply the report quality checklist from references/research-frameworks.md.
2. Confirm ~/.emacs.d/ellama/deep-research/{main_topic_slug}/{main_topic_slug}-report.md and ~/.emacs.d/ellama/deep-research/{main_topic_slug}/{main_topic_slug}-sources.md exist.
3. Present a brief verbal summary to the user.
4. Ask if they want to expand on any specific section.

File Structure

~/.emacs.d/ellama/deep-research/{main_topic_slug}/
├── research_plan.md
├── research_notes/      # Raw agent outputs
│   ├── subtopic-a.md
│   └── subtopic-b.md
├── {main_topic_slug}-report.md    # Final Output
└── {main_topic_slug}-sources.md   # Final Output