| name | ceramic |
| description | Search the web via Ceramic Search (lexical/keyword-based). Use when looking up current events, recent news, time-sensitive facts, specific people/products/companies, technical docs, or any topic requiring fresh web results. Triggers on "search the web", "look up", "find recent", "latest news", "current", or when built-in knowledge is likely stale. |
Ceramic Search
Lexical (keyword-based) web search. Configured as a global MCP in ~/.config/opencode/opencode.json — invoke the ceramic_search tool directly (not via skill_mcp).
Quick Start
ceramic_search(query="OpenAI GPT-5 announcement 2025")
Rewrite natural-language questions into keyword queries first. Fire 2–4 variants in parallel for better recall.
Tool
| Tool | Purpose |
|---|
ceramic_search | Search the web (returns ranked results) |
When to Use
- Current events, recent news, time-sensitive facts
- Topics where built-in knowledge may be stale
- Specific entities: people, products, technical terms, legal text, dates
How It Works
Ceramic is lexical, not semantic. It matches exact keywords and phrases — no synonym expansion, no intent inference. Word order matters (cat house ≠ house cat).
Querying — Keywords, Not Sentences
Rewrite natural-language questions into keyword queries before searching.
| ❌ Don't | ✅ Do |
|---|
What are the best ways to invest money? | beginner investing strategies stocks bonds |
Why is rent so high in California? | California rent increase housing shortage 2025 |
technology news | OpenAI GPT-5 announcement 2025 |
California laws | California tenant security deposit return law |
Rules:
- Use specific entities (names, products, dates, locations)
- Drop conversational filler (
how do I, what are, why is)
- Include explicit synonyms when terminology varies (
college university tuition)
- Avoid vague abstractions (
technology trends, people's feelings)
Multi-Query Strategy (Recommended)
Search is cheap. Fire 2–4 keyword variants in parallel instead of crafting one perfect query.
Example — user asks about climate impact on agriculture:
ceramic_search("climate change agriculture impact")
ceramic_search("global warming crop yields")
ceramic_search("developing countries farming climate effects")
Aggregate and rank results across queries.
Limitations
- Synonyms not matched:
BBQ ≠ barbecue, gym ≠ fitness center — include both if unsure
- Misspellings fail: exact spelling required
- Conversational queries fail: rewrite into keywords first
- English only (other languages coming)
When to Combine with Other Tools
Use a different tool (or LLM reasoning) when the task requires:
- Understanding intent rather than matching words
- Conceptual/semantic similarity
- Reasoning over the answer (Ceramic returns documents, not answers)
