Cnki Search

CNKI search

1. Record the requested keywords verbatim; default to subject/主题 if that field is offered. State the actual field used. Do not silently add synonyms or restrictive filters.
2. Inspect the homepage search box and database selector. Choose academic journals/学术期刊 when available; otherwise search then filter to journals.
3. Enter keywords through the UI and submit. Wait for a result list, explicit zero-results message, or access blocker.
4. Report actual query, database, retrieval time, total count and current sort. Extract up to the requested count (default 20) through cnki-parse-results if installed; otherwise use the rules below.
5. Read each distinct result row: title and observed detail URL, displayed authors, source, date, document type, DOI/record identifier if exposed. Mark shortened author lists incomplete. Preserve site rank; never substitute a paraphrased title for a new record.
6. For additional pages use the visible next-page control, verifying the page indicator and changed first record. Stop at the count or end; report shortfalls. Deduplicate on DOI, then observed database+record ID, otherwise flag matching title/year for review.

Example: “使用 cnki-search 搜索生成式人工智能”。

Browser and access

Use the user's available browser connector. Claude Code: Chrome DevTools MCP (list pages → select page → take snapshot → interact). Codex: use its available browser skill/tool and documented API. WorkBuddy: the browser-skill CLI (bsk) — bsk session start → bsk navigate --session → bsk snapshot → interact → bsk session stop (mandatory, even on error paths). Read that tool's instructions first; do not assume Chrome DevTools names exist in the other runtimes. If no connector is available, report the missing dependency, without installing it implicitly.

Start at an already-open CNKI official/authorized institutional entry. Otherwise default to the domestic CNKI site, in this order:

1. https://kns.cnki.net/kns8s/defaultresult/index — domestic 检索 entry (verified

working: renders 主题 + 学术期刊 controls and the result table, and honours an institutional login).

1. https://www.cnki.net/ — domestic homepage, only if the entry above is unreachable.

Never start at an overseas mirror (oversea.cnki.net, global.cnki.net, data.oversea.cnki.net, scholar.cnki.net, ar.oversea.cnki.net or similar). Detection: if the page title is "CNKI Overseas" or the host contains oversea, you are on the international platform — www.cnki.net may silently redirect there depending on the network exit point. Navigate straight to the kns.cnki.net entry above instead of staying on the mirror. Preserve the current institution route and observed links; do not reconstruct proxy URLs or trust a hostname solely because it contains "cnki". Inspect current visible controls before acting; refresh observations after navigation. Do not invent selectors, search API payloads, article URLs, download hashes or session tokens. Use read-only DOM extraction only if supported and grounded in observed markup. If an operation fails twice without progress, preserve completed records and report the blocker. Login and CAPTCHA require user intervention under the runtime policy; do not evade detection or bypass access controls. Do not export cookies or credentials. Close owned temporary tabs when finished, retaining only a page needed for user handoff.

Overseas fallback (last resort only)

Fall back to an overseas mirror only when the domestic site is genuinely unreachable or blocked for the user — for example kns.cnki.net times out, returns a network/ISP block page, or shows an access blocker with no institutional route available. When that happens:

1. Tell the user explicitly that the domestic site failed, state the observed

reason (timeout, block page, missing institution entitlement), and say you are switching to the international platform.

1. Record which platform produced every result: the overseas edition indexes a

different corpus, so counts, full text and export formats are not comparable with domestic CNKI results.

1. Re-check whether an authorized domestic route exists before continuing; if the

user has one, ask before settling for the overseas edition. Do not treat a plain redirect to oversea.cnki.net as "the domestic site is down" by itself — navigate to the kns.cnki.net entry first.

Evidence

This release is a UI-guided workflow, not a tested site scraper. In development, www.cnki.net redirected to oversea.cnki.net; Chinese language selection reached /chn/, exposing 主题, 搜索, 高级检索 and 出版物检索. Clicking 高级检索 on the overseas platform triggered a puzzle CAPTCHA before query submission. A later run opened https://kns.cnki.net/kns8s/defaultresult/index directly: the domestic 检索 page rendered 主题/学术期刊 controls and a result table, an institutional login was recognised, and a 主题 keyword search returned 总库 / 学术期刊 / 学位论文 counts without a CAPTCHA. The domestic entry is therefore the verified default; the overseas platform is fallback only (see above). Domestic full-text download and export controls remain unverified. Treat domestic and international platforms separately. Never report an attempted click as a successful search/export/download. Keep publication date, online-first date and indexing date distinct. Missing fields stay missing.

Source & license

This open-source skill is cataloged on AgentStack and links to its original source — we do not rehost the code.

• Author: longkou1988
• Source: longkou1988/cnki-skills
• License: MIT

Install and usage instructions live in the source repository linked above.