Database Comparison Guide

What it does

When your agent uses it

• Tasks that involve Academic paper search

Example prompts

• “/database-comparison-guide”

Workflow steps

6 steps, taken from the first numbered list in SKILL.md.

1. 1Define your research question using PICO (Population, Intervention, Comparison, Outcome) or PCC (Population, Concept, Context) frameworks.
2. 2Identify controlled vocabulary for each database (MeSH for PubMed, Emtree for Embase, Thesaurus for PsycINFO).
3. 3Build search strings combining controlled vocabulary with free-text synonyms using Boolean operators.
4. 4Execute searches across at least 2-3 databases relevant to your field.
5. 5Deduplicate results using reference managers (Zotero, EndNote) or tools like Covidence.
6. 6Document your search with database, date, exact query string, and result count for reproducibility.

What it can do on your machine

Read from SKILL.md and the folder at commit bf44b3c. It shows what the files ask for, not the result of running them.

• Tool permissions

  Pre-approves nothing: there is no allowed-tools line, so your agent's usual permission prompts apply.

  From allowed-tools in the SKILL.md frontmatter.

• Runs code

  Shell commands in SKILL.md call:

  • curl

  From the folder's file list and the shell code blocks in SKILL.md.

• Network

  Hosts in commands or code, which the agent is likely to contact:

  • export.arxiv.org
  • eutils.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

  From URLs in SKILL.md, links to its own repository left out.

• Credentials

  Names no API keys, tokens, secrets or passwords.

  From names ending in _API_KEY, _TOKEN, _SECRET, _KEY or _PASSWORD in SKILL.md.

Context cost

Database Comparison Guide loads about 1.2k tokens when it runs. Until then it costs about 23 tokens; SKILL.md has 390 words of instructions outside code blocks.

Always · name and description, kept in context so the agent knows when to use it

~23

When it runs · the whole SKILL.md, loaded when a task matches

~1.2k

Estimates: characters ÷ 4, the usual rule of thumb; real counts depend on the model's tokenizer. Scripts and assets cost tokens only if the agent reads them.

Safety

Automated static check — not a guarantee. Review scripts before installing. It scans the text of SKILL.md for risky patterns (piping downloads into a shell, reading credential files, hidden Unicode, destructive commands); files beside SKILL.md are not scanned.

SKILL.md

The full file from wentorai/research-plugins at commit bf44b3c, republished under its MIT licence (© wentorai). 390 words, ~1,187 tokens.

name

database-comparison-guide

description

Compare major academic databases and when to use each for research

# arXiv API query for recent ML papers
curl "http://export.arxiv.org/api/query?search_query=cat:cs.LG+AND+ti:transformer&start=0&max_results=25&sortBy=submittedDate&sortOrder=descending"

# PubMed E-utilities search with MeSH
curl "https://eutils.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/eutils/esearch.fcgi?db=pubmed&term=%22machine+learning%22[MeSH]+AND+%22drug+discovery%22[MeSH]&retmax=50&sort=date"

TS=("deep learning" AND "drug discovery") AND PY=(2020-2025)
# TS = Topic (title + abstract + keywords)
# PY = Publication Year
# Use NEAR/x for proximity: TS=("climate" NEAR/3 "adaptation")

TITLE-ABS-KEY("deep learning" AND "drug discovery") AND PUBYEAR > 2019
# Additional operators:
# AUTHLASTNAME(smith) AND AUTHFIRST(j*)
# AFFIL("MIT" OR "Massachusetts Institute of Technology")
# REF("seminal paper title")

"deep learning"[Title/Abstract] AND "drug discovery"[Title/Abstract]
AND ("2020/01/01"[Date - Publication] : "2025/12/31"[Date - Publication])
# Use filters: Clinical Trial[pt], Review[pt], Free Full Text[Filter]

© wentorai, MIT. Rendered from Markdown: HTML in the file is shown as text, images as links, and headings moved down two levels. Raw file

Files

Just SKILL.md in skills/literature/search/database-comparison-guide of wentorai/research-plugins.

Open the folder on GitHubat commit bf44b3c

Used in 1 other repository

We found 1 copy of this SKILL.md (exact, near-identical or edited) in other folders, from 1 other GitHub owner. This page covers the copy in wentorai/research-plugins, which our catalogue first saw on October 7, 2026.

• brycewang-stanford/Auto-Empirical-Research-Skillsskills/43-wentorai-research-plugins/skills/literature/search/database-comparison-guide