vault-answer

Vault Answer

Overview

Discipline skill for grounded Q&A over vault notes. Dispatches vault-query-answerer to produce an answer with inline [[wikilink]] citations plus an explicit ## Unknowns list (claims the vault could not support). Read-only on the vault — writes nothing outside .mz/task/<task_name>/. Discipline type because the skill enforces strict citation-grounding rules; the agent must resist the shortcut of answering from general LLM knowledge.

When to Use

Factual questions that should be answered from vault content — "what does my vault say about X", "search my notes for Y", "summarize what I've written on Z". Trigger phrases: "answer from notes", "grounded answer", "vault-based answer".

When NOT to use

• Editing notes — use Edit directly.
• Finding links between notes — use vault-connect.
• General LLM questions not tied to vault content — answer directly without this skill.
• Frontmatter/schema questions — use vault-schema.

Arguments

$ARGUMENTS is the question. If empty, escalate via AskUserQuestion — never guess the question.

Constants

• TASK_DIR: .mz/task/
• MAX_NOTES_READ: 20 — hard cap on notes the answerer may read.
• MAX_PREVIEW_WORDS: 300 — per-note preview slice for the answerer.
• CITATION_DENSITY_MIN_RATIO: 0.02 — at least 1 [[wikilink]] per 50 words of answer prose.

Core Process

Phase	Goal	Details
0	Setup	Inline below
1	Search + synthesize	phases/search_and_synthesize.md

No approval gate — read-only skill, no vault writes.

Phase 0: Setup

1. Capture $ARGUMENTS as the question. If empty, AskUserQuestion for the question — never guess.
2. Resolve vault path from OBSIDIAN_VAULT_PATH env, then MZ_VAULT_PATH env, then walk up from the working directory until a .obsidian/ folder is found. If nothing resolves, escalate via AskUserQuestion.
3. Derive task_name = <YYYY_MM_DD>_vault-answer_<question-slug> where <YYYY_MM_DD> is today's date (underscores) and <question-slug> is a snake_case summary of the question (max 20 chars); on same-day collision append _v2, _v3.
4. Create TASK_DIR<task_name>/ on disk.
5. Write state.md with Status: running, Phase: 0, Started: <ISO timestamp>, Vault: <path>, Question: <verbatim>.

Common Rationalizations

Rationalization	Rebuttal
"Answer from general LLM knowledge when the vault is thin."	"This skill exists to surface what the vault knows; general knowledge belongs elsewhere. Thin vault = long ## Unknowns section — surfacing the gap is the correct behavior, not compensating from general knowledge."
"Skip the ## Unknowns section if every claim looks grounded."	"The ## Unknowns section is always present; an empty list is still informative — it signals the vault fully covered the question. Omitting the section removes a load-bearing signal from the answer."
"Invent a plausible-sounding [[wikilink]] to hit the citation density target."	"Every [[wikilink]] must resolve to a note that was actually read. Invented links corrupt the citation trail silently and make the answer unauditable. Prefer low density with honest citations over fabricated ones."

Techniques

Techniques: delegated to phase files — see Phase Overview table above.

Red Flags

Red Flags: delegated to phase files — see Phase Overview table above.

Verification

Verification: delegated to phase files — see Phase Overview table above.