# MissingManual

> Deep research for AI coding agents working on hard technical problems whose answers are buried across the internet.

MissingManual is deep research for AI coding agents working on difficult technical problems whose answers are buried across papers, source code, benchmarks, documentation, and obscure parts of the internet. It checks consequential claims and returns actionable markdown that an installed agent can save inside the user's repository.

Connect via Streamable HTTP MCP at https://missingmanual.ai/mcp. Do not fetch /mcp as a document. Choose find_papers for a candidate paper list in markdown with abstracts and source links only (maxPapers: integer 1–30, default 10), or create_guide for a research guide. Paper discovery does not ingest full papers locally or perform local QA. Call the chosen action without payment metadata using the connected tool schema. It returns jobId, capability, status payment_required, paymentUrl, maximumAuthorizationUsdMicros 25000000 ($25), and pollAfterSeconds. Use a cryptographically random idempotencyKey and keep the entire initial response private. For an identical find_papers or create_guide retry, include the same key and returned capability; replay without capability conflicts. If the initial response was lost and no payment URL was delivered, a new random key may be used. get_result is the shared polling path for both actions; get_guide remains compatible. Keep the same action and identical input on retries. maximumAuthorizationUsdMicros is the requested maximum; authorizedUsdMicros refers only to actual authorization. Show the Stripe-hosted paymentUrl to the customer, who opens it and approves the $25 card hold. The agent must never enter payment details or approve checkout. Use the returned checkout expiry when provided; otherwise the payment link lasts 24 hours.

Research starts automatically after authorization is verified. Poll get_result with the same jobId and capability at pollAfterSeconds intervals, including after the customer returns from Stripe. Research can take up to 90 minutes. Do not create duplicate jobs while waiting. Success returns markdown and an itemized receipt after settlement. Capabilities expire after 30 days; keep them private and save results before expiry.

A completed create_guide result ends with a `## Verification` section. Its claims were extracted and the highest-consequence ones checked against current primary documentation; corrections are listed with canonical source URLs, and claims no primary source settled are labeled as neither confirmed nor refuted. Treat a correction as more current than the body text above it. This is a check, not a proof of correctness. When get_result returns a `quality` object, report its `unresolvedLimitations` rather than presenting the result as unconditionally verified. When it returns a `sources` array, use it instead of parsing links out of the markdown; each entry carries a canonical `id` and, for papers, a `fullTextUrl` when full text was bound.

Success charges measured provider cost rounded up to the next USD cent plus exactly $2, capped by the authorization. Failures, cancelled runs, and pricing_gap charge zero and fully release or refund. A pricing_gap result requires an auditable operator decision before free release. Leaving checkout does not cancel a backend job; no research starts before verified authorization. Existing SPT payment metadata is optional for advanced clients. Polling has no per-call fee. It can verify human payment and automatically start or resume the previously requested, approved research job; it never creates an additional paid job.

## Enrolled installations

There is a second, optional path: the `missingmanual` client package. It installs machine-wide for Codex CLI and per project for Claude Code or Cursor, saves a card once per machine through a Stripe setup link, and then bills subsequent research automatically with no website visit. It runs as a local MCP server that proxies these same tools, returns an opaque local `handle` instead of a jobId/capability, resumes the same paid job across restarts, and saves guides and paper sources as cross-referenced Markdown in the user's own repository. Ordinary text PDFs are converted to Markdown with source provenance. Enrollment is not a signup: no password, no dashboard. It is revocable with `missingmanual revoke`, and it is never required — the anonymous per-run checkout above always works and is unchanged. Consent covers future research that the user or their coding agent starts from that installation, at the same $25 per-job ceiling and the same pricing. Your research request, including any code excerpts your agent includes in the brief, is sent to third-party model providers to perform the research.

If an automatic charge needs the human's action, the failing tool call returns `status: billing_action_required` with an `actionUrl`. Show that URL to the human and stop; never open, submit, or fill it in. If an address was supplied at enrollment, an email is also attempted, but delivery is best-effort and never guaranteed.

## Use

- [Install](https://missingmanual.ai/install.md): Claude Code, Cursor, Codex, generic remote MCP, request and polling instructions
- [One missingmanual skill](https://missingmanual.ai/skills/missingmanual/SKILL.md): agent payment and capability safety
- [Collective Library](https://missingmanual.ai/examples.md): fifteen complete Apple Silicon reverse-engineering reports, with readable pages and Markdown sources
- [Metal command-buffer fault detection](https://missingmanual.ai/reports/metal-gpu-fault-detection-pytorch.md): complete report on silent tensor corruption and fail-closed validation
- [Accuracy-preserving RNNT beam search](https://missingmanual.ai/reports/rnnt-beam-search-apple-silicon.md): complete report on fixed-batch graphs and exact search semantics
- [Core ML compute-unit scheduling](https://missingmanual.ai/reports/coreml-compute-unit-scheduling.md): complete report on CPU, GPU, ANE partitioning and placement proof
- [Pricing](https://missingmanual.ai/pricing.md): hold, settlement, zero-charge outcomes and receipt
- [Homepage](https://missingmanual.ai/index.md): when to use MissingManual