Knowledge Base¶

The knowledge base (KB) is a file browser for your reference material: documentation, runbooks, meeting notes, research. It supports Markdown, org-mode, plain text, reStructuredText, and PDF files.

KB Sources¶

The KB reads from one or more directories configured in Settings > Knowledge Base Sources. Each source has a label (shown in the sidebar) and a path on disk.

Default source: ~/.kaisho/profiles/<profile>/knowledge/

Add more sources to include project docs, shared drives, or any folder with text files:

# settings.yaml
kb_sources:
  - label: Personal
    path: ~/.kaisho/profiles/work/knowledge
  - label: Company Docs
    path: ~/Documents/company-wiki

Browsing Files¶

The KB has a sidebar with a folder tree and a content panel. Click a file to view it:

• Markdown renders with full formatting
• PDF opens in an inline viewer
• Other text files display as plain text

Star files to mark favorites. Toggle Show starred only to filter the tree.

Creating Files¶

Click New File in the sidebar. Choose a source, enter a path (folders are created automatically), and write your content.

kai kb search "deployment"
kai kb show "runbooks/deploy-checklist.md"

Searching¶

Full-text search across all KB sources. Results show the file path, matching line number, and a snippet:

kai kb search "connection pooling" --max 10

PDF files are included in search results. Kaisho extracts text using pdftotext (poppler) with a fallback to pypdf.

File Operations¶

• Rename/move files within a source
• Move between sources (e.g., from Personal to Company Docs)
• Delete files (with confirmation)
• Edit Markdown files inline with a live preview editor

Supported File Types¶