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contextlint

getContextSlice

Overview

Section titled “Overview”

Takes a file path or an ID as a query and extracts the minimal set of documents related to it via BFS. The walk follows outgoing edges (the documents a given file references) and expands up to the configured depth limit.

Why it exists

Section titled “Why it exists”

When an AI agent or a human is working on a specific topic, you often want to hand them only the relevant documents rather than the whole repository. getContextSlice carves out a neighborhood around the query, keeping the context window and reader’s cognitive load small.

The query is interpreted in two ways:

  • If the query matches a file path in the graph, that file is used as the starting point for the outgoing-edge walk.
  • Otherwise, every document is scanned for the query as a table cell value, and every matching file is used as a starting point.

Signature

Section titled “Signature”
function getContextSlice(
  graph: ContextGraph,
  documents: Map<string, ParsedDocument>,
  query: string,
  maxDepth?: number,
): string[];

Parameters

Section titled “Parameters”
Parameter Type Required Description
graph ContextGraph ✓ The graph built by buildContextGraph.
documents Map<string, ParsedDocument> ✓ The same document Map used to build the graph. Required for scanning tables when the query is an ID.
query string ✓ A file path or ID string.
maxDepth number — Maximum BFS depth. Defaults to 2.

Return value

Section titled “Return value”

Returns string[]. The array contains the starting file or files plus every file reachable within maxDepth steps, sorted alphabetically. If no file matches the query, an empty array is returned.

Example

Section titled “Example”
import { buildContextGraph, getContextSlice, loadDocuments } from "@contextlint/core";


const documents = loadDocuments(["docs/**/*.md"]);
const graph = buildContextGraph(documents);


// Slice by file path
const slice = getContextSlice(graph, documents, "docs/specs/auth.md");
console.log(slice);


// Slice by ID (searches table cells)
const reqSlice = getContextSlice(graph, documents, "REQ-AUTH-01", 3);
console.log(reqSlice);
Section titled “Related functions”