Tools & skills reference

The connector exposes 27 tools across five categories. You never call tools by name: describe what you want in plain language and your AI assistant picks the right one. All tools authenticate via OAuth through your Strella account, scoped to the permissions you already have.

Data tools support field selection to minimize token usage. In the tables below, defaults are marked, and fields marked detail require an extra API call. The id field is always included.

Tool categories at a glance

Getting Started

strella_get_guide

Initializes a Strella session. Returns a context_id plus a platform guide with step-by-step workflows. Every other tool needs the context_id.

Good to know

• Called automatically: this tool runs automatically when the Strella connector is first invoked in a conversation. You don't need to call it manually; your AI assistant handles it behind the scenes.
• Required first step: returns a context_id that every other tool needs. Called once at the start of each conversation.
• Organization list: shows which organizations you belong to. Most users have one; multi-org users pick which to work with.

Research Data

strella_search_projects

Searches research projects by keyword, with field selection. Filters by workspace and date range.

Fields (id is always included. Default fields come back unless you narrow them. Detail fields require an extra call)

Filters

strella_project_detail

Gets a project summary. The tool always returns the base project settings. Use the include parameter to add data groups.

Optional includes

strella_list_participants

Lists a project's participants, with field selection. Filters by status, name, and age range.

Fields (id always included)

Filters

strella_participant_detail

Gets detailed data for a single participant. Defaults to demographics + interview_summaries.

Field groups

strella_get_questionnaire

Gets the questionnaire (interview script) for a project: the tree of questions, tasks, and sections the AI moderator follows.

Parameters

Good to know

• Full vs. summary: returns the complete, untruncated interview script. For a quick summary, use strella_project_detail with the questionnaire include instead.
• Question numbers: each question is numbered in the order it appears in the script (Q1, Q2, and T for tasks; sections aren't numbered). Transcript search uses the same numbers when it labels lines.

strella_list_workspaces

Lists all workspaces in the active organization.

Good to know

• No pagination: returns all workspaces in a single call.
• Use case: workspaces group projects by team or department, useful for scoping project searches.

strella_list_recruitment_orders

Lists recruitment orders for a project across both vendor panels.

Parameters

Good to know

• Progress tracking: each order shows counts for qualified, invited, completed, and pending participants.

strella_list_share_links

Lists a project's share links with their resolved settings, participant-facing URL, and participant count.

Parameters

Good to know

• Resolved settings: each link shows its effective settings: a per-link override, falling back to the project value wherever the link inherits.
• What's included: status, participant-facing URL, participant limit, screener requirement, auto-invite, collected fields, redirect URLs, and participant count.
• Paginated: up to 25 links per page. Page with cursor when has_more is true.

strella_list_custom_fields

Lists a project's custom fields: the columns on its participants table, including Tags and AI-coded categories, in column order.

Parameters

Good to know

• What's included: each field's name, type (text, single_select or multi_select), its options, and whether it is the participant identifier that matches a returning participant to their row.
• Values and labels: each option has a label, which the table shows, and a value, which participants hold. The assistant writes values, not labels.
• Participant values: a participant's values come with strella_participant_detail when the demographics group is requested.

strella_view_recording

Plays interview recordings in an interactive video player. Returns a ready-to-share session_share_link.

Parameters

Good to know

• Full interview: pass one participant with no timing to watch all sessions with view switching (split-screen, webcam, screen-share).
• Clips: pass start_time and end_time to play a specific segment. Timestamps are continuous across the full interview.

strella_list_highlight_reels

Lists a project's Saved Reels with clip counts, sentiment, and a link to open each one. Optionally embeds each reel's clips for content scanning.

Parameters

Good to know

• Newest first: reels are listed newest first by default; change the order with sort.
• Scan without opening: include_clips embeds each reel's clips (never the quotes) so an assistant can find "which reel covers onboarding" in a single call.
• Deep link: each reel includes a link to open it in Strella, where you can play, edit, share, and download it.
• Which reels are already shared: each reel also carries its public share link when it has one, so your assistant can tell shared reels from unshared ones at a glance. Listing never creates a link; ask for one when saving.

Analysis

strella_search_transcripts

Searches interview transcripts using a regular-expression pattern (JavaScript RegExp syntax), or finds the exact start and end of quotes you paste.

Parameters

How it works

1. Filter: narrows scope using your project, participant, date, and speaker filters at the database level, which is fast and efficient.
2. Match: applies your search pattern against the filtered transcript lines.
3. Return: sends back match counts, a per-participant breakdown, and a token estimate. If count_only is off, includes the matching text too.

Good to know

• Preview first: count_only is on by default. Check how many matches exist and how many tokens they'd use before fetching the full text.
• Wildcard (*): a bare * matches everything. Use it with a participant_id to retrieve someone's full transcript.
• Match limit: results are capped at 100 lines. If results are truncated, narrow your filters or use a more specific pattern.
• Timestamps: each match shows continuous timestamps (HH:MM:SS.s, rounded outward to a tenth of a second) across the participant's full interview; they don't restart between sessions.
• Exact quotes: a matching line is a whole answer, which can run for minutes. To clip just a quote, your assistant sends quotes and gets back each quote's own start and end in seconds, ready for a reel. It matches past filler sounds such as "um" and capitalization or punctuation differences. A quote that occurs more than once, or that no line says, comes back marked as such, with what to try next, rather than as a guessed time. Recordings without word-level timing return the whole answer's time range, and your assistant tells you that clip plays the full answer.
• Token estimate: the response includes an estimated_tokens field so you can gauge how much context window the results would use.
• Question labels: with include_question, each line starts with a label such as Q3 main (the main question Q3 and its answer) or Q3 f1 (the first follow-up to Q3 and its answer), plus a list of the questions those labels stand for. The numbers match the ones strella_get_questionnaire shows. Lines before the first question read intro, after the last outro, and lines from human-moderated or uploaded interviews no-data.
• Every answer to one question: pass a question's item_id with the pattern .* to read what everyone said to it. Answers come a page of whole participants at a time, and each page says how many participants are left.

strella_analyze_transcripts

Analyzes the transcripts of a single project on the server, in parallel. Returns per-participant summaries and timestamped quote references for a query.

Parameters

How it works

1. Scope participants: identifies which participants to analyze: all of them by default (up to 100), or the specific ones you listed.
2. Detect structured data: reads the project's questionnaire and screener, then uses AI to find which questions relate to your query (e.g., "What is their budget?" auto-detects budget-related screener questions).
3. Analyze each transcript: reads every participant's full transcript in parallel and produces a summary, relevant quotes, and an applicability judgment for each one.
4. Attach structured responses: for each participant, attaches their answers to the detected (or requested) screener/survey questions alongside the transcript analysis.

Good to know

• Reads every transcript: the tool reads the complete transcript for each participant, not just snippets. This is what powers the per-participant summaries and quotes.
• Auto-detects structured data: based on your query, the tool automatically finds relevant screener and survey questions and includes those answers in the results. No configuration needed.
• Applicability filtering: participants whose interview wasn't relevant to your query are marked as not applicable and excluded from results to save space. The count is still reported.
• Rate limited: this tool is rate-limited per organization. Each response shows how many calls remain and when the limit resets.
• Single call: pass all participants in one call; the server handles parallelism internally. Do not split into multiple calls.

strella_analyze_question_guide

Analyzes a project's question guide for objective coverage and quality issues. Returns prioritized suggestions and per-objective coverage. It leaves the guide unchanged.

Parameters

Good to know

• Read-only: nothing is written or committed. The guide is left exactly as it was; the suggestions are yours to apply or ignore.
• Draft first: analyzes the unpublished draft guide when one exists, otherwise the published guide.
• What you get: each research objective is rated for coverage (good, low, or none), with impact-scored suggestions for closing the gaps. Apply a fix with strella_edit_project.

Project Management

strella_create_project

Creates a new research project (starts live). Returns a project_id for further edits.

Parameters

Good to know

• Requires skill: load the question_guide_builder skill first; it provides step-by-step project creation guidance.
• Returns project_id: use the returned ID to add questions, screener, and settings via strella_edit_project.
• Human-moderated projects: the assistant writes the screener only, since a human-moderated study has no question guide. You then open the project in Strella, set your availability on the Scheduling tab, and publish from Build. The assistant can't do those two steps. The moderation mode is set at creation and can't be changed later. See Schedule moderated interviews.

strella_edit_project

Edits an existing project (settings, question guide, and/or screener) in a single call.

Parameters

Good to know

• Requires skill: load the question_guide_builder skill first.
• Partial updates: send only the fields you want to change; omitted fields stay as they are.
• Batch changes: settings, questionnaire, and screener can all be updated in a single call.
• Version safety: get base_hash from the content_hash returned by strella_project_detail or strella_get_questionnaire. Prevents conflicting edits.
• Unpublished guide changes: a question guide edit saves nothing while the question guide builder holds changes you haven't published. Strella tells your AI to ask you whether to publish or discard them in Strella first, or to erase them.
• Changes the check misses: the check doesn't see unpublished changes that only touch text formatting, a task's screen-verification screenshots or a section's audience percentage, and the edit replaces them. Publish those changes before you edit the question guide with your AI.

strella_prepare_image_uploads

Gives your AI single-use commands that upload image files for your question guide's image blocks, one command per image. Each upload stores the image in your organization, and the AI puts it into its image block when it edits the guide.

Parameters

Good to know

• Requires skill: load the guide_image_uploads skill first.
• Needs the files and a command line: it works only when your AI has the images as files and can run commands, as a coding assistant such as Claude Code can. In a plain chat, the AI adds the image block without its image and gives you a link that opens the guide builder on that block, where you upload the image.
• Same limits as the builder: PNG, JPEG, GIF or WebP, up to 4 MB each.
• Single use: each command uploads one image, then stops working. An unused command stops working after 15 minutes. Until then it works like a password, so your AI shows you a command only if you ask for it, for example to run the upload yourself.

strella_list_quotas

Lists participant quotas for a project. Returns all quotas in one call.

Parameters

Good to know

• What quotas do: quotas set recruitment targets for specific segments, e.g., "interview 10 PMs and 10 engineers".
• Computed status: each quota shows whether it's open or filled, based on completed interviews vs. limit.
• Quota groups: can also return the project's quota groups, including empty ones.

strella_edit_quotas

Creates or updates a single participant quota.

Parameters

Good to know

• Requires skill: load the quotas skill first.
• Full replacement on update: when updating, criteria is fully replaced. Fetch current criteria with strella_list_quotas first if you want to keep existing filters.
• Grouping: pass group_id to put the quota in an existing quota group, or new_group_name to create a group for it.

strella_edit_quota_groups

Creates or renames a quota group. A quota group is one dimension of your sample plan, such as Gender or Income, and each participant fills one quota in every group they match.

Parameters

Good to know

• Requires skill: load the quotas skill first.
• One call per dimension: a split like "25 PMs and 25 engineers" is one call with two quotas.
• No overlap: quotas in the same group can't share a participant, so the tool rejects criteria that overlap another quota in the group.
• Partial success: if one of the new quotas fails, the tool keeps the group and the quotas it created before the failure, and the response names the one that failed.
• Deleting a group: not available through the connector. Delete groups in Strella.

strella_write_draft_respondent_order

Creates or updates a draft recruitment order on the Respondent.io panel.

Parameters

Good to know

• Requires skill: load the panel-specific skill first; it provides live targeting options (countries, industries, pricing).
• Draft only: creates a draft. The researcher reviews and finalizes in Strella. Payment and publication happen in the app, not via the tool.
• Returns submit_url: direct the researcher to this link to review and submit the order.

strella_write_draft_user_interviews_order

Creates or updates a draft recruitment order on the User Interviews panel.

Parameters

Good to know

• Requires skill: load the panel-specific skill first; it provides live targeting options (countries, industries, pricing).
• Draft only: creates a draft. The researcher reviews and finalizes in Strella. Payment and publication happen in the app, not via the tool.
• Returns submit_url: direct the researcher to this link to review and submit the order.

strella_search_recruitment_options

Finds the vendor code for a targeting value you name. Use it for values too large to include in the write-draft skill prompt.

Parameters

Good to know

• When to use: only needed for targeting values too large to inline in the skill prompt (skills, occupations, locations, job titles). Other targeting values are available directly in the skill.

strella_edit_share_link

Creates or updates a single share link. A link inherits every project setting until you override it: status, participant limit, screener requirement, auto-invite, collected fields, or redirect URLs.

Parameters

Good to know

• Requires skill: load the share_links skill first; it returns the skill_id this tool needs.
• Inherit or override: every per-link setting defaults to the project value. Pass a value to override it, null to revert to the project value, or omit it to leave it unchanged.
• Changing the slug breaks old links: changing url_slug regenerates the participant token, so every share URL you've already distributed for that link stops resolving. The new token takes a fresh random suffix, so re-sending the old slug does not restore it.

strella_edit_custom_field

Creates or updates a single custom field on the participants table.

Parameters

Good to know

• Requires skill: load the custom_fields skill first; it returns the skill_id this tool needs.
• Options replace the whole list: send every option the field should keep. To rename an option without losing the participants who hold it, send its existing value with the new label.
• Changing the type keeps values as they are: participants' stored values are not converted to the new type.
• No delete: deleting a field removes every participant's value in it, so delete fields from the participants table in Strella.

strella_set_participant_custom_fields

Sets the same custom field values, such as tags, on up to 25 participants in one project.

Parameters

Good to know

• Requires skill: load the custom_fields skill first.
• Lists replace the whole value: a multi_select value replaces the participant's current list, so the assistant reads their tags first to add one.
• Only custom fields change: a participant's status, name and quotas stay as they are, and fields left out keep their values.
• Partial results: the result lists which participants were updated, which were refused (not found, or holding an identifier value another participant already has), and which were not attempted when an error stopped the run.

strella_save_highlight_reel

Saves interview clips into a project as an editable Saved Reel: the same reels you can play, edit, share, and download in Strella. Use it to keep a set of strong moments your AI assistant found while reviewing interviews.

Parameters

Good to know

• Requires skill: load the highlight_reels skill first; it returns the skill_id this tool needs.
• Clips can span projects: the reel lives in one project, but its clips may come from any project in your organization. When clips span several projects, your assistant asks which project to save the reel into.
• All-or-nothing: if any clip is invalid (unknown participant, unplayable recording, out-of-range time), the whole save is rejected with a per-clip reason and nothing is saved.
• Continuous timestamps: clip times are continuous seconds across a participant's full interview, the same frame strella_search_transcripts and strella_view_recording use.
• Returns a link: the response includes an in-app link to the saved reel, where you can play, edit, share, and download it. See Create & share a highlight reel.
• One public share link per reel: ask for it with create_share_link and the response also carries share_url, a link anyone can play without a Strella account. A reel keeps that one link: every later save through your assistant refreshes it to the reel's current clips, so the link you already sent never plays an old cut. To get links for several saved reels at once, your assistant lists them and asks for each reel's link in turn, with no video playing in the chat.

Utilities

strella_switch_organization

Switches the active organization for all subsequent tool calls. Requires confirmation on each use.

Parameters

Good to know

• When to use: only needed for users who belong to multiple organizations. Most users have one and never need this.

strella_skills

Loads detailed step-by-step instructions for a specific workflow, or lists all available skills.

Parameters

Good to know

• Auto-loaded for writes: write skills (question_guide_builder, quotas, recruitment) are loaded automatically when your AI assistant detects a matching intent. The skill returns a skill_id required by the corresponding write tool.
• Detailed guidance: skills provide step-by-step instructions, live config data, and validation rules for complex workflows.
• See Skills below: each skill is documented in the Skills section with its description, auto-loading behavior, and scope.

strella_search_help_docs

Searches the Strella help docs (these product guides) with a regular-expression pattern, or fetches one full docs page by slug. Your AI assistant uses it to answer "how does X work in Strella" questions from the real documentation instead of improvising.

Parameters

How it works

1. Search: greps every help-doc page for your pattern and returns matching lines with context, grouped with a per-page match count sorted by relevance.
2. Follow up: when excerpts aren't enough, the assistant fetches the best page in full via slug.
3. Cite: every result carries a working link to the docs site, so answers cite their source.

Good to know

• Docs, not interviews: this searches the product documentation. For what participants said in interviews, the assistant uses strella_search_transcripts instead.
• Honest misses: zero matches means the docs don't cover the topic; the assistant is told to say so rather than guess.
• Changelog on request: release notes are excluded from search (they mention every feature name), but the full changelog is available by asking for it directly (slug: changelog).
• Match limit: results are capped at 40 matching lines, at most 8 per page so one dense page can't crowd out the rest; the assistant narrows by section or pattern, or opens a page in full.

strella_send_feedback

Sends the Strella team feedback your AI assistant writes with you: a bug where a Strella tool failed, an idea for something Strella could do, or a note about something that was confusing.

How to start

• From your AI tool's prompt menu: AI tools that list connector prompts, such as Claude and Claude Code, show Send feedback to Strella (in Claude Code, as a slash command). You can add a sentence in your own words.
• By asking: say "send this feedback to Strella" or "report this problem to Strella". This works in every AI tool, including ChatGPT.

Your assistant loads the feedback skill first, which tells it what to write and to show you the draft.

Parameters

Good to know

• You approve it first: your assistant shows you the full draft and sends it only after you agree.
• Private details are removed: Strella replaces anything that looks like an email address, a phone number, or a credential such as an API key with a label before sending. Your assistant shows you the feedback exactly as sent.
• Participant details stay out: the feedback refers to people and projects by id, and leaves out names and interview text.
• A reference to quote: feedback usually returns a reference you can mention if you contact customersupport@strella.io.
• Limit: up to 10 pieces of feedback per person per hour.

Skills

Skills are detailed step-by-step guides that provide domain knowledge for specific workflows. Your AI loads a skill with the strella_skills tool, or omit the skill name to list every available skill. Many skills load automatically when the AI detects a matching intent.

Two badges describe how a skill behaves:

• skill_id: the skill returns a proof-of-reading token required by a write tool before it will run.
• dynamic: the skill fetches live data from the API each time it loads (e.g., current pricing or targeting catalogs).

tutorial

Hands-on walkthrough you steer from a short menu: ask a research question across the interviews in a project, build a simple test project, or find a moment in a recording and save it as a highlight reel. Suggested for first-time users.

Automatically suggested to new users when the guide detects a first-time session.

question_guide_builder   skill_id

Complete guide for creating and editing research projects, questionnaires, screeners, and moderator settings. Covers the full build and edit workflow including question types, follow-up depth, and screener qualification logic.

Automatically loaded when you ask to create or edit a project. The returned skill_id is required by strella_create_project and strella_edit_project.

question_guide_exact_importer   skill_id

Import an existing research guide (Google Doc, Word, or pasted text) verbatim into Strella, with no rewriting or inferring. Use when you have an existing discussion guide to port 1:1.

question_guide_media_blocks

Media block examples and documentation: website, Figma, video, image, and embed blocks with tasks and questions. Load when building a guide that shows media to participants.

guide_image_uploads   skill_id

Upload image files into a question guide's image blocks. Covers when an upload applies, preparing the commands, uploading each image, writing every image into the guide in one edit, and what to do when an upload is refused.

Automatically loaded when your AI needs to upload an image. The returned skill_id is required by strella_prepare_image_uploads.

question_guide_ab_testing

A/B testing setup with variant blocks and audience rules for segment-targeted sections. Load when the guide needs A/B comparisons or segment-specific questions.

plan_changes

Generate a reviewable markdown plan before creating or editing a project. Shows the proposed structure for approval before making any changes.

quotas   skill_id

Create and update participant quotas: segment targets defined by screener criteria with a fill limit and behavior. Covers DNF criteria format, full-replacement update semantics, and screener-coupling requirements.

Automatically loaded when you ask to create or edit quotas. The returned skill_id is required by strella_edit_quotas.

share_links   skill_id

Create and update participant share links: per-link outreach URLs whose settings inherit from the project unless overridden. Covers create vs update, the override rule (a value overrides, null reverts to the project value, omit leaves unchanged), and the url_slug change that breaks already-distributed links.

Automatically loaded when you ask to create or edit a share link. The returned skill_id is required by strella_edit_share_link.

custom_fields   skill_id

Create and edit custom fields on the participants table, and set participants' values in them. Covers option values and labels, full-replacement options, type changes, and the participant identifier.

Automatically loaded when you ask to add or edit a column or tag participants. The returned skill_id is required by strella_edit_custom_field and strella_set_participant_custom_fields.

highlight_reels   skill_id

Save a set of interview clips into a project as a Saved Reel. Covers how clips are addressed (participant plus continuous timestamps), building the reel in playback order, the all-or-nothing validation that rejects a save if any clip is invalid, and how to get a reel's public share link.

Automatically loaded when you ask to save a highlight reel. The returned skill_id is required by strella_save_highlight_reel.

research_explorer

Step-by-step workflow for exploring and analyzing research data. Provides structured guidance for navigating projects, participants, and transcripts.

capabilities

Complete reference of all tools and what they can do: read, analyze, write, and watch. Load when you want to see everything available.

whats_new

The connector's latest additions, newest first, with a prompt to try for each item. The list matches the What's new page, so your AI can answer "what's new?" or suggest something you haven't tried yet.

feedback   skill_id

Write feedback for the Strella team: a bug, an idea, or something confusing. Covers when to offer it, what each kind needs, keeping it to this conversation and free of participant details, and showing you the full draft before anything is sent.

Automatically loaded when you ask to send feedback. The returned skill_id is required by strella_send_feedback.

write_draft_respondent_order   skill_id   dynamic

Draft a Respondent.io recruitment order. Fetches live panel config (countries, industries, demographics, pricing) each time it loads so targeting options are always current.

Automatically loaded when you ask to set up recruitment via Respondent.io. The returned skill_id is required by the write tool.

write_draft_user_interviews_order   skill_id   dynamic

Draft a User Interviews recruitment order. Fetches live characteristic catalog (slugs, operators, pricing) each time it loads so targeting options are always current.

Automatically loaded when you ask to set up recruitment via User Interviews. The returned skill_id is required by the write tool.

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