list_pain_signals

Browse the corpus with structured filters. Use this for targeted discovery: a specific area, a minimum owner diversity threshold, or a specific pain type.

Parameters

Name	Type	Required	Description
query	string	no	Text filter on topic (substring match)
macroArea	enum	no	Filter by area (see get_taxonomy for valid values)
painType	enum	no	bug, feature_request, complaint, or question
owner	string	no	Substring match on the dominant GitHub owner (e.g. vscode). Single-vendor signals only.
minDiversity	integer	no	Minimum distinct products/repos showing the pain. Use 5 to filter single-product noise.
minScore	number	no	Minimum composite score (0-100)
sortBy	enum	no	score, growth, volume, or lastSeenAt (default: score)
direction	enum	no	asc or desc (default: desc)
page	integer	no	Page number, 0-based (default: 0)
size	integer	no	Page size (1-50, default: 20)

Powerful combinations

• painType=feature_request + macroArea=AI_AGENTS_LLM: what developers want built in the LLM space.
• minDiversity=5: only cross-market pains felt by multiple products (not a single product’s bug).
• owner=vscode: teardown of a specific tool’s pain landscape.
• sortBy=growth + minScore=60: high-quality signals with the fastest recent growth.

Example call

{
  "name": "list_pain_signals",
  "arguments": {
    "macroArea": "AUTH_IDENTITY",
    "painType": "feature_request",
    "minDiversity": 5,
    "sortBy": "growth",
    "size": 15
  }
}

Truncated response shape

15 signals (page 1) - AUTH_IDENTITY / feature_request / minDiversity=5

1. Passkey adoption friction in mobile web apps
   score=79.4  volume=1120  growth=+2.1x  owners=18
   id: 7b2c4d8e-...

2. Session invalidation across distributed services
   score=74.1  volume=890  growth=+1.4x  owners=11
   id: c3e1a9f2-...

...

Interpreting results

The owners field (backed by uniqueOwnerCount) is the most important market-breadth signal. High score with few owners usually means one product’s bug. High owners with modest score often means a real cross-market problem worth building for.