The File Search Tool
Search the agent’s workspace for filenames or text content and get back matching paths and lines — so an agent can locate the exact code or config it needs without reading everything.
A suggestion isn’t a shipped change
An agent that can only propose code still leaves all the work to a human. To actually deliver, it needs a real, governed workspace where it can run code, edit files, test, and use Git — safely, and without touching anything you didn’t allow.
Read-only agents
Suggestions still require a human to run, test, and commit everything.
Unsafe execution
Running agent-generated code on real infrastructure is a security risk.
No verification
Without tests and builds, an agent can’t know its change works.
Ungoverned Git
Direct repo access with no policy or audit is a non-starter in the enterprise.
File Search, without the risk
Capability
What it does
Find files and text across the workspace fast.
it searches the workspace for a filename pattern or text content and returns matching paths and lines.
Assignable to any agent
How it works
Predictable, inspectable behavior
Designed to be reliable.
search runs over the sandboxed workspace and returns ranked matches with context, so an agent finds the right place to act quickly and precisely.
Every call logged
Governance
Private, governed, on-premise
Runs inside your perimeter.
Execution runs in an isolated, on-premise sandbox scoped per tenant with full command and file audit logging, so an agent can do real work on your code without unsafe access or anything leaving your perimeter.
Per-tenant, logged
Parameters
The file_search tool accepts these inputs when an agent calls it. Required inputs are flagged.
default: . Optional Directory to search within.
default: false Optional Treat the query as a regular expression.
default: 50 Optional Maximum matches to return.
How the File Search tool works in practice
File Search is a code execution & workspace tool you assign to a VDF AI agent. It searches the workspace for a filename pattern or text content and returns matching paths and lines. Its hallmarks — Search, Grep, Matches — let an agent rely on it as a dependable step in a larger task rather than a brittle one-off script.
Under the hood, search runs over the sandboxed workspace and returns ranked matches with context, so an agent finds the right place to act quickly and precisely. It expects query as required input, so calls are explicit and easy to audit. Every call is scoped to the requesting tenant and written to an audit log, so the capability is safe to run inside a regulated, on-premise environment — the same governance model behind every VDF AI tool.
Teams reach for File Search when they need to handle locate code, config hunting, and refactor scoping. It rarely works alone — pair it with File Read, File List, and RAG Grep to build a complete, governed workflow, then compose those steps into an on-premise VDF AI Network.
Where File Search pays back
Locate code
Find where a function or symbol is used.
Config hunting
Grep for a setting across the project.
Refactor scoping
List every file touching a term before changing it.
Debugging
Trace a string from an error back to its source.
Assigned to agents, orchestrated as networks
On VDF AI, an industry’s use cases map to agents, and you assign tools like this one to those agents. Compose multiple agents into a governed, on-premise network.
What changes after you assign it
Questions about the File Search tool
What is the File Search tool?
It searches the workspace for a filename pattern or text content and returns matching paths and lines. Assigned to a VDF AI agent, it runs under role-based policy with full audit logging so the capability is safe to use in production.
Does it support regex?
Yes. Set is_regex to true to search with a regular expression instead of a literal string.
How is this different from RAG grep?
File search scans the live workspace directly; rag.grep searches an indexed repository snapshot for retrieval.
What inputs does the File Search tool need?
It requires query, and optionally accepts path, is_regex, and max_results. Each parameter is validated when an agent calls the tool, and the full call is logged for audit.
Which tools pair well with File Search?
File Search is commonly assigned alongside File Read, File List, and RAG Grep. On VDF AI you compose several tools and agents into a single governed, on-premise network.
Does it run on-premise?
Yes. Like every VDF AI tool, it can run on-premise or in your sovereign cloud, scoped per user and audit-logged, so your data never leaves your perimeter.
How do agents use it?
You assign the tool to an agent under a role-based policy; the agent calls it as one step in a task, and several agents and tools can be orchestrated together as a governed VDF AI Network.
Assign File Search to these agents
These VDF AI agents can be assigned this tool. Open an agent to see the full toolkit it can run.
Tools that work well alongside this one
Where this tool delivers value
Put File Search to work
See the File Search tool assigned to an agent and orchestrated in a governed, on-premise network.