
Sd Download
- 19 installs
- 45 repo stars
- Updated June 23, 2026
- yuanyuanma03/academic-research-skills
Download article PDFs from ScienceDirect by PII or URL to local disk, requiring institutional or subscriber access.
About
Navigates to a ScienceDirect article, extracts the PDF link, and downloads the file locally. A researcher with subscription access uses it to save article PDFs.
- Extracts the pdfft PDF link from the article page
- Uses an initScript to reduce bot detection during navigation
Sd Download by the numbers
- 19 all-time installs (skills.sh)
- Ranked #1,308 of 2,715 Automation & Workflows skills by installs in the Skillselion catalog
- Data as of Aug 3, 2026 (Skillselion catalog sync)
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| Installs | 19 |
|---|---|
| repo stars | ★ 45 |
| Last updated | June 23, 2026 |
| Repository | yuanyuanma03/academic-research-skills ↗ |
What it does
Download article PDFs from ScienceDirect by PII or URL to local disk, requiring institutional or subscriber access.
Files
ScienceDirect PDF Download
Download PDF files from ScienceDirect articles to the user's local disk.
Prerequisites
- The user must have access to the article (institutional subscription, open access, or personal subscription).
- If the article is behind a paywall and the user has no access, the download will fail.
Single Article Download
Step 1: Navigate to article page and extract PDF link
If already on the article page, skip navigation. Otherwise use navigate_page with initScript:
navigate_page({
url: "{BASE_URL}/science/article/pii/{PII}",
initScript: "Object.defineProperty(navigator, 'webdriver', {get: () => undefined})"
})Then extract the PDF URL with evaluate_script:
async () => {
// Wait for page to load
for (let i = 0; i < 20; i++) {
if (document.querySelector('a[href*="pdfft"]') || document.querySelector('.access-options')) break;
await new Promise(r => setTimeout(r, 500));
}
const pdfLink = document.querySelector('a[href*="pdfft"][class*="accessbar"]')
|| document.querySelector('a[href*="pdfft"]');
if (pdfLink) {
return { pdfUrl: pdfLink.href };
}
const noAccess = document.querySelector('.access-options, .get-access, [class*="GetAccess"]');
if (noAccess) {
return { error: 'No access. User needs institutional or subscriber access.' };
}
return { error: 'PDF link not found on this page.' };
}Step 2: Navigate to PDF URL
Open the PDF URL with initScript:
navigate_page({
url: "{pdfUrl}",
initScript: "Object.defineProperty(navigator, 'webdriver', {get: () => undefined})"
})Step 3: Handle Cloudflare verification
After navigation, wait 5s then check the page state with evaluate_script:
async () => {
await new Promise(r => setTimeout(r, 5000));
return {
contentType: document.contentType,
title: document.title,
url: window.location.href.substring(0, 80)
};
}Three possible outcomes:
A) `contentType === 'application/pdf'` → PDF loaded directly. Skip to Step 4.
B) Title is "Security verification" or body contains "Are you a robot" → Turnstile checkbox appeared. Auto-click:
1. Use take_snapshot to get the a11y tree. Find the checkbox inside the Cloudflare iframe:
Iframe "包含 Cloudflare 安全质询的小组件"
checkbox "确认您是真人" ← target uid2. Use click(uid) on the checkbox element. (Chrome DevTools MCP works at CDP protocol level and can interact with cross-origin iframes.) 3. Wait 5s, then re-check document.contentType:
- If
application/pdf→ success, proceed to Step 4. - If still on verification → retry click once. After 2 failed attempts, tell user: "请在浏览器中完成验证后告知我。"
C) Title is "请稍候…" → JS challenge still running. Wait another 5s and re-check. Usually resolves to A or B.
Step 4: Trigger download to local disk
Once contentType === 'application/pdf', the PDF is displayed in browser but NOT saved to disk yet. Trigger the actual download with evaluate_script:
(pii) => {
const a = document.createElement('a');
a.href = window.location.href;
a.download = pii + '-main.pdf';
document.body.appendChild(a);
a.click();
document.body.removeChild(a);
return { downloaded: true, filename: pii + '-main.pdf' };
}Pass the PII as an argument so the filename is meaningful (e.g. S0022169426003136-main.pdf).
Tell the user the PDF has been downloaded and the filename.
Batch Download from Search Results
Note: Batch download requires authentication. Checkboxes and download buttons are only visible to logged-in users.
Step 1: Select articles
On the search results page, select articles using checkboxes. Each checkbox id is the PII.
Step 2: Submit download form
Use evaluate_script:
(piis) => {
piis.forEach(pii => {
const cb = document.getElementById(pii);
if (cb && !cb.checked) cb.click();
});
const downloadBtn = document.querySelector('.download-all-link-button');
if (downloadBtn) {
downloadBtn.click();
return { success: true, message: 'Download initiated for selected articles.' };
}
const form = document.querySelector('form[action*="pdf/download"]');
if (!form) return { error: 'Download form not found. User may need to log in.' };
return { error: 'Download button not found.' };
}PDF URL Pattern
{BASE_URL}/science/article/pii/{PII}/pdfft?md5={HASH}&pid=1-s2.0-{PII}-main.pdfThe md5 hash is unique per article and session. It cannot be constructed — it must be extracted from the page.
Notes
- This skill is set to
disable-model-invocation: true— it must be explicitly invoked with/sd-download. - Open access articles can be downloaded without authentication.
- For subscription articles, the user must be authenticated (institutional access, VPN, or personal subscription).
- After solving Cloudflare once, subsequent PDF downloads in the same session work without interruption.
- If download fails, suggest the user check their access status or try logging in.