ai-job-search README

The project's README from github.com/MadsLorentzen/ai-job-search. As one markdown file: README.md.

Pip, the courier bird

AI Job Search

The job search that runs on your machine.

MadsLorentzen%2Fai-job-search | Trendshift

CI

An AI-powered job application framework built on Claude Code. Fork it, fill in your profile, and let Claude evaluate job postings, tailor your CV, write cover letters, and prepare you for interviews.

Note: This is an independent open-source project and is not affiliated with, endorsed by, sponsored by, or maintained by Anthropic. Anthropic and Claude Code are referenced only to describe the toolchain this workflow uses.

This project has no affiliated cryptocurrency, token, or paid sponsorship program. Anything claiming otherwise is unauthorized and should be treated as a scam. The only ways to support the project are the Ko-fi link below and contributing on GitHub.

Does it actually work?

I'm a geophysicist by training. When my position was cut in late 2025, I built this framework to run my own job search - the same /scrape, /apply, and /interview workflow in this repo, used weekly, on my own career. I was upfront about it with every employer I spoke to, and instead of counting against me, it usually sparked a genuine technical conversation.

Sixty-nine tailored applications, twenty first interviews, and one signed contract later, I started as an AI engineer in June 2026. People kept asking whether this actually works. It got me hired. Now it's yours.

The longer version, including the full application funnel, is on LinkedIn.

Did this save you a Sunday of cover-letter writing? Consider a coffee.
Did it land you the job? Maybe two.
☕

Buy me a coffee at ko-fi.com

What this is

A structured workflow that turns Claude Code into a full-stack job application assistant. The core workflow (self-profiling, fit evaluation, and the drafter-reviewer application pipeline) is language- and country-agnostic. The job portal search skills are built for the Danish market (Jobindex, Jobnet, Akademikernes Jobbank, etc.), but the pattern is designed to be swapped for your local job boards.

/setup          /scrape              /apply <url>
  |                |                     |
  v                v                     v
Fill in        Search job           Evaluate fit
your profile   portals              Score & recommend
  |                |                     |
  v                v                     v
Profile        Present matches      Draft CV + Cover Letter
files ready    with fit ratings     (LaTeX, tailored)
                   |                     |
                   v                     v
               Pick a match         Reviewer agent critiques
               -> /apply            -> Revise -> Final output

The framework encodes career guidance best practices, including structured evaluation criteria, forward-looking cover letter framing, and optional salary benchmarking.

Prerequisites

Quick start

🎥 Prefer to see it in action first? The Next New Thing did a hands-on walkthrough of how the workflow is actually used, from setup to a finished application (recorded August 2026 - commands may have evolved since).

1. Fork and clone

gh repo fork MadsLorentzen/ai-job-search --clone
cd ai-job-search

[!IMPORTANT] A fork of this repo is always public — GitHub does not allow private forks of public repositories — and /setup (step 3 below) writes your personal data (name, contact details, employment history, salary expectations) into tracked files. If this copy is for your own job search rather than for contributing changes back, use a private repository with this repo as upstream instead — the two-minute recipe is in SETUP.md section 8, and every update workflow works identically. Fork only to contribute.

2. Install job search tools

PowerShell:

$tools = @("jobbank-search", "jobdanmark-search", "jobindex-search", "jobnet-search", "linkedin-search", "freehire-search")
foreach ($tool in $tools) {
  Push-Location ".agents/skills/$tool/cli"
  bun install
  Pop-Location
}

Bash / zsh / Git Bash:

for tool in jobbank-search jobdanmark-search jobindex-search jobnet-search linkedin-search freehire-search; do
  (cd .agents/skills/$tool/cli && bun install)
done

For linkedin-search and freehire-search the install is optional: both have zero runtime dependencies and run with plain bun; bun install only pulls TypeScript dev types.

3. Set up your profile

claude
# Then inside Claude Code:
/setup

/setup offers three paths: read your documents/ folder if you have one populated (CV PDF, LinkedIn export, diplomas, reference letters, past applications), import a single CV pasted in chat, or walk through an interview. It auto-detects what you have and asks. Documents-folder mode is idempotent and safe to re-run as you add more material; see documents/README.md for the layout.

4. Search for jobs

/scrape

This searches multiple job portals for positions matching your profile, deduplicates results, and presents them sorted by fit. Pick a match to run /apply on it directly — or, when a scrape returns more jobs than you want to eyeball, run /rank to batch-score them all against the fit framework and get a ranked shortlist first.

5. Apply to a job

/apply https://jobindex.dk/job/1234567

If the URL can't be fetched (some job portals block automated access), you can paste the job description directly instead:

/apply <paste the full job description here>

This runs the full workflow: evaluate fit, draft CV + cover letter, review with a second agent, revise, and present the final output.

Postings are treated as untrusted input (the workflow follows no instructions embedded in them and fetches no links from their body), but agentic defenses are instruction-level, not a sandbox - on an unfamiliar job board, skim what was fetched and written before you hit send. Details in SECURITY.md.

Other commands

/setup, /scrape, and /apply form the core workflow. Ten more commands extend it once your profile is in place:

/reset is also available, see Starting over below.

File structure

ai-job-search/
├── CLAUDE.md                          # Main candidate profile + workflow rules
├── .claude/
│   ├── commands/
│   │   ├── apply.md                   # /apply workflow (drafter-reviewer)
│   │   ├── setup.md                   # /setup onboarding (documents folder, CV import, or interview)
│   │   ├── expand.md                  # /expand competency enrichment from documents and online presence
│   │   ├── add-template.md            # /add-template register custom templates (LaTeX, Typst, ...)
│   │   ├── add-portal.md              # /add-portal generate a job-portal search skill for your market
│   │   ├── rank.md                    # /rank triage scraped jobs into a ranked shortlist
│   │   ├── outcome.md                 # /outcome record application results, archive materials
│   │   ├── gmail-sync.md              # /gmail-sync auto-detect application status from Gmail
│   │   ├── interview.md               # /interview stage-specific prep pack + mock interview
│   │   ├── html-report.md             # /html-report generate application tracker dashboard
│   │   ├── notion-sync.md             # /notion-sync one-way pipeline view in a Notion database
│   │   └── reset.md                   # /reset wipe profile data or documents folder
│   ├── skills/
│   │   ├── job-application-assistant/  # Core application skill
│   │   │   ├── SKILL.md               # Skill definition
│   │   │   ├── 01-candidate-profile.md # Your education, experience, skills
│   │   │   ├── 02-behavioral-profile.md# PI/DISC/personality assessment
│   │   │   ├── 03-writing-style.md    # Tone, structure, do's and don'ts
│   │   │   ├── 04-job-evaluation.md   # Scoring framework for job fit
│   │   │   ├── 05-cv-templates.md     # LaTeX CV structure + tailoring rules
│   │   │   ├── 06-cover-letter-templates.md # LaTeX cover letter templates
│   │   │   └── 07-interview-prep.md   # STAR examples + interview framework
│   │   ├── job-scraper/               # Job search orchestration
│   │   └── upskill/                   # /upskill skill gap analysis and learning plan
│   └── settings.json                  # Claude Code permissions (shared, scoped)
├── .agents/skills/                    # Job portal CLI tools
│   ├── jobbank-search/                # Akademikernes Jobbank (Denmark)
│   ├── jobdanmark-search/             # Jobdanmark.dk (Denmark)
│   ├── jobindex-search/               # Jobindex.dk (Denmark)
│   ├── jobnet-search/                 # Jobnet.dk (Denmark, government portal)
│   ├── linkedin-search/               # LinkedIn public job listings (country-agnostic)
│   └── freehire-search/               # freehire.me tech job aggregator (multi-market, REST API)
├── cv/
│   └── main_example.tex               # moderncv LaTeX template
├── cover_letters/
│   ├── cover.cls                      # Custom cover letter LaTeX class
│   ├── cover_example.tex              # Example cover letter (structural reference + CI smoke test)
│   └── OpenFonts/                     # Lato + Raleway fonts
├── templates/                         # Custom templates registered via /add-template
│   └── README.md                      # Folder layout instructions
├── documents/                         # Career source materials for /setup Path A and /expand
│   ├── README.md                      # Folder layout instructions
│   ├── cv/                            # Master CV (PDF or .tex)
│   ├── linkedin/                      # LinkedIn profile export (PDF)
│   ├── diplomas/                      # Degree certificates and transcripts
│   ├── references/                    # Reference letters
│   └── applications/                  # Past application records (<company>_<role>/)
├── .github/workflows/ci.yml           # CI: LaTeX smoke compiles, skill lint, CLI typechecks
├── salary_lookup.py                   # Salary benchmarking tool (BYO data)
├── tools/
│   ├── check_framework_version.py     # CI check: framework_version bumped when skill files change
│   ├── check_upstream_updates.py      # Preview which personalized files an upstream update touches
│   ├── convert_salary_excel.py        # Convert salary Excel to JSON
│   ├── lint_skills.py                 # CI lint for skills, commands, settings.json
│   ├── robots_check.py                # Gate the browser-header retry against robots.txt
│   ├── security_guards.py             # CI guards: permission allowlist, gitignore rules, manifests
│   ├── upstream_triage.py             # Sort upstream commits into worth-reviewing vs probably-skip
│   ├── verify_layout.py               # Measure a compiled PDF's page layout (holes, orphans, footer collisions)
│   ├── verify_pdf.py                  # Verify a compiled PDF's page count and extractable text
│   └── README_SALARY_TOOL.md          # Salary tool setup instructions
├── job_scraper/                       # Scraper state (seen jobs, results)
├── gmail_sync/                        # /gmail-sync state (processed message IDs, last sync date)
├── upskill/                           # /upskill report output (markdown reports per run)
├── job_search_tracker.csv             # Application tracking spreadsheet
└── SETUP.md                           # Detailed setup guide

How /apply works

The /apply command runs a drafter-reviewer workflow with mandatory PDF compilation:

  1. Parse the job posting (URL or text)
  2. Evaluate fit against your profile (skills, experience, culture, location, career alignment)
  3. Draft a tailored CV and cover letter in LaTeX
  4. Spawn a reviewer agent that researches the company and critiques the drafts
  5. Revise based on the reviewer's feedback
  6. Compile and inspect both PDFs: lualatex for the CV, xelatex for the cover letter. Claude reads the rendered pages and iterates on the LaTeX until the CV is exactly 2 pages with no orphaned entry titles, and the cover letter is exactly 1 page with the signature visible and fonts consistent.
  7. ATS-check the CV: extract the PDF's text layer (pdftotext, optional dependency) and verify it the way an ATS parser sees it — contact details present as literal text, no garbled glyphs, sane reading order — then score the posting's keyword coverage against the extraction. Keywords the profile genuinely supports get added; genuine gaps stay visible, never stuffed.

ai-job-search (MadsLorentzen/ai-job-search)

Searching Database…

What is this?An AI-powered job application framework built on top of Claude Code. You fork it, fill in your profile, and Claude evaluates job postings, tailors your CV, writes cover letters, and preps you for interviews, all running locally on your own machine.
Is this a standalone app, or does it run inside Claude Code?It is not a standalone app. It is a set of slash commands and skills (like /setup, /scrape, /apply, /interview) layered on top of a forked git repo of scripts and templates, and it runs inside the Claude Code CLI.
How do I get it running?Fork and clone the repo, install the job search CLI tools with Bun, then run /setup inside Claude Code. /setup can read a documents folder of your CV and LinkedIn export, take a pasted CV, or just interview you to build your profile.
What do I need installed besides Claude Code?Python 3.10+, Bun for the job search CLI tools, and a LaTeX distribution with lualatex and xelatex (TeX Live, MacTeX, TinyTeX, or MiKTeX), since the CV and cover letter are LaTeX documents that get compiled to PDF.
Does it submit job applications for me?No, /apply drafts and compiles the CV and cover letter PDFs and runs an ATS keyword check, but sending is on you. Postings are treated as untrusted text the workflow never blindly acts on, and you're told to skim what was fetched and written before hitting send.
Are the job portal search tools only built for Denmark?The shipped portal search skills target the Danish job market (Jobindex, Jobnet, Akademikernes Jobbank), but the core fit-evaluation and application pipeline is language- and country-agnostic, and /add-portal can generate a new search skill for your own local job boards.
What does the /interview command do?It builds a stage-specific interview prep pack pulled from the application's own archive (the exact posting, the CV/cover letter the interviewer actually read, past feedback), maps likely questions to your STAR examples, and runs a mock interview, giving honest bridge answers rather than inventing experience for gaps.
Can it track what happened to my applications?Yes, /outcome logs interview stages, offers, rejections, or silence into a tracker, and /outcome followup flags applications that have gone quiet for 10+ days and drafts (but never sends) a short follow-up based only on what you already submitted.
Can I use my own CV template instead of the default LaTeX one?Yes, /add-template registers a custom CV or cover letter template in LaTeX, Typst, or another toolchain, captures its compile command and style rules, runs a mandatory test compile, and wires it into /apply.
Why fork the repo instead of just installing it as a package?The project is meant to be forked and owned: your profile, applications, and tracker live as tracked files inside your copy, so forking it (or building a private repo from it) keeps your whole job search self-contained and under your control.
Size
4.6 MB
Stars
48.9K
Age
7mo
Commits · 90 Days