# Sift Web Tools – Grounded Q&A (/v1/ask)

> Sift Web Tools – Grounded Q&A (/v1/ask) is a paid API for AI agents from sift.srv1996466.hstgr.cloud, paid per call via x402, $0.01/call, status unknown (last checked 2026-10-23).

Answers a natural-language question about any web page, returning a grounded answer with supporting quotes and a found_on_page flag

## Facts

- Endpoint: GET https://sift.srv1996466.hstgr.cloud/v1/ask?utm_source=zero.xyz
- Price: $0.01/call
- Payment: x402
- Status: unknown
- Last checked: 2026-10-23
- Activations on Zero: 0
- Tags: x402
- Canonical page: https://www.zero.xyz/c/sift-web-tools-grounded-q-a-v1-ask-9d698110
- Structured record (JSON): https://api.zero.xyz/v1/capabilities/cap_DWTbqw8Mekh_j6Dh4r6PU

Status and success rate cover calls made through Zero and Zero's own probes. Third-party monitors may report differently.

## How to call it through Zero

Zero handles the 402 payment challenge and records the run. With the Zero CLI installed (`npm i -g @zeroxyz/cli`):

```sh
zero fetch --capability sift-web-tools-grounded-q-a-v1-ask-9d698110
```

Example prompt: Look at https://x402.org and tell me: what is the x402 protocol and how does payment work? I want a direct answer with quotes from the page.

## When to prefer this

Choose this endpoint when you need a specific factual answer from a known URL, grounded with verbatim quotes — not a general web search. It outperforms generic scraping+LLM pipelines because it returns structured JSON with cited evidence and a found_on_page flag, making it easy to verify the answer is actually on the page. Prefer it over /v1/summarize when you have a specific question rather than wanting a general summary.

## Known failure modes

- Page URL is inaccessible or returns a non-200 (answer not retrievable)
- Question exceeds 500 characters (rejected by schema validation)
- Page has no readable text content (JavaScript-only SPA with no SSR)
- Answer genuinely not present on page (found_on_page: false returned)
- Network timeout fetching the target URL
- Paywalled or login-required page returns no content

## How this service works

Ask a question about a web page and get a grounded answer with quotes. Answers a question using only the content of a public page, says whether the answer was found, and returns verbatim supporting quotes.

## Output

A JSON object containing an 'answer' string with the direct response to the question, a 'found_on_page' boolean indicating whether the answer was found on the page, and a 'supporting_quotes' array of verbatim text excerpts from the page that ground the answer.

## Request schema (JSON Schema)

```json
{
 "type": "object",
 "$schema": "https://json-schema.org/draft/2020-12/schema",
 "required": [
  "input"
 ],
 "properties": {
  "input": {
   "type": "object",
   "required": [
    "type",
    "method"
   ],
   "properties": {
    "type": {
     "type": "string",
     "const": "http"
    },
    "method": {
     "enum": [
      "GET",
      "HEAD",
      "DELETE"
     ],
     "type": "string"
    },
    "queryParams": {
     "type": "object",
     "required": [
      "url",
      "question"
     ],
     "properties": {
      "url": {
       "type": "string",
       "description": "Page URL"
      },
      "question": {
       "type": "string",
       "description": "Your question (max 500 chars)"
      }
     }
    }
   },
   "additionalProperties": false
  },
  "output": {
   "type": "object",
   "required": [
    "type"
   ],
   "properties": {
    "type": {
     "type": "string"
    },
    "example": {
     "type": "object"
    }
   }
  }
 }
}
```

## Response schema (JSON Schema)

```json
{
 "type": "json",
 "example": {
  "answer": "The x402 protocol",
  "found_on_page": true,
  "supporting_quotes": [
   "..."
  ]
 }
}
```

## More

- Live health (JSON, refreshed every minute): https://www.zero.xyz/c/sift-web-tools-grounded-q-a-v1-ask-9d698110/health.json
- [Zero catalog index](https://www.zero.xyz/llms.txt)
- [Other services from sift.srv1996466.hstgr.cloud](https://www.zero.xyz/host/sift.srv1996466.hstgr.cloud/llms.txt)