--- name: perplexity-advanced-troubleshooting description: | Apply Perplexity advanced debugging techniques for hard-to-diagnose issues. Use when standard troubleshooting fails, investigating complex race conditions, or preparing evidence bundles for Perplexity support escalation. Trigger with phrases like "perplexity hard bug", "perplexity mystery error", "perplexity impossible to debug", "difficult perplexity issue", "perplexity deep debug". allowed-tools: Read, Grep, Bash(kubectl:*), Bash(curl:*), Bash(tcpdump:*) version: 1.0.0 license: MIT author: Jeremy Longshore --- # Perplexity Advanced Troubleshooting ## Overview Deep debugging techniques for complex Perplexity issues that resist standard troubleshooting. ## Prerequisites - Access to production logs and metrics - kubectl access to clusters - Network capture tools available - Understanding of distributed tracing ## Evidence Collection Framework ### Comprehensive Debug Bundle ```bash #!/bin/bash # advanced-perplexity-debug.sh BUNDLE="perplexity-advanced-debug-$(date +%Y%m%d-%H%M%S)" mkdir -p "$BUNDLE"/{logs,metrics,network,config,traces} # 1. Extended logs (1 hour window) kubectl logs -l app=perplexity-integration --since=1h > "$BUNDLE/logs/pods.log" journalctl -u perplexity-service --since "1 hour ago" > "$BUNDLE/logs/system.log" # 2. Metrics dump curl -s localhost:9090/api/v1/query?query=perplexity_requests_total > "$BUNDLE/metrics/requests.json" curl -s localhost:9090/api/v1/query?query=perplexity_errors_total > "$BUNDLE/metrics/errors.json" # 3. Network capture (30 seconds) timeout 30 tcpdump -i any port 443 -w "$BUNDLE/network/capture.pcap" & # 4. Distributed traces curl -s localhost:16686/api/traces?service=perplexity > "$BUNDLE/traces/jaeger.json" # 5. Configuration state kubectl get cm perplexity-config -o yaml > "$BUNDLE/config/configmap.yaml" kubectl get secret perplexity-secrets -o yaml > "$BUNDLE/config/secrets-redacted.yaml" tar -czf "$BUNDLE.tar.gz" "$BUNDLE" echo "Advanced debug bundle: $BUNDLE.tar.gz" ``` ## Systematic Isolation ### Layer-by-Layer Testing ```typescript // Test each layer independently async function diagnosePerplexityIssue(): Promise { const results: DiagnosisResult[] = []; // Layer 1: Network connectivity results.push(await testNetworkConnectivity()); // Layer 2: DNS resolution results.push(await testDNSResolution('api.perplexity.com')); // Layer 3: TLS handshake results.push(await testTLSHandshake('api.perplexity.com')); // Layer 4: Authentication results.push(await testAuthentication()); // Layer 5: API response results.push(await testAPIResponse()); // Layer 6: Response parsing results.push(await testResponseParsing()); return { results, firstFailure: results.find(r => !r.success) }; } ``` ### Minimal Reproduction ```typescript // Strip down to absolute minimum async function minimalRepro(): Promise { // 1. Fresh client, no customization const client = new PerplexityClient({ apiKey: process.env.PERPLEXITY_API_KEY!, }); // 2. Simplest possible call try { const result = await client.ping(); console.log('Ping successful:', result); } catch (error) { console.error('Ping failed:', { message: error.message, code: error.code, stack: error.stack, }); } } ``` ## Timing Analysis ```typescript class TimingAnalyzer { private timings: Map = new Map(); async measure(label: string, fn: () => Promise): Promise { const start = performance.now(); try { return await fn(); } finally { const duration = performance.now() - start; const existing = this.timings.get(label) || []; existing.push(duration); this.timings.set(label, existing); } } report(): TimingReport { const report: TimingReport = {}; for (const [label, times] of this.timings) { report[label] = { count: times.length, min: Math.min(...times), max: Math.max(...times), avg: times.reduce((a, b) => a + b, 0) / times.length, p95: this.percentile(times, 95), }; } return report; } } ``` ## Memory and Resource Analysis ```typescript // Detect memory leaks in Perplexity client usage const heapUsed: number[] = []; setInterval(() => { const usage = process.memoryUsage(); heapUsed.push(usage.heapUsed); // Alert on sustained growth if (heapUsed.length > 60) { // 1 hour at 1/min const trend = heapUsed[59] - heapUsed[0]; if (trend > 100 * 1024 * 1024) { // 100MB growth console.warn('Potential memory leak in perplexity integration'); } } }, 60000); ``` ## Race Condition Detection ```typescript // Detect concurrent access issues class PerplexityConcurrencyChecker { private inProgress: Set = new Set(); async execute(key: string, fn: () => Promise): Promise { if (this.inProgress.has(key)) { console.warn(`Concurrent access detected for ${key}`); } this.inProgress.add(key); try { return await fn(); } finally { this.inProgress.delete(key); } } } ``` ## Support Escalation Template ```markdown ## Perplexity Support Escalation **Severity:** P[1-4] **Request ID:** [from error response] **Timestamp:** [ISO 8601] ### Issue Summary [One paragraph description] ### Steps to Reproduce 1. [Step 1] 2. [Step 2] ### Expected vs Actual - Expected: [behavior] - Actual: [behavior] ### Evidence Attached - [ ] Debug bundle (perplexity-advanced-debug-*.tar.gz) - [ ] Minimal reproduction code - [ ] Timing analysis - [ ] Network capture (if relevant) ### Workarounds Attempted 1. [Workaround 1] - Result: [outcome] 2. [Workaround 2] - Result: [outcome] ``` ## Instructions ### Step 1: Collect Evidence Bundle Run the comprehensive debug script to gather all relevant data. ### Step 2: Systematic Isolation Test each layer independently to identify the failure point. ### Step 3: Create Minimal Reproduction Strip down to the simplest failing case. ### Step 4: Escalate with Evidence Use the support template with all collected evidence. ## Output - Comprehensive debug bundle collected - Failure layer identified - Minimal reproduction created - Support escalation submitted ## Error Handling | Issue | Cause | Solution | |-------|-------|----------| | Can't reproduce | Race condition | Add timing analysis | | Intermittent failure | Timing-dependent | Increase sample size | | No useful logs | Missing instrumentation | Add debug logging | | Memory growth | Resource leak | Use heap profiling | ## Examples ### Quick Layer Test ```bash # Test each layer in sequence curl -v https://api.perplexity.com/health 2>&1 | grep -E "(Connected|TLS|HTTP)" ``` ## Resources - [Perplexity Support Portal](https://support.perplexity.com) - [Perplexity Status Page](https://status.perplexity.com) ## Next Steps For load testing, see `perplexity-load-scale`. --- Source attribution: Dicklesworthstone Original project: https://github.com/Dicklesworthstone/pi_agent_rust/blob/f28fc46ee0db8e710d95b8b55592cd38d60f2b26/tests/ext_conformance/artifacts/plugins-community/plugins/saas-packs/perplexity-pack/skills/perplexity-advanced-troubleshooting/SKILL.md License: MIT License information: https://opensource.org/license/mit Original upstream instructions; downloaded from Mega AI Hub. ## Upstream license notice MIT License (with OpenAI/Anthropic Rider) Copyright (c) 2026 Jeffrey Emanuel Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy of this software and associated documentation files (the "Software"), to deal in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions: ADDITIONAL RIDER / RESTRICTION (OpenAI / Anthropic): This rider is part of the "conditions" of this License. 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IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM, OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE SOFTWARE. # Mega AI Hub resource metadata Creator / publisher: Dicklesworthstone Original project: https://github.com/Dicklesworthstone/pi_agent_rust/blob/f28fc46ee0db8e710d95b8b55592cd38d60f2b26/tests/ext_conformance/artifacts/plugins-community/plugins/saas-packs/perplexity-pack/skills/perplexity-advanced-troubleshooting/SKILL.md Attribution basis: Source repository record Fields of work: Development & Engineering, Customer Support Roles: Backend Developer, DevOps / SRE, Technical Support Specialties: Backend Tools: Perplexity Country applicability: Country not specified Classification basis: Source catalog labels Instruction SHA-256: 9cc06fa8bb2660f2139d04fe9f168e23695dee7d0099c99bdca9dd695acf6242