Search and indexing: find any output again

Context Mode Engine puts every large output, file, folder and web page you index into one SQLite FTS5 database per project, on your machine. When you need that test log or that doc page again, the agent calls ctx_search and gets the five best matching parts back in 1.7 ms median.

Free · Local · Private · Yours to keep

Context Mode Engine is source-available under the Elastic License 2.0. Use it, copy it, change it and share it at zero cost, for as long as you follow the licence terms. It runs on your machine, sends zero usage data, and keeps your data in ~/.context-mode.

The answer was in that log ten minutes ago

Your agent ran the tests, read a long log and moved on. Now you ask about one error in that log. The agent runs the tests again or reads the whole file again. That costs time and fills the context window with the same bytes twice.

Context Mode Engine keeps that output for you. The agent asks a short question and reads back only the part that answers it.

What goes into the index

The index fills in two ways.

• By itself. When a command prints more than the reply holds, the Engine stores the whole output and the reply ends with a ctx_search call the agent can run. On agents with a replace channel, a large tool output goes in the same way.
• When you ask. ctx_index stores a file, a folder, a text or a URL. In a folder it follows each nested .gitignore. A URL comes back as Markdown. Each path label uses forward slashes on every OS, such as docs/api.md.

The Engine cuts each item into chunks of at most 4,096 B. A Markdown chunk stays inside one heading section and carries its heading path as its title. A code block that fits in one chunk stays whole.

All of it goes into ~/.context-mode/projects/<projectKey>/context.db, one file per project, outside your repo. ctx_index stores 155 ms per MB, median of 5 runs over 3 real files of 0.6 MB (raw results, line 120).

What ctx_search gives back

One search matches words and names at the same time, so timeout also finds "timed out" and authMid finds src/authMiddleware.ts, and the agent gets back the best matching parts, each with its source label.

1. Hits from the current session come first, then the rest by score.
2. When a word matches zero rows, it tries a spelling fix from the words in the index.
3. It returns 5 hits per reply. Each snippet is at most 800 B, or a whole code block of at most 2,048 B. A More: line gives the call for the next page.

A search takes 1.7 ms median (range 1.6-2.0 ms), 5 runs of 20 queries over 8 indexed files (raw results, line 119).

Each hit line names its source and chunk number. Here is the shape of a reply, with example labels:

Query "timeout":
test-output #4: Error in api/retry.test.ts: request timeout after 5000 ms ...
docs/api.md #12: ## Retries  Each call waits 5,000 ms, then ...
More: ctx_search({queries:["timeout"], offset:5})

Pick a scope

Other inputs: source picks one item by its label, sort:"timeline" lists hits oldest first, and source:"decision" searches only the rows where you answered a question.

What you get

The agent finds an earlier answer with one short call and reads a few hundred bytes in place of the whole log. Your index stays on your disk. The Engine deletes an item after 30 days with zero reads, keeps each project at 500 MB or less, and ctx_purge deletes a session, a source or a whole project when you ask.