GrepAI Watch Daemon

This skill covers the grepai watch command and daemon management for real-time code indexing.

When to Use This Skill

• Starting initial code indexing

• Setting up real-time file monitoring

• Running the daemon in background

• Troubleshooting indexing issues

What the Watch Daemon Does

The watch daemon:

• Scans all source files in your project

• Chunks code into segments (~512 tokens)

• Generates embeddings via your configured provider

• Stores vectors in your configured backend

• Monitors for file changes in real-time

• Updates the index when files change

Basic Usage

Start Watching (Foreground)

cd /your/project grepai watch

Output:

🔍 GrepAI Watch Scanning files... Found 245 files Processing chunks... ████████████████████████████████ 100% Indexed 1,234 chunks Watching for changes...

Press Ctrl+C to stop.

Start in Background

grepai watch --background

Output:

🔍 GrepAI Watch (background) Daemon started with PID 12345 Log file: ~/.grepai/daemon.log

Check Daemon Status

grepai watch --status

Output:

✅ GrepAI Daemon Running

PID: 12345 Started: 2025-01-28 10:30:00 Project: /path/to/project

Statistics:

• Files indexed: 245
• Chunks: 1,234
• Last update: 2 minutes ago

Stop the Daemon

grepai watch --stop

Output:

✅ Daemon stopped (PID 12345)

Command Reference

Command Description

grepai watch

Start daemon in foreground

grepai watch --background

Start daemon in background

grepai watch --status

Check daemon status

grepai watch --stop

Stop running daemon

Configuration

Watch Settings

.grepai/config.yaml

watch:

Debounce delay in milliseconds

Groups rapid file changes together

debounce_ms: 500

Debounce Explained

When you save a file, editors often write multiple times quickly. Debouncing waits for changes to settle:

Value Behavior

100

More responsive, more reindexing

500

Balanced (default)

1000

Less responsive, fewer reindexing

Initial Indexing

What Gets Indexed

The daemon indexes files:

• Matching supported extensions (.go, .js, .ts, .py, etc.)

• Not in ignore patterns (node_modules, .git, etc.)

• Respecting .gitignore

Indexing Progress

Large codebases show progress:

Scanning files... Found 10,245 files Processing chunks... ████████████████░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░░ 50% (5,122/10,245)

Indexing Time Estimates

Codebase Files Time (Ollama) Time (OpenAI)

Small 100 ~30s ~10s

Medium 1,000 ~5min ~1min

Large 10,000 ~30min ~5min

Real-Time Monitoring

After initial indexing, the daemon watches for:

• File creation

• File modification

• File deletion

• File renames

File Change Detection

Uses OS-native file watching:

• macOS: FSEvents

• Linux: inotify

• Windows: ReadDirectoryChangesW

What Triggers Reindexing

Action Result

Save existing file Re-embed file chunks

Create new file Index new chunks

Delete file Remove from index

Rename file Update path, keep vectors

Background Daemon Management

Starting on System Boot

macOS (launchd)

Create ~/Library/LaunchAgents/com.grepai.watch.plist :

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?> <!DOCTYPE plist PUBLIC "-//Apple//DTD PLIST 1.0//EN" "http://www.apple.com/DTDs/PropertyList-1.0.dtd"> <plist version="1.0"> <dict> <key>Label</key> <string>com.grepai.watch</string> <key>ProgramArguments</key> <array> <string>/usr/local/bin/grepai</string> <string>watch</string> </array> <key>WorkingDirectory</key> <string>/path/to/your/project</string> <key>RunAtLoad</key> <true/> <key>KeepAlive</key> <true/> </dict> </plist>

Load:

launchctl load ~/Library/LaunchAgents/com.grepai.watch.plist

Linux (systemd)

Create ~/.config/systemd/user/grepai-watch.service :

[Unit] Description=GrepAI Watch Daemon After=network.target

[Service] Type=simple WorkingDirectory=/path/to/your/project ExecStart=/usr/local/bin/grepai watch Restart=always

[Install] WantedBy=default.target

Enable:

systemctl --user enable grepai-watch systemctl --user start grepai-watch

Checking Logs

Background daemon logs

tail -f ~/.grepai/daemon.log

Or with systemd

journalctl --user -u grepai-watch -f

Multiple Projects

One Daemon Per Project

Run separate daemons for each project:

Terminal 1: Project A

cd /path/to/project-a grepai watch --background

Terminal 2: Project B

cd /path/to/project-b grepai watch --background

Using Workspaces

For multi-project setups:

grepai workspace create my-workspace grepai workspace add my-workspace /path/to/project-a grepai workspace add my-workspace /path/to/project-b grepai watch --workspace my-workspace

Troubleshooting

Daemon Won't Start

❌ Problem: "Another daemon is already running" ✅ Solution:

grepai watch --stop grepai watch --background

❌ Problem: "Config not found" ✅ Solution: Initialize first:

grepai init grepai watch

❌ Problem: "Embedder connection failed" ✅ Solution: Start your embedding provider:

ollama serve # For Ollama

Indexing Issues

❌ Problem: Files not being indexed ✅ Solution: Check ignore patterns in config, ensure file extension is supported

❌ Problem: Indexing very slow ✅ Solutions:

• Use OpenAI for faster cloud embeddings

• Add more ignore patterns

• Increase chunking size

❌ Problem: Index seems outdated ✅ Solution: Clear and reindex:

rm .grepai/index.gob grepai watch

File Watch Issues

❌ Problem: Changes not detected ✅ Solutions:

• Reduce debounce_ms

• Check inotify limits (Linux): echo 65536 | sudo tee /proc/sys/fs/inotify/max_user_watches

Best Practices

• Run in background: For continuous monitoring

• Use workspace for monorepos: Better organization

• Set up auto-start: launchd or systemd

• Check logs periodically: Monitor for errors

• Reindex after config changes: Especially after changing embedding model

Status Check

Regular health check:

grepai status

Output:

✅ GrepAI Status

Project: /path/to/project Config: .grepai/config.yaml

Embedder: Ollama (nomic-embed-text) Storage: GOB (.grepai/index.gob)

Index:

• Files: 245
• Chunks: 1,234
• Size: 12.5 MB
• Last updated: 2025-01-28 10:30:00

Daemon: Running (PID 12345)

Output Format

Watch daemon status:

✅ Watch Daemon Active

Mode: Background PID: 12345 Project: /path/to/project

Initial Index:

• Files scanned: 245
• Chunks created: 1,234
• Duration: 45s

Real-time Monitor:

• Debounce: 500ms
• Events processed: 23
• Last event: 5 minutes ago

Next steps:

• Run 'grepai search "query"' to search
• Run 'grepai watch --status' to check status
• Run 'grepai watch --stop' to stop daemon