MemPalace/mempalace · error · SearchError

No palace found at {palace_path}

Error message

No palace found at {palace_path}

What it means

Error "No palace found at {palace_path}" thrown in MemPalace/mempalace.

Source

Thrown at mempalace/searcher.py:662

        # less-helpful backend validation path.
        backend_name = None

    if backend_name == "chroma" and _hnsw_capacity_diverged(palace_path):
        return _print_search_results_bm25_only(
            query,
            palace_path,
            wing,
            room,
            n_results,
            stop_words=stop_words,
            since_dt=since_dt,
            before_dt=before_dt,
        )

    col = _open_collection_or_explain(palace_path, opener=get_collection)
    if col is None:
        if not os.path.isdir(palace_path):
            raise SearchError(f"No palace found at {palace_path}")
        raise SearchError(f"No palace database at {palace_path}")

    # Alert the user if this palace predates hnsw:space=cosine being set on
    # creation — their similarity scores will be junk until they run repair.
    _warn_if_legacy_metric(col)

    where = build_where_filter(wing, room)

    try:
        kwargs = {
            "query_texts": [query],
            # The window is a post-filter (ChromaDB can't range-compare
            # string metadata), so widen the fetch the same way the
            # programmatic path does and trim back after filtering.
            "n_results": _candidate_pool_size(n_results, date_window_active)
            if date_window_active
            else n_results,
            "include": ["documents", "metadatas", "distances"],

View on GitHub (pinned to 06cb6987f0)

Solutions

1. Run mempalace init or check the palace path configuration

When it happens

Trigger: Thrown at mempalace/searcher.py:662 when the library encounters an invalid state.

Common situations: Search was run against a palace path that does not exist.

AI-assisted analysis of MemPalace/mempalace@06cb6987f0 (2026-08-15). Data as JSON: /api/errors/8928ce381ef4eeaf. Report an issue: GitHub.