apache/cassandra · error · IndexNotFound

Index {} not found

Error message

Index {} not found

What it means

Shell.get_index_meta looks up a secondary index by name in KeyspaceMetadata.indexes. If the index name is absent, it raises IndexNotFound. Indexes are keyspace-scoped, so a valid index in another keyspace still fails here.

Source

Thrown at pylib/cqlshlib/cqlshmain.py:600

            table_meta = TableMetadata(ks_meta, 'role_permissions')
            table_meta.columns['role'] = ColumnMetadata(table_meta, 'role', cassandra.cqltypes.UTF8Type)
            table_meta.columns['resource'] = ColumnMetadata(table_meta, 'resource', cassandra.cqltypes.UTF8Type)
            table_meta.columns['permission'] = ColumnMetadata(table_meta, 'permission', cassandra.cqltypes.UTF8Type)
        elif tablename == 'generated_values':
            ks_meta = KeyspaceMetadata(ksname, True, None, None)
            table_meta = TableMetadata(ks_meta, 'generated_values')
            table_meta.columns['generated_password'] = ColumnMetadata(table_meta, 'generated_password', cassandra.cqltypes.UTF8Type)
            table_meta.columns['generated_role_name'] = ColumnMetadata(table_meta, 'generated_role_name', cassandra.cqltypes.UTF8Type)
        else:
            raise ColumnFamilyNotFound("Column family {} not found".format(tablename))

    def get_index_meta(self, ksname, idxname):
        if ksname is None:
            ksname = self.current_keyspace
        ksmeta = self.get_keyspace_meta(ksname)

        if idxname not in ksmeta.indexes:
            raise IndexNotFound("Index {} not found".format(idxname))

        return ksmeta.indexes[idxname]

    def get_view_meta(self, ksname, viewname):
        if ksname is None:
            ksname = self.current_keyspace
        ksmeta = self.get_keyspace_meta(ksname)

        if viewname not in ksmeta.views:
            raise MaterializedViewNotFound("Materialized view '{}' not found".format(viewname))
        return ksmeta.views[viewname]

    def get_object_meta(self, ks, name):
        if name is None:
            if ks and ks in self.conn.metadata.keyspaces:
                return self.conn.metadata.keyspaces[ks]
            elif self.current_keyspace is None:
                raise ObjectNotFound("'{}' not found in keyspaces".format(ks))

View on GitHub (pinned to 88fd0f6a0e)

Solutions

  1. Run DESCRIBE KEYSPACE <ks> to see actual index names and correct the name.
  2. Include the keyspace explicitly and confirm the current keyspace is right.
  3. Refresh schema metadata / reconnect if the index was just created.
  4. Create the index with CREATE INDEX if it does not exist.

Example fix

// before
shell.get_index_meta('ks', 'users_by_email_idx')  # IndexNotFound
// after
shell.get_index_meta('ks', 'users_email_idx')  # exact index name from schema
Defensive patterns

Strategy: validation

Validate before calling

ksmeta = shell.get_keyspace_meta(ksname)
if idxname not in ksmeta.indexes:
    raise LookupError(f"Index {idxname} missing in {ksname}")

Type guard

def index_exists(shell, ksname, idxname):
    return idxname in shell.get_keyspace_meta(ksname).indexes

Try / catch

try:
    imeta = shell.get_index_meta(ksname, idxname)
except IndexNotFound:
    imeta = None  # use table metadata and scan its index definitions instead

Prevention

When it happens

Trigger: get_index_meta(ksname, idxname) with idxname not present in ksmeta.indexes — e.g. DESCRIBE of a dropped/typo'd index, or metadata fetched before a CREATE INDEX completed.

Common situations: Referring to an index by its backing table name instead of the actual index name; index dropped by another session; schema disagreement after CREATE INDEX; wrong keyspace in scope.

Understand the failure class

Background: "Not found" and "does not exist" errors: why "Task not found", "No such folder", and "Can't find" fire when a lookup comes back empty — this error's family across 14 libraries.

Related errors

AI-assisted analysis of apache/cassandra@88fd0f6a0e (2026-09-10). Data as JSON: /api/errors/b4cb216cc1a286e3. Report an issue: GitHub.