hygrep 0.0.9

Grep + neural reranking for code search

hygrep (hhg)

Semantic code search with automatic indexing

pip install hygrep
hhg "authentication flow" ./src

What it does

Search your codebase using natural language. Results are functions and classes ranked by relevance:

$ hhg "error handling" ./tests/golden
No index found. Building...
Found 4 files (0.0s)
✓ Indexed 59 blocks from 4 files (5.4s)

Searching for: error handling
api_handlers.ts:127 function errorHandler
  function errorHandler(err: Error, req: Request, res: Response, next: NextFunc...
    console.error('API Error:', err.message);

errors.rs:7 class AppError
  pub enum AppError {
      /// Database operation failed.
      Database(DatabaseError),

2 results (0.60s)

Search Modes

Mode	Flag	Use Case
Semantic	(default)	Best quality, uses embeddings + index
Fast	-f	No index, grep + neural rerank
Exact	-e	Fastest, literal string match
Regex	-r	Pattern matching

hhg "auth flow" ./src           # Semantic (auto-indexes on first run)
hhg -f "validate" ./src         # Grep + neural rerank (no index needed)
hhg -e "TODO" ./src             # Exact match (fastest)
hhg -r "TODO.*fix" ./src        # Regex match

Install

Requires Python 3.11-3.13 (3.14 not yet supported due to onnxruntime).

pip install hygrep
# or
uv tool install hygrep
# or
pipx install hygrep

First search builds an index automatically (stored in .hhg/). Models are downloaded from HuggingFace and cached.

Usage

hhg "query" [path]              # Search (default: current dir)
hhg -n 5 "error handling" .     # Limit results
hhg --json "auth" .             # JSON output for scripts/agents
hhg -l "config" .               # List matching files only
hhg -t py,js "api" .            # Filter by file type
hhg --exclude "tests/*" "fn" .  # Exclude patterns
hhg status [path]               # Check index status
hhg rebuild [path]              # Rebuild index from scratch
hhg clean [path]                # Delete index

Note: Options must come before positional arguments.

Output

Default:

src/auth.py:42 function login
  def login(user, password):
      """Authenticate user and create session."""
      ...

JSON (--json):

[
  {
    "file": "src/auth.py",
    "type": "function",
    "name": "login",
    "line": 42,
    "end_line": 58,
    "content": "def login(user, password): ...",
    "score": 0.87
  }
]

Compact JSON (--json --compact): Same fields without content.

How it Works

Semantic mode (default):

Query → Embed → Vector search → Results
         ↓
    Auto-indexes on first run (.hhg/)
    Auto-updates when files change

Fast mode (-f):

Query → Grep scan → Tree-sitter extract → Neural rerank → Results

Exact/Regex mode (-e/-r):

Pattern → Grep scan → Tree-sitter extract → Results

Supported Languages

Bash, C, C++, C#, Elixir, Go, Java, JavaScript, JSON, Kotlin, Lua, Mojo, PHP, Python, Ruby, Rust, Svelte, Swift, TOML, TypeScript, YAML, Zig

Development

git clone https://github.com/nijaru/hygrep && cd hygrep
pixi install && pixi run build-ext && pixi run test

License

MIT