PaveDB — Retrieval you can inspect. Infrastructure you can own.

PaveDB is an inspectable retrieval database for AI applications. By default, text searches keep their source provenance, stored query record, and replay trail.

Start embedded in Python, self-host the same engine over HTTP, or point the same clients at managed PaveDB. The API stays stable and the archive remains portable, so the prototype is not a throwaway and the hosted path keeps an exit.

Highlights

• One engine and interface from embedded prototype to self-hosted or managed production
• Query history and replay for text searches, enabled by default
• Deterministic provenance: every text-backed hit returns a document id, snippet, and source-specific page, row, or offset
• Multi-tenant collections: /collections/{tenant}/{name}
• Upload and search TXT, CSV, and PDF
• Metadata filters on search ({"filters": {"docid": "DOC-1"}})
• Embedded Python, REST, and CLI entry points
• Health/metrics endpoints + Prometheus exporter
• Local and hosted embedding choices; default stack is FAISS + SBERT

Requirements

• Python 3.10–3.14

Install (PyPI)

python -m venv .venv
source .venv/bin/activate
pip install pavedb

CPU-only deployments can use the PyTorch CPU wheel index:

pip install "pavedb[cpu]" \
  --index-url https://download.pytorch.org/whl/cpu \
  --extra-index-url https://pypi.org/simple

Quickstart

Embedded, with no server or config:

from pavesdk.client import connect

db = connect("./data")
books = db.create_collection("books")
books.add("Captain Nemo commands the Nautilus.", docid="note-1")
hits = books.search("submarine captain", k=3)
db.close()

Serve the same engine over HTTP:

# Start the server (installed entry point)
pavesrv

pavesrv is the supported server entry point. The packaged pave.main:app target rejects direct ASGI loading because it bypasses startup policy. Close an embedded client before serving its data directory: one supported local entry point owns a directory at a time.

Auth defaults to static. none is refused outside dev mode. For production, set a key:

export PAVEDB_AUTH__MODE=static
export PAVEDB_AUTH__GLOBAL_KEY="your-secret"

Minimal config (optional)

By default PaveDB runs with sensible local defaults. For a user install, customize ~/pavedb/config.yml:

vector_store:
  type: faiss
embedder:
  default: native
  instances:
    native:
      type: sbert
auth:
  mode: static
  global_key: ${PAVEDB_GLOBAL_KEY}

Then export:

export PAVEDB_GLOBAL_KEY="your-secret"

If you keep the file elsewhere, point the runtime at it explicitly:

export PAVEDB_CONFIG=/path/to/config.yml

CLI example

pavecli create-collection demo books
pavecli ingest demo books demo/20k_leagues.txt --docid=verne-20k \
  --metadata='{"lang":"en"}'
pavecli search demo books "captain nemo" -k 5

REST example

# Create a collection
curl -X POST http://localhost:8086/v1/collections/demo/books \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer your-secret"

# Upload a TXT document
curl -X POST http://localhost:8086/v1/collections/demo/books/documents \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer your-secret" \
  -F "file=@demo/20k_leagues.txt" -F "docid=verne-20k" \
  -F 'metadata={"lang":"en"}'

# Search (GET, no filters)
curl -G --data-urlencode "q=hello" \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer your-secret" \
  http://localhost:8086/v1/collections/demo/books/search

# Search (POST, with filters)
curl -X POST http://localhost:8086/v1/collections/demo/books/search \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer your-secret" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"q":"captain nemo","k":5,"filters":{"docid":"verne-20k"}}'

License

AGPL-3.0-or-later — (C) 2025, 2026 Rodrigo Rodrigues da Silva rodrigo@flowlexi.com