Baloo/Debugging

Baloo is responsible for searching through files. Given that every system is quite different, and many different files can have different results, there can be some issues with Baloo. This page aims at helping you debug what exactly is going on and how to report the issue appropriately.

If you're in doubt, and not sure what is going on, please just file a bug and provide whatever information you feel may be appropriate. The developers will ask for more information and provide steps for you to follow.

Baloo is consuming too much CPU / RAM / Disk IO ?

The Baloo Project is responsible for many different parts of KDE. The developers need to know exactly which component is problematic. It would be best if you checked what the offending process is called.

baloo_file

This process is responsible for scheduling the indexing of files and save the name of the file. If this process is consuming too much CPU or Disk IO, it's probably due to the initial indexing. Based on your hard drive speed, baloo_file is able to do somewhere between 100 to 1000 files per second. Depending on how many files you have, it could take a couple of minutes. It would be best to just wait for a couple of minutes.

If you feel that you have been waiting for quite some time, and the baloo_file process is still consuming too much CPU or disk IO, please file a bug.

balooshow

The BalooShow tool is used to print debug information about a file.

   $ balooshow /home/vishesh/file.jpg
   4 /home/vishesh/file.jpg
           Width: 713
           Height: 955
           Photo X Dimension: 713
           Photo X Dimension: 955 

Please run this tool on the file which is not being found. It should print information similar to what is being printed above. If no information is printed, then please check the following

1. The file is not in the list of exclude folders
2. The baloo_file process is running.

Find by filename

balooshow -x displays additional information, including the terms that Dolphin's Find > by Filename search matches. For example,

 $ balooshow -x path/to/日本国_déjà_γενεος.txt`
 ...
 File Name Terms: Fdeja Ftxt Fγενεος deja txt γενεος

If you type more than one character in the Dolphin file browser's find by Filename field, it searches these terms anchored at the start, thus searching for "de", "γε", etc. should return this file.

baloosearch

The Baloosearch tool can be used to perform simple searches.

 $ baloosearch fire
   77040 /home/vishesh/kde5/src/qt5/qtimageformats/tests/shared/images/mng/fire.mng
   237751 /home/vishesh/Videos/Catching Fire Epic Review Special Edition.mp4
   237788 /home/vishesh/Videos/The Hunger Games Catching Fire (2013) [1080p]
   237790 /home/vishesh/Videos/fire.mp4
   53907 /home/vishesh/kde5/src/qt5/qtwebkit/Source/WebCore/html/MediaController.cpp
   54051 /home/vishesh/kde5/src/qt5/qtwebkit/Source/WebCore/html/HTMLMediaElement.cpp
   52257 /home/vishesh/kde5/src/qt5/qtwebkit/Source/WebCore/platform/ThreadTimers.cpp
   52867 /home/vishesh/kde5/src/qt5/qtwebkit/Source/WebCore/loader/NavigationScheduler.cpp
   53568 /home/vishesh/kde5/src/qt5/qtwebkit/Source/WebCore/html/track/TrackListBase.cpp
   52255 /home/vishesh/kde5/src/qt5/qtwebkit/Source/WebCore/platform/Timer.cpp

You should try searching for the file with this command.

If the file is not found even though it is indexed, then please file a bug with the exact search term, and the relevant words in the file.