Knowledge Storage

Knowledge persists to an absolute, per-project Chroma store so unrelated projects never share one on-disk database.

Quick Start

Use the default location

Pass sources and let the store persist under the per-project default.

from praisonaiagents import Agent

agent = Agent(
    name="Research Assistant",
    knowledge=["docs/"]
)

agent.start("Summarize the docs")

Data lands at <project>/.praisonai/knowledge/chroma.

Choose your own location

Set vector_store.config.path to store data anywhere you like.

from praisonaiagents import Agent

agent = Agent(
    name="Research Assistant",
    knowledge={
        "sources": ["docs/"],
        "vector_store": {
            "config": {"path": "/data/my_project/chroma"}
        }
    }
)

agent.start("Summarize the docs")

Where Is My Data Stored?

Omit path and Knowledge persists to an absolute directory derived from your project root.

Setting	Location
Default (no `path`)	`<project>/.praisonai/knowledge/chroma`
Explicit `path`	Exactly the directory you provide

The default is absolute and per-project, so two projects — or a test harness that changes directories — never write to the same sqlite file.

Earlier releases defaulted to the cwd-relative string "knowledge_db", which let unrelated projects collide. Upgrade to the release built from PraisonAI PR #4422 for the isolated default.

How to Change It

Point path at any directory via the Agent config or a standalone Knowledge instance.

from praisonaiagents import Knowledge

kb = Knowledge(config={
    "vector_store": {
        "config": {"path": "/data/shared/chroma"}
    }
})

kb.add("research.pdf")

An explicitly configured path always wins over the default.

What If the Store Is Corrupt?

A corrupt, locked, or version-mismatched Chroma store now raises a RuntimeError instead of crashing the interpreter.

RuntimeError: Chroma persist failed at '<path>' (PanicException: <text>).
Pass a fresh directory via knowledge config vector_store.config.path.

ChromaDB’s rust bindings can raise a PanicException (a BaseException, not Exception) that previously unwound through Agent.start and killed Python — on Windows this showed up as a SIGSEGV or hang (issue #4376). The SDK now catches it and re-raises an actionable Python error, while KeyboardInterrupt still propagates so Ctrl-C keeps working. Directory indexing behaves the same: a backend panic on one file surfaces as RuntimeError: Knowledge indexing backend crashed on <file> rather than terminating the process. Recovery: delete the persist directory and re-index, or point path at a fresh directory.

import shutil
from praisonaiagents import Agent

shutil.rmtree(".praisonai/knowledge/chroma", ignore_errors=True)

agent = Agent(name="Research Assistant", knowledge=["docs/"])
agent.start("Re-index and answer")

Configuration Options

Chroma persistence is controlled by a single option under vector_store.config.

Option	Type	Default	Description
`path`	`str`	`<project>/.praisonai/knowledge/chroma` (absolute, per project)	Directory where the Chroma sqlite store is persisted. Optional — omit to use the per-project default.

Best Practices

Omit path for local development

Leave path unset and rely on the per-project default. Each project keeps its own isolated store with zero configuration.

Set an explicit path for shared or deployed stores

Point path at a stable, absolute directory when multiple services must read the same knowledge base, or when deploying where the working directory changes.

Recover instead of retrying on a panic

A RuntimeError: Chroma persist failed ... means the store is corrupt or locked. Delete the directory or switch to a fresh path — re-running against the same broken store repeats the failure.

Isolate per environment

Use distinct paths for development, test, and production so an experiment never corrupts a shared index.

Knowledge

Add documents and query them from an agent

Knowledge Backends

Pick and configure a vector store

Getting Started

Install

Core Concepts

Guides

Features

Models

Databases

Observability

Memory

Telemetry & Analytics

Knowledge

RAG

Persistence

Tools

Other Features

Developers

Configuration

Best Practices

Getting Started (No Code)

Quick Start

Where Is My Data Stored?

How to Change It

What If the Store Is Corrupt?

Configuration Options

Best Practices

Knowledge

Knowledge Backends

​Quick Start

​Where Is My Data Stored?

​How to Change It

​What If the Store Is Corrupt?

​Configuration Options

​Best Practices

​Related

Knowledge

Knowledge Backends

Quick Start

Where Is My Data Stored?

How to Change It

What If the Store Is Corrupt?

Configuration Options

Best Practices

Related