usearch.cr

Crystal bindings for USearch, a fast approximate nearest neighbor search library using HNSW.

Features

• Fast ANN search via HNSW (Hierarchical Navigable Small World) graphs
• Multiple distance metrics (cosine, L2, inner product, etc.)
• Multiple quantization formats (f32, f16, i8, binary)
• Single-file persistence
• Memory-mapped indexes for large datasets
• Scales to millions of vectors

Installation

1. Add the shard

dependencies:
  usearch:
    github: trans/usearch.cr

shards install

2. Build libusearch

# Run the setup script (clones and builds usearch)
./scripts/setup.sh

This clones USearch into vendor/usearch/ and builds the static library. The library is statically linked, so no runtime dependencies are needed.

Requirements

• CMake 3.14+
• C++17 compiler (GCC 8+ or Clang 10+)

Dynamic linking (alternative)

If you prefer dynamic linking:

# Build with dynamic linking flag
crystal build -Dusearch_dynamic src/myapp.cr

# Set library path at runtime
LD_LIBRARY_PATH=vendor/usearch/build ./myapp

Usage

require "usearch"

# Create an index
index = USearch::Index.new(
  dimensions: 128,
  metric: :cos,           # :cos, :l2sq, :ip, :hamming, etc.
  quantization: :f16      # :f32, :f16, :i8, :b1
)

# Add vectors (key = your database row ID)
index.add(1_u64, vector1)
index.add(2_u64, vector2)
index.add(3_u64, vector3)

# Search for nearest neighbors
results = index.search(query_vector, k: 10)
results.each do |r|
  puts "Key: #{r.key}, Distance: #{r.distance}"
end

# Check if key exists
index.contains?(1_u64)  # => true

# Remove a vector
index.remove(1_u64)

# Save to disk
index.save("vectors.usearch")

# Load later
index = USearch::Index.load("vectors.usearch", dimensions: 128)

# Or memory-map for large indexes
index = USearch::Index.view("vectors.usearch", dimensions: 128)

# Clean up
index.close

Filtered Search

Search with a predicate to filter candidates:

# Only return vectors with even keys
results = index.filtered_search(query, k: 10) { |key| key.even? }

# Only return vectors in a specific set
valid_ids = Set{1_u64, 5_u64, 10_u64}
results = index.filtered_search(query, k: 10) { |key| valid_ids.includes?(key) }

Exact Search

Brute-force search (useful for ground truth or small datasets):

dataset = [vec1, vec2, vec3, ...]  # Array(Array(Float32))
queries = [query1, query2]

results = USearch.exact_search(dataset, queries, k: 10, metric: :cos)
# results[0] = top-10 for query1, results[1] = top-10 for query2

Serialization to Bytes

# Serialize to bytes (for embedding in other formats)
bytes = index.to_bytes

# Load from bytes
index = USearch::Index.from_bytes(bytes, dimensions: 128)

# View from bytes (zero-copy, buffer must stay alive)
index = USearch::Index.view_bytes(bytes, dimensions: 128)

# Inspect metadata without loading
meta = USearch::Index.metadata("vectors.usearch")
puts meta.dimensions  # => 128

Metrics

Quantization

Performance Tips

• Use f16 quantization for 2x memory savings with minimal recall loss
• Call reserve(n) before bulk inserts to avoid reallocations
• Use view() instead of load() for very large indexes
• Tune expansion_search for speed/accuracy tradeoff:

  index.expansion_search = 128  # Higher = more accurate, slower
  index.expansion_add = 256     # Higher = better graph quality
  

Utilities

# Library version
USearch::Index.version  # => "2.x.x"

# SIMD acceleration in use
USearch.hardware_acceleration  # => "avx2"

Development

crystal spec

License

MIT