Files
lancedb/docs
KarthikSandXuanwo 3dd579785e fix(python)!: align synchronous table method signatures (#4498)
Closes #4396.

Calls written against `Table` can fail or bind different arguments when
used with `RemoteTable`. Align the affected sync signatures, positional
order, and defaults; preserve renamed remote keywords as deprecated
aliases. Share legacy vector configuration and tokenizer inference,
forward index tuning and timeout options, and accept `fast_search`
consistently.

Preserve current upstream conversion behavior: local
`to_polars(batch_size=...)` returns a LazyFrame; remote tables accept
the same argument signature but raise the documented
unsupported-operation error and direct callers to
`table.search().to_polars()`. The abstract `Table` method retains its
unsupported-operation error, with the implementation confined to
`LanceTable`.

Regression coverage checks argument binding, deprecated aliases, option
forwarding, native behavior through both wrappers, HTTP index requests,
and remote conversion rejection. The merge preserves current tokenizer
defaults, remote query defaults, HNSW-PQ support, and
unsupported-operation handling.

Runtime validation at `c4fb01f2` (Linux x86_64, uv-managed Python
3.12.15):
- Focused Ruff lint and formatting passed for all four changed Python
files.
- Rebuilt and installed the current native extension successfully with
the repository's `ci` Cargo profile.
- Seven regression suites passed: `test_errors.py`,
`test_table_signatures.py`, `test_remote_db.py`, `test_table.py`,
`test_index.py`, `test_fts.py`, and `test_query.py`: **874 passed, 1
deselected**, with slow and S3 tests excluded.
- CI caught an abstract-base conversion regression in the initial merge.
The existing error-contract test reproduced it locally (1 failed, 7
passed); restoring the implementation to `LanceTable` fixes it while
preserving signature parity.
- Full-root Ruff reports 49 lint errors and 11 files needing formatting,
all in unchanged upstream `docs/web-tests` files. The four changed
Python files pass both checks.
- Validated against upstream `197403e8`, using Lance 15.0.0-beta.1 and
LanceDB 0.41.0-beta.14 bindings.

Historical validation before this merge: 618 tests passed and one was
deselected. That result does not establish correctness of the current
merge. The original client-side reproduction produced nine
argument-binding errors without contacting a server; the initial
regression suite failed 32 cases before the fix and passed 39 after it.

Documentation review follow-up: restored the `batch_size` parameter
description on the abstract `Table.to_polars` method so it appears in
the public API reference. This adds six docstring lines and changes no
runtime behavior. After this edit, all 47 focused error-contract and
signature tests pass; changed-file Ruff lint/format and `git diff
--check` pass. Repository-wide Ruff still reports the same 49 findings
and 11 formatting files in unchanged `docs/web-tests`. The full
documentation site and seven-suite runtime run were not repeated for
this documentation-only follow-up.

The reported ARM64 production-server deployment has not been recreated.
HTTP integration tests use the repository's local mock server.

BREAKING CHANGE: Remote synchronous table methods now use the positional
argument order and defaults documented by `Table`. Migrate calls using
the former remote-only positional order to named arguments, particularly
`create_index` and `search`; pass `index_type` by keyword to
`create_scalar_index`. Remote scalar and vector index creation now
default to `replace=True`; specify `replace=False` to retain rejection
of an existing index. Renamed remote keywords remain supported as
deprecated aliases, as documented above.

---------

Co-authored-by: Xuanwo <github@xuanwo.io>
2026-10-26 19:28:44 +08:00
..
2026-09-09 15:33:04 +08:00

LanceDB Documentation

LanceDB docs are available at docs.lancedb.com.

The SDK docs are built and deployed automatically by Github Actions whenever a commit is pushed to the main branch. So it is possible for the docs to show unreleased features.

Building the docs

Setup

  1. Install LanceDB Python. See setup in Python contributing guide. Run make develop to install the Python package.
  2. Install documentation dependencies. From LanceDB repo root: pip install -r docs/requirements.txt

Preview the docs

Run these commands from the LanceDB repository root. The subshell changes into docs to load mkdocs.yml, while leaving your shell in the repository root.

(cd docs && PYTHONPATH=. mkdocs serve)

If you want to just generate the HTML files:

(cd docs && PYTHONPATH=. mkdocs build)

If successful, you should see a docs/site directory in the repository root that you can verify locally.

Adding examples

To make sure examples are correct, we put examples in test files so they can be run as part of our test suites.

You can see the tests are at:

  • Python: python/python/tests/docs
  • Typescript: nodejs/examples/

Checking python examples

cd python
pytest -vv python/tests/docs

Checking typescript examples

The examples depend on @lancedb/lancedb at file:../dist, so the package must be built before running the tests. This uses pnpm; see the Typescript contributing guide for the toolchain setup.

pushd nodejs
pnpm install
pnpm build
popd

Then you can run the examples by going to the nodejs/examples directory, which is a separate pnpm package with its own lockfile:

pushd nodejs/examples
pnpm install
pnpm test
popd

API documentation

Python

The Python API documentation is organized based on the file docs/src/python/python.md. We manually add entries there so we can control the organization of the reference page. However, this means any new types must be manually added to the file. No additional steps are needed to generate the API documentation.

Typescript

The typescript API documentation is generated from the typescript source code using typedoc.

When new APIs are added, you must manually re-run the typedoc command to update the API documentation. The new files should be checked into the repository.

pushd nodejs
# `pnpm docs` would invoke pnpm's built-in `docs` command, not the script.
pnpm run docs
popd