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Chromium Datasource

The Chromium datasource extracts browsing history from Chromium's History database file, allowing you to index and search your web browsing activity.

Overview

This datasource reads visit data from Chromium's local SQLite database, including:

  • URLs visited
  • Page titles
  • Visit timestamps

The datasource safely creates a temporary copy of the database to avoid conflicts with Chromium when it's running.

Configuration

Basic Configuration

[datasources.chromium-browsing]
type = 'chromium'
# interval = '30m0s'  # Optional: custom fetch interval (default: 30m0s)

[datasources.chromium-browsing.config]
database_path = '/home/user/.config/chromium/Default/History'

Required Fields

  • database_path: Full path to Chromium's History file

Finding Your Chromium Profile

The location of your Chromium profile varies by operating system:

Linux

~/.config/chromium/Default/History

For other profiles:

~/.config/chromium/Profile 1/History
~/.config/chromium/Profile 2/History

macOS

~/Library/Application Support/Chromium/Default/History

Windows

%LOCALAPPDATA%\Chromium\User Data\Default\History

To find your exact profile path:

  1. Open Chromium
  2. Navigate to chrome://version
  3. Look for "Profile Path"
  4. The History file will be in that directory

Chromium-based Browsers

This datasource works with any Chromium-based browser that uses the same database schema, including:

  • Google Chrome: Replace chromium with google-chrome or chrome in the paths
  • Microsoft Edge: Look in ~/.config/microsoft-edge/ (Linux) or equivalent
  • Brave: Look in ~/.config/BraveSoftware/Brave-Browser/ (Linux) or equivalent
  • Vivaldi: Look in ~/.config/vivaldi/ (Linux) or equivalent

Example: Google Chrome on Linux

[datasources.chrome]
type = 'chromium'

[datasources.chrome.config]
database_path = '/home/user/.config/google-chrome/Default/History'

Multiple Profiles

You can configure multiple Chromium profiles or different browsers as separate datasources:

[datasources.chromium-work]
type = 'chromium'

[datasources.chromium-work.config]
database_path = '/home/user/.config/chromium/Profile 1/History'

[datasources.chromium-personal]
type = 'chromium'

[datasources.chromium-personal.config]
database_path = '/home/user/.config/chromium/Default/History'

[datasources.chrome]
type = 'chromium'

[datasources.chrome.config]
database_path = '/home/user/.config/google-chrome/Default/History'

Schema-Only Configuration (For Importer Use)

If you're using the chromium-importer tool to import browsing history remotely, you can configure the datasource with interval = '0s' to disable automatic fetching while still providing the schema for storage:

[datasources.chromium]
type = 'chromium'
interval = '0s'  # Disable automatic fetching (schema-only)
[datasources.chromium.config]
database_path = '/tmp/not-used'  # Dummy path, won't be accessed

[datasources.importer]
type = 'importer'
interval = '5m0s'  # Check for imported blocks every 5 minutes
[datasources.importer.config]
api_url = 'http://localhost:9090'
api_key = 'your-token'

This configuration:

  • ✅ Registers the chromium schema for storage
  • ✅ Accepts imported blocks from chromium-importer
  • ✅ No automatic fetching (interval is 0)
  • ✅ No error during scheduled fetches
  • ✅ Database file is created with proper schema
  • ⚠️ May warn at startup if database path doesn't exist (harmless)

See the chromium-importer documentation for details on importing from remote machines.

Usage

Once configured, the Chromium datasource works with all standard ergs commands:

# Fetch browsing history
ergs fetch

# Search your browsing history
ergs search --query "documentation"

# List recent visits
ergs list --datasource chromium-browsing --limit 10

Data Fields

Each visit record includes:

  • url: The visited URL
  • title: Page title (if available)
  • visit_date: When the page was visited

Important Notes

  • Database Locks: Close Chromium (and all Chromium-based browsers) before running ergs to avoid database locking issues
  • Privacy: Only visits stored in Chromium's history are included; incognito sessions are not recorded
  • Safety: The datasource creates a temporary copy of your database file, so your original Chromium data is never modified
  • Performance: Large browsing histories may take longer to process initially
  • Timestamp Format: Chromium uses WebKit time format (microseconds since January 1, 1601 UTC), which is automatically converted to standard Unix time

Troubleshooting

"Database file does not exist"

  • Verify the path to your Chromium profile
  • Check that the History file exists in the specified location
  • Ensure you have read permissions for the file
  • Note: The file is named History (no extension)

"Required Chromium tables not found"

  • The database file may be corrupted or from an incompatible browser
  • Try using a different Chromium profile
  • Verify the file is actually a Chromium database (not Firefox or another browser)

Empty results

  • Check that your Chromium profile has browsing history
  • Verify Chromium is completely closed when running ergs
  • Try running ergs with --debug flag for more detailed logging

Database is locked

  • Ensure all Chromium-based browsers are completely closed
  • Check that no other processes are accessing the History file
  • Wait a few seconds and try again

Differences from Firefox Datasource

The Chromium datasource is similar to the Firefox datasource but with some key differences:

  • Database Schema: Uses Chromium's urls and visits tables instead of Firefox's moz_places and moz_historyvisits
  • Timestamp Format: Uses WebKit/Chrome time (microseconds since 1601) instead of Unix microseconds
  • No Description Field: Chromium doesn't store page descriptions in the history database
  • File Name: The database is named History (not places.sqlite)
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