# DevHub stops responding while an agent searches a large repository

> Several text searches at once can hold DevHub busy; run them one at a time and prefer the symbol search.

**Symptom:** An agent sends many `files_search` calls in one turn against a large repository. DevHub does not repaint or answer clicks until they finish. In the report, eight calls each took about a minute and a few seconds and finished together.

**Cause:** Text search reads files one after another inside the main process of DevHub, which also serves MCP and every window. Calls arrive together and wait behind each other, and the application has nothing free to repaint. A rare string reads every file in the repository, because the maximum number of results limits what is returned, not the work.

**Solution:**

There is no fix to install. Until there is:

- Ask the agent to run one `files_search` at a time on a large repository. Other tools can be batched.
- Prefer `repo_symbol_search` where the language is indexed. It answers from the Repository Index, not from the disk.
- Wait. DevHub responds again when the searches finish.

**Applies from:** 0.8.1

> **Caution:** This was read from the code and matches the timings of one report. It was not reproduced
> deliberately, and a change in a later version may have made it obsolete. Check the [release
> notes](/devhub/release-notes/index.md).

## Related

- [Repository Index](/devhub/features/repository-index/index.md)
- [Limits for agents](/devhub/for-agents/limits/index.md)