HKUDS/Vibe-Trading · error · RegistryError

invalid {kind} {token!r}: must match {_ID_RE.pattern}

Error message

invalid {kind} {token!r}: must match {_ID_RE.pattern}

What it means

_validate_id_token enforces that alpha/theme identifiers match _ID_RE (a restricted identifier pattern). Tokens with spaces, uppercase, special characters, or empty strings raise RegistryError.

Source

Thrown at agent/src/factors/registry.py:144

class SkipAlpha(Exception):
    """Raised when an alpha's preconditions (sector, columns) are not met."""


class RegistryError(Exception):
    """Raised on registry-level configuration errors."""


@dataclass(frozen=True, slots=True)
class _LoadError:
    alpha_id: str
    reason: str


def _validate_id_token(token: str, kind: str) -> None:
    if not _ID_RE.fullmatch(token):
        raise RegistryError(f"invalid {kind} {token!r}: must match {_ID_RE.pattern}")


def load_alpha_meta_from_py(path: Path) -> AlphaMeta:
    """AST-extract the ``__alpha_meta__`` dict literal from a zoo module.

    No import is performed — purely static parsing. Raises ``RegistryError`` on
    malformed metadata.
    """
    size = path.stat().st_size
    if size > _MAX_PY_BYTES:
        raise RegistryError(f"{path.name}: {size}B exceeds {_MAX_PY_BYTES}B cap")

    source = path.read_text(encoding="utf-8")
    tree = ast.parse(source, filename=str(path))

    meta_node: ast.expr | None = None
    for stmt in tree.body:
        if not isinstance(stmt, ast.Assign):

View on GitHub (pinned to 80ffdda44c)

Solutions

1. Rename the id to match _ID_RE (typically lowercase snake_case/kebab-case alphanumerics)
2. Generate ids programmatically: re.sub(r'[^a-z0-9_-]', '', name.lower())
3. Check the pattern printed in the error message and conform to it

Example fix

# before
__alpha_meta__ = {'alpha_id': 'Momentum Fast!', ...}
# after
__alpha_meta__ = {'alpha_id': 'momentum_fast', ...}

import re
_ID_RE = re.compile(r'[a-z0-9][a-z0-9_-]*')  # mirror library pattern
assert _ID_RE.fullmatch(alpha_id), f'bad id: {alpha_id!r}'

def is_valid_id(token: str) -> bool:
    return bool(_ID_RE.fullmatch(token))

try:
    registry.register(path)
except RegistryError as e:
    if 'must match' in str(e): fix_id_and_retry(path)

When it happens

Trigger: Registering an alpha with id like 'My Alpha!', 'alpha#1', or '' in __alpha_meta__, or a theme token failing the same regex during scan/register.

Common situations: Auto-generating ids from filenames or display names with spaces/uppercase, hand-written metadata with friendly-looking names, or copy-pasted ids from another system with different id rules.

Related errors

• unknown panel column: {column}
• {path.name}: {size}B exceeds {_MAX_PY_BYTES}B cap
• {path.name}: __alpha_meta__ assignment not found
• {path.name}: __alpha_meta__ not a literal: {exc}
• {path.name}: __alpha_meta__ must be dict, got {type(raw).__n

AI-assisted analysis of HKUDS/Vibe-Trading@80ffdda44c (2026-08-28). Data as JSON: /api/errors/cc3655b155c60e32. Report an issue: GitHub.