What causes "invalid session goal revision" in Hmbown/CodeWhale?

Fix or remove the goal_id field in the goal file (a valid non-empty ID ≤128 chars, or null).

invalid session goal revision

Error message

invalid session goal revision

What it means

When a goal_id is present, it must be non-empty and at most 128 bytes; otherwise SessionGoalState::validate rejects the state with this InvalidData error. This guards the revision identifier used to detect concurrent goal changes.

Solutions

Fix or remove the goal_id field in the goal file (a valid non-empty ID ≤128 chars, or null).
Delete the goal file and recreate the goal via the TUI.
Use the session's own goal commands to regenerate a valid revision instead of hand-crafting IDs.

Example fix

// before
{"goal_id": "", ...}
// after
{"goal_id": "g-8f14e45f", ...}   // or remove the field / set null

Defensive patterns

Strategy: validation

Validate before calling

fn goal_id_ok(id: &Option<String>) -> bool {
    id.as_ref().map(|i| !i.is_empty() && i.len() <= 128).unwrap_or(true)
}

Try / catch

match load_goal(path) {
    Err(e) if e.to_string().contains("invalid session goal revision") => {
        eprintln!("goal_id must be non-empty and <=128 chars, or absent");
    }
    other => other?,
}

Prevention

Let Codewhale generate goal_ids; don't hand-craft them.
Validate ID length before writing goal JSON programmatically.
Set goal_id to null rather than "" when clearing it.

When it happens

Trigger: Loading a goal state where goal_id is Some("") or a string longer than 128 bytes/chars.

Common situations: Hand-edited goal files setting goal_id to an empty string; scripts generating oversized IDs; corruption or truncation of the goal file.

Understand the failure class

Background: "invalid id" errors: invalid identifier format — why libraries reject IDs before lookup, and how to fix them — this error's family across 37 libraries.

Related errors

AI-assisted analysis of Hmbown/CodeWhale@73e0f67d83 (2026-09-22). Data as JSON: /api/errors/b3d5332624952df9. Report an issue: GitHub.

Appendix: source

Thrown at crates/tui/src/session_manager.rs:833

                    self.schema_version, CURRENT_SESSION_GOAL_SCHEMA_VERSION
                ),
            ));
        }
        let objective = self.objective.trim();
        if objective.is_empty() || objective.chars().count() > MAX_SESSION_GOAL_OBJECTIVE_CHARS {
            return Err(io::Error::new(
                io::ErrorKind::InvalidData,
                format!(
                    "Session goal objective must contain 1..={MAX_SESSION_GOAL_OBJECTIVE_CHARS} characters"
                ),
            ));
        }
        if self
            .goal_id
            .as_ref()
            .is_some_and(|id| id.is_empty() || id.len() > 128)
        {
            return Err(io::Error::new(
                io::ErrorKind::InvalidData,
                "invalid session goal revision",
            ));
        }
        codewhale_protocol::validate_goal_stall_state(
            self.last_gap_fingerprint.as_deref(),
            self.repeated_gap_count,
            self.last_gap_pass,
            self.continuation_count,
        )
        .map_err(|error| io::Error::new(io::ErrorKind::InvalidData, error))
    }

    #[must_use]
    pub fn to_runtime_snapshot(&self) -> GoalSnapshot {
        GoalSnapshot {
            goal_id: self.goal_id.clone(),
            objective: Some(self.objective.clone()),

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