MuntashirAkon/AppManager · error · IllegalArgumentException

Size is out of range: + size

Error message

Size is out of range: + size

What it means

TarArchiveEntry.setSize(long) validates that a tar entry's size is non-negative before storing it; tar headers cannot represent negative sizes. IllegalArgumentException("Size is out of range: " + size) is thrown for negative values.

Source

Thrown at app/src/main/java/org/apache/commons/compress/archivers/tar/TarArchiveEntry.java:910

    /**
     * Get if this entry is a sparse file with 1.X PAX Format or not
     *
     * @return True if this entry is a sparse file with 1.X PAX Format
     * @since 1.20
     */
    public boolean isPaxGNU1XSparse() {
        return paxGNU1XSparse;
    }

    /**
     * Set this entry's file size.
     *
     * @param size This entry's new file size.
     * @throws IllegalArgumentException if the size is < 0.
     */
    public void setSize(final long size) {
        if (size < 0) {
            throw new IllegalArgumentException("Size is out of range: " + size);
        }
        this.size = size;
    }

    /**
     * Get this entry's major device number.
     *
     * @return This entry's major device number.
     * @since 1.4
     */
    public int getDevMajor() {
        return devMajor;
    }

    /**
     * Set this entry's major device number.
     *
     * @param devNo This entry's major device number.

View on GitHub (pinned to 0152f468fc)

Solutions

1. Clamp or validate the size to >= 0 before calling setSize().
2. Fix the size computation (e.g. Math.max(0, end - start)) or use Files.size(path) for the true length.
3. When reading, reject archives whose PAX size header is negative rather than propagating it.
4. Catch IllegalArgumentException and skip the offending entry with a log.

Example fix

// before
entry.setSize(file.length() - skipped); // may go negative
// after
long size = Math.max(0, file.length() - skipped);
entry.setSize(size);

if (size < 0) throw new IllegalArgumentException("Entry size must be >= 0, got " + size);
tarEntry.setSize(size);

boolean isValidTarSize(long size) { return size >= 0 && size <= 0x7FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFL; }

try { tarEntry.setSize(size); } catch (IllegalArgumentException e) { Log.w(TAG, "Skipping entry with bad size", e); }

When it happens

Trigger: Calling setSize() with a negative long — typically from a corrupted/overflowed length value, a size computed as (end - start) where start > end, or a PaxHeader ('size=' via processPaxHeader) carrying a negative number.

Common situations: Backing up files whose reported length underflowed; computing entry size from wrong offsets; malicious/corrupted PAX headers in a crafted archive; long overflow when summing chunk sizes.

Understand the failure class

Background: "value must be between 0 and 1" / "out of range" / "must not be negative" errors: fixing range-validation failures across open-source libraries — this error's family across 42 libraries.

Related errors

• APK files backup is requested but no APK files have been bac
• APK files backup is requested but no APK files have been bac
• Major device number is out of range: + devNo
• Request to write '${numToWrite}' bytes exceeds size in heade
• Record to write has length '${record.length}' which is not t

AI-assisted analysis of MuntashirAkon/AppManager@0152f468fc (2026-09-12). Data as JSON: /api/errors/79d531a01b3c7532. Report an issue: GitHub.