SonarSource/sonarqube · error · IllegalArgumentException

Invalid format:

Error message

Invalid format: 

What it means

After decoding, parseComplianceStandardsFilter splits the string on '&' and each part on '='; each part must be exactly key=value. If any segment deviates (0 or >1 '='), it throws 'Invalid format: <decodedParam>' as an IllegalArgumentException.

Solutions

1. Format the parameter as repeated key=value segments joined by '&', e.g. cwe=20,89&owaspTop10=a1
2. Encode '=' inside values as %3D so split("=") still yields exactly two parts
3. Trim stray '&' separators before sending
4. Validate with a regex like ^[^=&]+=[^=&]+(&[^=&]+=[^=&]+)*$ client-side

Example fix

// before
filter=cwe=20=89
// after
filter=cwe=20,89

function isValidComplianceFilter(decoded) {
  return /^([^=&]+=[^=&]+)(&[^=&]+=[^=&]+)*$/.test(decoded);
}

try {
  await api.searchIssues({ complianceStandards: filter });
} catch (e) {
  if (e.status === 400 && /Invalid format: /.test(e.message)) {
    throw new Error(`Filter must be key=value pairs joined by '&': got '${filter}'`);
  }
  throw e;
}

When it happens

Trigger: Supplying a filter like 'key' (no =), 'key=a=b' (extra =), or an empty/stray '&' segment in the compliance standards parameter.

Common situations: Hand-built query strings not escaped, using ';' instead of '&' as separator, trailing '&' from concatenation, values containing unencoded '='.

Understand the failure class

Background: "Invalid ... format", "must be in format X", "does not look like a ..." — invalid argument format errors across CLI tools and libraries — this error's family across 17 libraries.

Related errors

• Can't URI decode
• Invalid impact format
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• a JVM option can't overwrite mandatory JVM options. The…
• a JVM option can't overwrite mandatory JVM options.

AI-assisted analysis of SonarSource/sonarqube@184c821202 (2026-09-09). Data as JSON: /api/errors/9526ca4dbc08303f. Report an issue: GitHub.

Appendix: source

Thrown at server/sonar-webserver-webapi/src/main/java/org/sonar/server/common/ParamParsingUtils.java:67

  public static Map<ReportKey, Set<String>> parseComplianceStandardsFilter(@Nullable String param) {
    if (param == null) {
      return Map.of();
    }

    String decodedParam;
    try {
      decodedParam = URLDecoder.decode(param, StandardCharsets.UTF_8);
    } catch (IllegalArgumentException e) {
      throw new IllegalArgumentException("Can't URI decode: " + param, e);
    }

    Map<ReportKey, Set<String>> categoriesByStandard = new HashMap<>();

    String[] parts = decodedParam.split("&");
    for (String part : parts) {
      String[] keyValue = part.split("=");
      if (keyValue.length != 2) {
        throw new IllegalArgumentException("Invalid format: " + decodedParam);
      }
      Set<String> values = Arrays.stream(keyValue[1].split(",")).filter(s -> !s.isBlank()).collect(Collectors.toSet());
      categoriesByStandard.put(ReportKey.parse(keyValue[0]), values);
    }

    return categoriesByStandard;
  }
}

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