Yeachan-Heo/oh-my-codex · error · Error

autoresearch candidate artifact base_commit is required

Error message

autoresearch candidate artifact base_commit is required

What it means

The required base_commit field must be a non-empty trimmed string. It identifies the git commit the candidate was produced against and cannot be missing, empty, or whitespace-only.

Source

Thrown at src/autoresearch/runtime.ts:1039

  let parsed: unknown;
  try {
    parsed = JSON.parse(raw);
  } catch {
    throw new Error('autoresearch candidate artifact must be valid JSON');
  }
  if (!parsed || typeof parsed !== 'object' || Array.isArray(parsed)) {
    throw new Error('autoresearch candidate artifact must be a JSON object');
  }
  const record = parsed as Record<string, unknown>;
  const status = record.status;
  if (status !== 'candidate' && status !== 'noop' && status !== 'abort' && status !== 'interrupted') {
    throw new Error('autoresearch candidate artifact status must be candidate|noop|abort|interrupted');
  }
  if (record.candidate_commit !== null && typeof record.candidate_commit !== 'string') {
    throw new Error('autoresearch candidate artifact candidate_commit must be string|null');
  }
  if (typeof record.base_commit !== 'string' || !record.base_commit.trim()) {
    throw new Error('autoresearch candidate artifact base_commit is required');
  }
  if (typeof record.description !== 'string') {
    throw new Error('autoresearch candidate artifact description is required');
  }
  if (!Array.isArray(record.notes) || record.notes.some((note) => typeof note !== 'string')) {
    throw new Error('autoresearch candidate artifact notes must be a string array');
  }
  if (typeof record.created_at !== 'string' || !record.created_at.trim()) {
    throw new Error('autoresearch candidate artifact created_at is required');
  }
  return {
    status,
    candidate_commit: record.candidate_commit,
    base_commit: record.base_commit,
    description: record.description,
    notes: record.notes,
    created_at: record.created_at,
  };

View on GitHub (pinned to 3ad79a8a6f)

Solutions

  1. Have the worker capture the base commit (git rev-parse HEAD) before starting and always write it as base_commit
  2. If the repo has no commits, create an initial empty commit so a base SHA exists
  3. Fix worker templates so base_commit is unconditionally populated, never conditionally omitted
  4. Fail loudly inside the worker if the base SHA cannot be read, instead of writing an empty value

Example fix

// before
{"status":"candidate","candidate_commit":"def","description":"...","notes":[]}
// after
{"status":"candidate","base_commit":"abc123","candidate_commit":"def456","description":"...","notes":[]}
Defensive patterns

Strategy: validation

Validate before calling

function isValidBaseCommit(v: unknown): boolean {
  return typeof v === 'string' && v.trim().length > 0;
}
const parsed = JSON.parse(raw) as Record<string, unknown>;
if (!isValidBaseCommit(parsed.base_commit)) throw new Error('artifact base_commit missing/empty');

Type guard

function hasBaseCommit(v: unknown): v is { base_commit: string } {
  return typeof v === 'object' && v !== null && typeof (v as any).base_commit === 'string' && (v as any).base_commit.trim() !== '';
}

Try / catch

try { const a = parseAutoresearchCandidateArtifact(raw); }
catch (e) { if (e instanceof Error && e.message.includes('base_commit is required')) { /* capture git rev-parse HEAD and repopulate the artifact */ } throw e; }

Prevention

When it happens

Trigger: A worker omitting base_commit, emitting an empty string, whitespace, or a non-string value when it could not determine the base commit (e.g. empty repo, detached context, or a failed git call inside the worker).

Common situations: Workers running in repos with no commits yet, base SHA capture failing silently and defaulting to '', or templates that skip the field on some branches.

Related errors

AI-assisted analysis of Yeachan-Heo/oh-my-codex@3ad79a8a6f (2026-08-27). Data as JSON: /api/errors/5e753b58f4e6dfbd. Report an issue: GitHub.