abhigyanpatwari/GitNexus · info · Error

Wiki was generated in ${prevDisplay}; use --force to regener

Error message

Wiki was generated in ${prevDisplay}; use --force to regenerate in ${nextDisplay}.

What it means

Thrown during wiki generation's up-to-date check (first site, before DB initialization) when the wiki was already generated for the current commit but in a different language than the effective language of this run. The check is skipped when `--force` is set. This prevents silently overwriting a wiki generated in one language with content in another without explicit consent.

Source

Thrown at gitnexus/src/core/wiki/generator.ts:268

  /**
   * Main entry point. Runs the full pipeline or incremental update.
   */
  async run(): Promise<WikiRunResult> {
    await fs.mkdir(this.wikiDir, { recursive: true });

    const existingMeta = await this.loadWikiMeta();
    const currentCommit = this.getCurrentCommit();
    const forceMode = this.options.force;

    // Up-to-date check (skip if --force)
    if (!forceMode && existingMeta && existingMeta.fromCommit === currentCommit) {
      const currentLang = this.effectiveLang();
      const metaLang = existingMeta.lang ?? '';
      if (currentLang !== metaLang) {
        const prevDisplay = metaLang || 'english (default)';
        const nextDisplay = currentLang || 'english (default)';
        throw new Error(
          `Wiki was generated in ${prevDisplay}; use --force to regenerate in ${nextDisplay}.`,
        );
      }
      // Still regenerate the HTML viewer in case it's missing
      await this.ensureHTMLViewer();
      return { pagesGenerated: 0, mode: 'up-to-date', failedModules: [] };
    }

    // Force mode: delete snapshot to force full re-grouping
    if (forceMode) {
      try {
        await fs.unlink(path.join(this.wikiDir, 'first_module_tree.json'));
      } catch {}
      // Delete existing module pages so they get regenerated
      const existingFiles = await fs.readdir(this.wikiDir).catch(() => [] as string[]);
      for (const f of existingFiles) {
        if (f.endsWith('.md')) {
          try {

View on GitHub (pinned to d540b00184)

Solutions

1. Add `--force` to regenerate the wiki in the new language: `gitnexus wiki --force`.
2. Or switch back to the language the wiki was generated in (shown in the error as `prevDisplay`).

Example fix

# before
gitnexus wiki --lang japanese
# error: Wiki was generated in english (default); use --force to regenerate in japanese.
# after
gitnexus wiki --lang japanese --force

// Before wiki generation, check if a language change is needed:
const meta = await loadWikiMeta();
if (meta && meta.fromCommit === currentCommit && meta.lang !== desiredLang) {
  console.log(`Wiki exists in ${meta.lang}. Pass --force to regenerate in ${desiredLang}.`);
  // either add --force or abort
}

const needsForceForLanguageChange = (
  meta: WikiMeta | undefined,
  currentCommit: string,
  desiredLang: string,
): boolean =>
  !!meta &&
  meta.fromCommit === currentCommit &&
  (meta.lang ?? '') !== (desiredLang ?? '');

try {
  await generator.generate();
} catch (err) {
  if (err instanceof Error && err.message.startsWith('Wiki was generated in')) {
    console.error('Add --force to regenerate in the new language.');
  }
  throw err;
}

When it happens

Trigger: `!forceMode && existingMeta && existingMeta.fromCommit === currentCommit` and `this.effectiveLang() !== existingMeta.lang`. The existing wiki metadata records a different language than the current run's resolved language (which defaults to English or respects a `--lang` flag).

Common situations: Generated a wiki in English, then ran `gitnexus wiki --lang japanese` on the same commit without `--force`; or the `GITNEXUS_WIKI_LANG` env var changed between runs on an unchanged repo.

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AI-assisted analysis of abhigyanpatwari/GitNexus@d540b00184 (2026-08-12). Data as JSON: /api/errors/da9c0dfaad4408d3. Report an issue: GitHub.