apache/cassandra · error · java.lang.IllegalArgumentException

tablehistograms requires

Error message

tablehistograms requires <keyspace> <table> or <keyspace.table> format argument.

What it means

nodetool tablehistograms (tablehistograms command) expects table targets as '<keyspace> <table>' or '<keyspace.table>'; any other argument shape is rejected with IllegalArgumentException. Only zero arguments (all tables) or these accepted forms proceed.

Solutions

1. Pass a single '<keyspace.table>' argument, e.g. `nodetool tablehistograms ks1.tbl1`.
2. Or pass two positional arguments '<keyspace> <table>', e.g. `nodetool tablehistograms ks1 tbl1`.
3. Call with no arguments to get histograms for all tables.

Example fix

// before
nodetool tablehistograms tbl1
// after
nodetool tablehistograms keyspace1.tbl1

function isAcceptable(args) { return args.length === 0 || args.length === 2 || (args.length === 1 && /^[^.]+\.[^.]+$/.test(args[0])); }

const isKsTable = (s) => typeof s === 'string' && /^[^\s.]+\.[^\s.]+$/.test(s);

try { runTableHistograms(args); } catch (IllegalArgumentException e) { if (e.getMessage().includes('requires <keyspace> <table>')) printUsage(); else throw e; }

When it happens

Trigger: Running e.g. `nodetool tablehistograms ks.` , `nodetool tablehistograms tbl1` (table without keyspace), or `nodetool tablehistograms a b c` (extra args).

Common situations: Quoting mistakes in scripts splitting 'ks.tbl' into separate args incorrectly, or passing a bare table name assuming a default keyspace.

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

• argument for sort must be one of
• argument for top must be a positive integer.
• arguments for -F are json,yaml only.
• arguments for -F are json,yaml only.
• arguments for -F are json,yaml only.

AI-assisted analysis of apache/cassandra@88fd0f6a0e (2026-09-10). Data as JSON: /api/errors/eb956f66b1687403. Report an issue: GitHub.

Appendix: source

Thrown at src/java/org/apache/cassandra/tools/nodetool/TableHistograms.java:89

        }

        if (args.size() == 2 && args.stream().noneMatch(arg -> arg.contains(".")))
        {
            tablesList.put(args.get(0), args.get(1));
        }
        else if (args.size() == 1)
        {
            Pair<String, String> ksTbPair = parseTheKsTbPair(args.get(0));
            tablesList.put(ksTbPair.left, ksTbPair.right);
        }
        else if (args.size() == 0)
        {
            // use all tables
            tablesList = allTables;
        }
        else
        {
            throw new IllegalArgumentException("tablehistograms requires <keyspace> <table> or <keyspace.table> format argument.");
        }

        // verify that all tables to list exist
        for (String keyspace : tablesList.keys())
        {
            for (String table : tablesList.get(keyspace))
            {
                if (!allTables.containsEntry(keyspace, table))
                    throw new IllegalArgumentException("Unknown table " + keyspace + '.' + table);
            }
        }

        for (String keyspace : tablesList.keys().elementSet())
        {
            for (String table : tablesList.get(keyspace))
            {
                // calculate percentile of row size and column count
                long[] estimatedPartitionSize = (long[]) probe.getColumnFamilyMetric(keyspace, table, "EstimatedPartitionSizeHistogram");

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