What causes "too many entries in v0 dotfiles var delete record" in atuinsh/atuin?

Upgrade atuin everywhere the record store syncs to the same version

too many entries in v0 dotfiles var delete record

Error message

too many entries in v0 dotfiles var delete record

What it means

A v0 dotfiles var 'delete' record must be a msgpack array containing exactly 1 field (the variable name). During deserialization, an array length other than 1 causes this error, as the payload does not conform to the v0 var-delete schema. It protects the record store from corrupt or future-format data.

Source

Thrown at crates/atuin-dotfiles/src/store/var.rs:70

        }

        match version {
            RecordVersion::V0 => {
                let mut bytes = decode::Bytes::new(&data.0);

                let record_type = decode::read_u8(&mut bytes).map_err(error_report)?;

                match record_type {
                    // create
                    0 => {
                        let env = Var::deserialize(&mut bytes)?;
                        Ok(Self::Create(env))
                    }

                    // delete
                    1 => {
                        let nfields = decode::read_array_len(&mut bytes).map_err(error_report)?;
                        ensure!(nfields == 1, "too many entries in v0 dotfiles var delete record");

                        let bytes = bytes.remaining_slice();

                        let (key, bytes) =
                            decode::read_str_from_slice(bytes).map_err(error_report)?;

                        if !bytes.is_empty() {
                            bail!("trailing bytes in encoded dotfiles var record. malformed");
                        }

                        Ok(Self::Delete(key.to_owned()))
                    }

                    n => {
                        bail!("unknown Dotfiles var record type {n}");
                    }
                }
            }

View on GitHub (pinned to c0c717ab04)

Solutions

Upgrade atuin everywhere the record store syncs to the same version
Remove the malformed record and re-run the var deletion on a current client
Re-sync dotfiles from a machine with intact data
Inspect/repair the record store database if corruption is repeated

Defensive patterns

Strategy: validation

Validate before calling

let n = rmp::decode::read_array_len(&mut bytes)?;
if n != 1 { return Err("malformed v0 var delete record".into()); }

Try / catch

match VarRecord::deserialize(&data) {
    Ok(rec) => apply(rec),
    Err(e) => log::warn!("skipping bad var delete record: {e}"),
}

Prevention

Upgrade all synced clients to the same version
Avoid external writes to the record store
Re-create deleted vars from a current client if a record is corrupt
Keep backups of the record store DB

When it happens

Trigger: Deserializing a v0 var delete record (record_type 1) whose decoded msgpack array length differs from 1.

Common situations: Version skew between synced atuin clients; corrupted sync payloads; records written by non-atuin tools into the store.

Understand the failure class

Background: Schema validation failed / invalid input schema: payload rejected because its shape doesn't match the expected schema — this error's family across 28 libraries.

Related errors

AI-assisted analysis of atuinsh/atuin@c0c717ab04 (2026-09-12). Data as JSON: /api/errors/83827749a6fc8e9a. Report an issue: GitHub.