benbjohnson/litestream · error

too many arguments

Error message

too many arguments

What it means

CLI argument-count error from the `litestream databases` subcommand: positional arguments were supplied but the command accepts none — it reads databases from a config file (or default path) and lists them. Returned by `Run` immediately when `fs.NArg() != 0` after flag parsing.

Source

Thrown at cmd/litestream/databases.go:24

	"flag"
	"fmt"
	"os"
	"text/tabwriter"
)

// DatabasesCommand is a command for listing managed databases.
type DatabasesCommand struct{}

// Run executes the command.
func (c *DatabasesCommand) Run(_ context.Context, args []string) (err error) {
	fs := flag.NewFlagSet("litestream-databases", flag.ContinueOnError)
	configPath, noExpandEnv := registerConfigFlag(fs)
	jsonOutput := fs.Bool("json", false, "output raw JSON")
	fs.Usage = c.Usage
	if err := fs.Parse(args); err != nil {
		return err
	} else if fs.NArg() != 0 {
		return fmt.Errorf("too many arguments")
	}

	// Load configuration.
	if *configPath == "" {
		*configPath = DefaultConfigPath()
	}
	config, err := ReadConfigFile(*configPath, !*noExpandEnv)
	if err != nil {
		return err
	}

	databases := make([]DatabaseInfo, 0, len(config.DBs))
	for _, dbConfig := range config.DBs {
		db, err := NewDBFromConfig(dbConfig)
		if err != nil {
			return err
		}

View on GitHub (pinned to 4ed7a308f6)

Solutions

1. Use `litestream databases --config /etc/litestream.yml` instead of a positional path
2. Run `litestream databases` with no positional args to list all configured DBs
3. Remove stray/empty positional arguments from the command line
4. Check `litestream databases --help` for accepted flags

Example fix

// before
litestream databases /etc/litestream.yml
// after
litestream databases --config /etc/litestream.yml

// shell pre-check
EXTRA=$((${#@} - $(printf '%s\n' "$@" | grep -c '^--' || true)))
# or simply: call with no positional args
litestream databases --config "$CONFIG"

When it happens

Trigger: Running `litestream databases /etc/litestream.yml` passing the config path positionally instead of via `--config`; old muscle memory from other CLIs; shell scripts appending stray arguments.

Common situations: Users expecting `databases <db-path>` to filter to one database; migration from `litestream db` style commands; quoting errors leaving an empty string argument.

Understand the failure class

Background: "Unknown argument", "Invalid value", and "must be one of": invalid CLI argument errors explained — this error's family across 35 libraries.

Related errors

• failed to format response: %w
• too many arguments
• must specify at least one replica URL for %s
• too many arguments
• too many arguments

AI-assisted analysis of benbjohnson/litestream@4ed7a308f6 (2026-09-06). Data as JSON: /api/errors/88c547195395dd64. Report an issue: GitHub.