can1357/oh-my-pi · error · StatError

missing operand Try 'stat --help' for more information.

Error message

missing operand
Try 'stat --help' for more information.

What it means

StatError::MissingOperand is thrown when the stat builtin is invoked with no file operands at all. stat requires at least one file (or '-' for stdin in filesystem mode) to report on, and the message follows the GNU convention of pointing the user at 'stat --help'.

Source

Thrown at crates/pi-builtins/src/stat.rs:138

-`%d`: free file nodes in file system
-`%f`: free blocks in file system
-`%i`: file system ID in hex
-`%l`: maximum length of filenames
-`%n`: file name
-`%s`: block size (for faster transfers)
-`%S`: fundamental block size (for block counts)
-`%t`: file system type in hex
-`%T`: file system type in human readable form

NOTE: your shell may have its own version of stat, which usually supersedes
the version described here.  Please refer to your shell's documentation
for details about the options it supports.";

	#[derive(Debug, Error)]
	enum StatError {
		#[error("Invalid quoting style: {style}")]
		InvalidQuotingStyle { style: String },
		#[error("missing operand\nTry 'stat --help' for more information.")]
		MissingOperand,
		#[error("{directive}: invalid directive")]
		InvalidDirective { directive: String },
		#[error("cannot read table of mounted file systems: {error}")]
		#[cfg_attr(not(unix), allow(dead_code, reason = "mount tables are unix-only"))]
		CannotReadFilesystem { error: String },
		#[error("using '-' to denote standard input does not work in file system mode")]
		#[cfg_attr(not(unix), allow(dead_code, reason = "stdin filesystem mode is unix-only"))]
		StdinFilesystemMode,
		#[error("cannot read file system information for {file}: {error}")]
		CannotReadFilesystemInfo { file: String, error: String },
		#[error("cannot stat {file}: {error}")]
		CannotStat { file: String, error: String },
	}

	mod options {
		pub const DEREFERENCE: &str = "dereference";
		pub const FILE_SYSTEM: &str = "file-system";

View on GitHub (pinned to 9690622007)

Solutions

1. Pass at least one file operand: `stat <file>`.
2. Quote/default the path variable: `stat "${FILE:?path required}"` or `stat "${FILE:-.}"`.
3. Check upstream command output if arguments are generated dynamically.
4. Read `stat --help` for expected usage.

Example fix

// before
FILE=""
stat $FILE
// after
FILE="./target.txt"
stat "$FILE"

// require at least one operand before invoking stat
if (operands.length === 0) {
  throw new Error("stat: missing operand — pass at least one file path");
}

try {
  await stat(args);
} catch (err) {
  if (String(err).includes("missing operand")) {
    // default to current directory entry or fail with a clear message
    if (!file) throw new Error("no file given to stat");
    return stat([file, ...args]);
  } else throw err;
}

When it happens

Trigger: Running the stat builtin with only options and no path: `stat` or `stat --printf='%n'` with no positional argument.

Common situations: Shell variables holding paths that expanded to empty (`stat $UNSET_VAR`); pipelines where an upstream command produced no arguments; scripts that forgot a default path; wrapping code that drops empty args.

Understand the failure class

Background: "missing required argument" and "the following required arguments were not provided": what required-argument errors mean and how to fix them — this error's family across 20 libraries.

Related errors

• Invalid quoting style: {style}
• too many templates
• extra operand {} file operands cannot be combined with --fil
• multiple output files specified
• when reading file names from standard input, no file name of

AI-assisted analysis of can1357/oh-my-pi@9690622007 (2026-08-31). Data as JSON: /api/errors/5e5abd8ede905bda. Report an issue: GitHub.