denoland/deno · error

Found {} documentation lint error{}.

Error message

Found {} documentation lint error{}.

What it means

`deno doc --lint` collects documentation diagnostics (e.g. missing JSDoc on exported symbols, broken doc references), prints each one in full via DisplayDocDiagnostic above the summary, then bails with the total count (singular/pluralized). The bail itself is just the failure summary — the actionable detail is in the per-diagnostic output preceding it.

Source

Thrown at cli/tools/doc.rs:752

      .entry(diagnostic.location.filename.clone())
      .or_insert_with(BTreeMap::new)
      .entry(diagnostic.location.line)
      .or_insert_with(BTreeMap::new)
      .entry(diagnostic.location.col)
      .or_insert_with(Vec::new)
      .push(diagnostic);
  }

  for (_, diagnostics_by_lc) in diagnostic_groups {
    for (_, diagnostics_by_col) in diagnostics_by_lc {
      for (_, diagnostics) in diagnostics_by_col {
        for diagnostic in diagnostics {
          log::error!("{}\n", DisplayDocDiagnostic(diagnostic).display());
        }
      }
    }
  }
  bail!(
    "Found {} documentation lint error{}.",
    colors::bold(diagnostics.len().to_string()),
    if diagnostics.len() == 1 { "" } else { "s" }
  );
}

View on GitHub (pinned to f7822238ca)

Solutions

1. Read each printed diagnostic above the summary — it gives file, line, and what's missing.
2. Add the required JSDoc (description and any demanded tags) to each flagged export.
3. Fix or remove broken {@link}/reference targets in doc comments.
4. Re-run until the count reaches zero before pushing.

Example fix

// before
export function add(a: number, b: number): number {
  return a + b;
}

// after
/** Adds two numbers. */
export function add(a: number, b: number): number {
  return a + b;
}

# CI: capture diagnostics, fail with context
if ! deno doc --lint src/ > doclint.log 2>&1; then
  echo "doc lint failed:"; grep -c 'lint error' doclint.log || true
  cat doclint.log
  exit 1
fi

When it happens

Trigger: Running `deno doc --lint` over a codebase where exported symbols lack the required JSDoc, or doc comments contain broken references. Every diagnostic found across all files increments the reported count.

Common situations: Enabling doc lint on an existing codebase for the first time; CI gates that run `deno doc --lint`; new exports added without JSDoc in repos where the lint is enforced.

Related errors

• Node {} was not found!
• The bench name can't be empty
• BenchContext::end() has already been invoked
• deno ci requires a lockfile, but none was found. hint: run
• No rules have been configured

AI-assisted analysis of denoland/deno@f7822238ca (2026-08-20). Data as JSON: /api/errors/8bbb9db87e9b6167. Report an issue: GitHub.