flowable/flowable-engine · warning

Error parsing input values

Error message

Error parsing input values

What it means

Warning logged by InputValuesParser.parseChildElement when an exception is thrown while parsing the <inputValues> element (allowed input values list) of a DMN input clause. The exception is swallowed; the clause keeps a null or partial inputValues, so validation of input entry values against allowed values is skipped for that column.

Solutions

1. Check the attached stack trace for the concrete parsing exception.
2. Fix the <inputValues> block: values should be a comma-separated list inside <text>, e.g. <text>"A","B"</text>.
3. Validate the .dmn against the DMN XSD before deployment.
4. Re-export from the DMN tool to regenerate standard XML.

Example fix

<!-- before -->
<inputValues><text></text></inputValues> <!-- malformed/unclosed structure -->
<!-- after -->
<inputValues><text>"standard","premium"</text></inputValues>

// check inputValues format before deployment
String text = inputValuesText.trim();
if (!text.isEmpty() && !Pattern.compile("^(\\\"[^\"]*\\\"|[^,\\\"]+)(\\s*,\\s*(\\\"[^\"]*\\\"|[^,\\\"]+))*$").matcher(text).matches()) {
  throw new IllegalArgumentException("inputValues must be a comma-separated list: " + text);
}

When it happens

Trigger: Parsing <inputValues> contents where splitInputValues processing or the XMLStreamReader itself throws (malformed XML, unexpected token, bad CDATA/text structure) before the </inputValues> end element is reached.

Common situations: Malformed comma-separated value lists in .dmn XML edited by hand; exporter quirks nesting <text> differently than expected; corrupted or truncated files.

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

• Error determine output clause for position
• Error determine output clause for position
• Error parsing input entry
• Error parsing input expression
• Error parsing input expression

AI-assisted analysis of flowable/flowable-engine@d6d39ce1c6 (2026-09-11). Data as JSON: /api/errors/b38921255a02d498. Report an issue: GitHub.

Appendix: source

Thrown at modules/flowable-dmn-xml-converter/src/main/java/org/flowable/dmn/converter/child/InputValuesParser.java:57

        UnaryTests inputValues = new UnaryTests();

        boolean readyWithInputValues = false;
        try {
            while (!readyWithInputValues && xtr.hasNext()) {
                xtr.next();
                if (xtr.isStartElement() && ELEMENT_TEXT.equalsIgnoreCase(xtr.getLocalName())) {
                    String inputValuesText = xtr.getElementText();
                    inputValues.setText(inputValuesText);

                    List<Object> splitInputValues = splitAndFormatInputOutputValues(inputValuesText);
                    inputValues.setTextValues(splitInputValues);
                } else if (xtr.isEndElement() && getElementName().equalsIgnoreCase(xtr.getLocalName())) {
                    readyWithInputValues = true;
                }
            }
        } catch (Exception e) {
            LOGGER.warn("Error parsing input values", e);
        }

        clause.setInputValues(inputValues);
    }
}

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