flowable/flowable-engine · error · FlowableException

Error while reading {ATTRIBUTE_ELEMENT_NAME} extension eleme

Error message

Error while reading {ATTRIBUTE_ELEMENT_NAME} extension element

What it means

Flowable wraps any failure while reading the text content of a <extensionElements> child's element name (the 'elementName' attribute element) into this FlowableException. It is a low-level XML parsing wrapper: the original cause (usually an XMLStreamException from the underlying StAX reader) is attached as the cause. It means the CMMN XML is malformed at that position or the stream is in an unexpected state.

Source

Thrown at modules/flowable-cmmn-converter/src/main/java/org/flowable/cmmn/converter/ExtensionElementsXMLConverter.java:492

            } catch (Exception e) {
                LOGGER.warn("Error parsing collection child elements", e);
            }
        }

    }

    protected void readElementName(XMLStreamReader xtr, ConversionHelper conversionHelper) {
        CmmnElement currentCmmnElement = conversionHelper.getCurrentCmmnElement();

        if (currentCmmnElement instanceof CaseElement) {
            try {
                String elementName = xtr.getElementText();

                if (StringUtils.isNotEmpty(elementName)) {
                    ((CaseElement) currentCmmnElement).setName(elementName.trim());
                }
            } catch (Exception e) {
                throw new FlowableException("Error while reading " + ATTRIBUTE_ELEMENT_NAME + " extension element", e);
            }

        }

    }

    protected void readCommonXmlInfo(BaseElement baseElement, XMLStreamReader xtr) {
        baseElement.setId(xtr.getAttributeValue(null, CmmnXmlConstants.ATTRIBUTE_ID));
        Location location = xtr.getLocation();
        baseElement.setXmlRowNumber(location.getLineNumber());
        baseElement.setXmlRowNumber(location.getColumnNumber());
    }

}

View on GitHub (pinned to d6d39ce1c6)

Solutions

1. Validate the CMMN XML with an XML schema/validator and fix malformed extension elements near the reported location.
2. Check the exception cause (e.getCause()) to identify the exact XMLStreamException and offset.
3. Ensure extension elements use the correct Flowable extension namespace (e.g. http://flowable.org/cmmn).
4. Re-export the model from the original modeling tool instead of hand-editing the XML.

Example fix

// before
<extensionElements>
  <flowable:name
</extensionElements>
// after
<extensionElements>
  <flowable:name>myName</flowable:name>
</extensionElements>

// Validate XML before conversion
javax.xml.XMLConstants / javax.xml.validation.Validator.validate(new StreamSource(cmmnXmlFile)); // throws if malformed
// Or quick well-formedness check:
new XMLInputFactoryImpl().createXMLStreamReader(new FileInputStream(cmmnXmlFile)); // throws XMLStreamException early

try {
    CmmnModel model = cmmnXmlConverter.convertToCmmnModel(inputStream);
} catch (FlowableException e) {
    Throwable cause = e.getCause(); // XMLStreamException with line/column
    throw new IllegalArgumentException("Invalid CMMN extension element: " + (cause != null ? cause.getMessage() : e.getMessage()), e);
}

When it happens

Trigger: Converting a CMMN model whose extension element (element identified by ATTRIBUTE_ELEMENT_NAME) has malformed or unreadable text content; the StAX reader throws XMLStreamException on xtr.getElementText(); also thrown when the current CMMN element cannot accept the name.

Common situations: Hand-edited or tool-generated CMMN XML with a truncated/empty extension element; wrong namespace declarations; corrupted XML files; incompatible converter version vs XML features.

Understand the failure class

Background: "failed to read file", EACCES, ENOENT and "could not read <path>" errors: when a program can't read a file from disk — this error's family across 49 libraries.

Related errors

• Error converting process reference expression
• Error converting standard event
• Error converting text annotation
• Error converting timer expression
• Error processing BPMN document

AI-assisted analysis of flowable/flowable-engine@d6d39ce1c6 (2026-09-11). Data as JSON: /api/errors/8febb077fd5a1cc2. Report an issue: GitHub.