flowable/flowable-engine · error · ActivitiIllegalArgumentException

Invalid query usage: cannot set both taskNameInIgnoreCase…

Error message

Invalid query usage: cannot set both taskNameInIgnoreCase and name

What it means

Activiti task queries allow only one name filter at a time. Once taskName(String) has set the exact `name` criterion, calling taskNameInIgnoreCase(...) would create conflicting conditions, so the engine throws ActivitiIllegalArgumentException at query build time.

Solutions

Remove the taskName(...) call so only taskNameInIgnoreCase is applied
Decide which filter wins in your API layer and reject requests that supply both before building the query
Build a fresh TaskQuery instance per filter mode instead of mutating a shared one

Example fix

// before
taskQuery.taskName("review").taskNameInIgnoreCase(names);
// after
taskQuery.taskNameInIgnoreCase(names); // drop the exact-name filter

Defensive patterns

Strategy: validation

Validate before calling

if (exactName != null && namesIn != null) {
    throw new IllegalArgumentException("Provide either an exact task name or a name list, not both");
}

Try / catch

try {
    buildTaskQuery(criteria);
} catch (org.activiti.engine.ActivitiIllegalArgumentException e) {
    throw new InvalidSearchCriteriaException(e.getMessage());
}

Prevention

Enforce one-name-filter semantics in your search DTO validation
Build a fresh TaskQuery per request instead of reusing/mutating one
Centralize criteria-to-query mapping so conflicts are caught in one place

When it happens

Trigger: Chaining taskQuery.taskName("foo").taskNameInIgnoreCase(list) (or calling taskNameInIgnoreCase when orQuery `name` is set) on the same TaskQuery object.

Common situations: Composing query criteria dynamically from a search DTO where both exactName and nameIn fields were provided by the caller; copy-paste reuse of a base query object that already had taskName set.

Related errors

AI-assisted analysis of flowable/flowable-engine@d6d39ce1c6 (2026-09-11). Data as JSON: /api/errors/576311871fafe955. Report an issue: GitHub.

Appendix: source

Thrown at modules/flowable5-engine/src/main/java/org/activiti/engine/impl/TaskQueryImpl.java:206

        return this;
    }

    @Override
    public TaskQuery taskNameInIgnoreCase(List<String> nameList) {
        if (nameList == null) {
            throw new ActivitiIllegalArgumentException("Task name list is null");
        }
        if (nameList.isEmpty()) {
            throw new ActivitiIllegalArgumentException("Task name list is empty");
        }
        for (String name : nameList) {
            if (name == null) {
                throw new ActivitiIllegalArgumentException("None of the given task names can be null");
            }
        }

        if (name != null) {
            throw new ActivitiIllegalArgumentException("Invalid query usage: cannot set both taskNameInIgnoreCase and name");
        }
        if (nameLike != null) {
            throw new ActivitiIllegalArgumentException("Invalid query usage: cannot set both taskNameInIgnoreCase and nameLike");
        }
        if (nameLikeIgnoreCase != null) {
            throw new ActivitiIllegalArgumentException("Invalid query usage: cannot set both taskNameInIgnoreCase and nameLikeIgnoreCase");
        }

        final int nameListSize = nameList.size();
        final List<String> caseIgnoredNameList = new ArrayList<>(nameListSize);
        for (String name : nameList) {
            caseIgnoredNameList.add(name.toLowerCase());
        }

        if (orActive) {
            this.currentOrQueryObject.nameListIgnoreCase = caseIgnoredNameList;
        } else {
            this.nameListIgnoreCase = caseIgnoredNameList;

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