flowable/flowable-engine · error · FlowableIllegalArgumentException

scopeIds is empty

Error message

scopeIds is empty

What it means

Fluent-setter validation in InternalEntityLinkQueryImpl.scopeIds: the scope-id collection filter is null or empty, so an IN clause cannot be built and the query builder rejects it rather than returning unscoped results.

Solutions

1. Check !CollectionUtils.isEmpty(scopeIds) before calling.
2. Skip the query entirely or use an unfiltered variant when no ids are available.
3. Verify the upstream logic that populates the collection.

Example fix

// before
query.scopeIds(ids).list(); // throws when ids empty

// after
if (ids != null && !ids.isEmpty()) {
    query.scopeIds(ids).list();
}

if (CollectionUtils.isEmpty(scopeIds)) { return Collections.emptyList(); }

try {
    links = entityLinkQuery.scopeIds(ids).list();
} catch (FlowableIllegalArgumentException e) {
    links = Collections.emptyList();
}

When it happens

Trigger: Calling InternalEntityLinkQuery.scopeIds(null), scopeIds(Collections.emptyList()), or scopeIds(list) where the list was never populated.

Common situations: Building queries from a dynamic set of ids that turned out empty (e.g. no matching parent scopes found); passing an uninitialized collection variable.

Understand the failure class

Background: "must not be empty", "cannot be empty" — required-field validation errors across open-source libraries — this error's family across 41 libraries.

Related errors

• referenceScopeDefinitionId is empty
• referenceScopeId is empty
• referenceScopeType is empty
• scopeDefinitionId is empty
• scopeId is empty

AI-assisted analysis of flowable/flowable-engine@d6d39ce1c6 (2026-09-11). Data as JSON: /api/errors/330897baed1fb4a8. Report an issue: GitHub.

Appendix: source

Thrown at modules/flowable-entitylink-service/src/main/java/org/flowable/entitylink/service/impl/InternalEntityLinkQueryImpl.java:67

    public InternalEntityLinkQueryImpl(Function<InternalEntityLinkQueryImpl<E>, List<E>> listProvider,
            Function<InternalEntityLinkQueryImpl<E>, E> singleResultProvider) {
        this.listProvider = listProvider;
        this.singleResultProvider = singleResultProvider;
    }

    @Override
    public InternalEntityLinkQuery<E> scopeId(String scopeId) {
        if (StringUtils.isEmpty(scopeId)) {
            throw new FlowableIllegalArgumentException("scopeId is empty");
        }
        this.scopeId = scopeId;
        return this;
    }

    @Override
    public InternalEntityLinkQuery<E> scopeIds(Collection<String> scopeIds) {
        if (scopeIds == null || scopeIds.isEmpty()) {
            throw new FlowableIllegalArgumentException("scopeIds is empty");
        }
        this.scopeIds = scopeIds;
        return this;
    }

    @Override
    public InternalEntityLinkQuery<E> scopeDefinitionId(String scopeDefinitionId) {
        if (StringUtils.isEmpty(scopeDefinitionId)) {
            throw new FlowableIllegalArgumentException("scopeDefinitionId is empty");
        }
        this.scopeDefinitionId = scopeDefinitionId;
        return this;
    }

    @Override
    public InternalEntityLinkQuery<E> scopeType(String scopeType) {
        if (StringUtils.isEmpty(scopeType)) {
            throw new FlowableIllegalArgumentException("scopeType is empty");

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