gastownhall/beads · error

database name cannot be empty

Error message

database name cannot be empty

What it means

ValidateDatabaseName rejects an empty database name before it can be interpolated into SQL. It is the first of several checks (empty, >64 chars, pattern match) guarding against SQL injection via backtick escaping in CREATE DATABASE / query construction.

Source

Thrown at internal/storage/dolt/history.go:31

)

// validTablePattern matches valid table names
var validTablePattern = regexp.MustCompile(`^[a-zA-Z_][a-zA-Z0-9_]*$`)

// validDatabasePattern matches valid MySQL database names (alphanumeric, underscore, hyphen)
var validDatabasePattern = regexp.MustCompile(`^[a-zA-Z_][a-zA-Z0-9_\-]*$`)

// validateRef checks if a ref is safe to use in queries.
// Delegates to issueops.ValidateRef.
func validateRef(ref string) error {
	return issueops.ValidateRef(ref)
}

// ValidateDatabaseName checks if a database name is safe to use in queries.
// Prevents SQL injection via backtick escaping in CREATE DATABASE statements.
func ValidateDatabaseName(name string) error {
	if name == "" {
		return fmt.Errorf("database name cannot be empty")
	}
	if len(name) > 64 {
		return fmt.Errorf("database name too long")
	}
	if !validDatabasePattern.MatchString(name) {
		return fmt.Errorf("invalid database name: %s", name)
	}
	return nil
}

// validateTableName checks if a table name is safe to use in queries
func validateTableName(table string) error {
	if table == "" {
		return fmt.Errorf("table name cannot be empty")
	}
	if len(table) > 64 {
		return fmt.Errorf("table name too long")
	}

View on GitHub (pinned to 71377f2769)

Solutions

1. Set the database name in config or via the environment variable before calling the API
2. Add an early check/flag default so an empty name is replaced with the intended database
3. If derived from a remote URL, verify the URL includes the database path segment
4. Run ValidateDatabaseName yourself at config-load time to fail fast with a clear message

Example fix

// before
store, err := BootstrapFromRemoteWithRemote(ctx, remoteURL, "") // empty DB
// after
dbName := os.Getenv("BEADS_DB")
if err := dolt.ValidateDatabaseName(dbName); err != nil {
	return fmt.Errorf("configure a database name: %w", err)
}
store, err := BootstrapFromRemoteWithRemote(ctx, remoteURL, dbName)

func requireDBName(name string) error {
	if strings.TrimSpace(name) == "" {
		return errors.New("database name must be set (check config / env)")
	}
	return nil
}
if err := requireDBName(cfg.Database); err != nil { return err }

func hasDatabaseName(name string) bool { return strings.TrimSpace(name) != "" }

if err := dolt.ValidateDatabaseName(name); err != nil {
	switch {
	case err.Error() == "database name cannot be empty": // fix config
	case strings.Contains(err.Error(), "too long"): // truncate/choose shorter name
	default: // invalid chars, sanitize
	}
}

When it happens

Trigger: BootstrapFromRemoteWithDB, openServerConnection, or other callers pass an empty string as the database name — typically an unset config field or an empty env var (e.g. BEADS_DB unset).

Common situations: Config struct field never populated; environment variable empty rather than unset so the default isn't applied; CLI flag provided as empty string; remote URL parsed without a database component.

Related errors

• ExternalDoltConfig: Port %d out of range [1, 65535]
• uow: doltBinExec must not be empty
• uow: database name must not be empty (caller should default
• uow: rootUser must not be empty
• uow: external: %w

AI-assisted analysis of gastownhall/beads@71377f2769 (2026-08-30). Data as JSON: /api/errors/07be51b8512244e1. Report an issue: GitHub.