gastownhall/beads · error

failed to get swarm status: %v

Error message

failed to get swarm status: %v

What it means

Wrapper around getSwarmStatus failures once the epic has been resolved. Any error computing the swarm's aggregate status (dependent-issue queries, per-crew state reads) is wrapped here and then printed via HandleErrorRespectJSON.

Source

Thrown at cmd/bd/swarm_proxied_server.go:154

					epic, err = uw.IssueUseCase().GetIssue(ctx, dep.DependsOnID)
					if err != nil {
						return nil, fmt.Errorf("failed to get linked epic: %v", err)
					}
					break
				}
			}
			if epic == nil {
				return nil, fmt.Errorf("swarm molecule '%s' has no linked epic", issueID)
			}
		} else if issue.IssueType == types.TypeEpic || issue.IssueType == "molecule" {
			epic = issue
		} else {
			return nil, fmt.Errorf("'%s' is not an epic or swarm molecule (type: %s)", issueID, issue.IssueType)
		}

		status, err := getSwarmStatus(ctx, r, epic)
		if err != nil {
			return nil, fmt.Errorf("failed to get swarm status: %v", err)
		}
		return status, nil
	})
	if err != nil {
		return HandleErrorRespectJSON("%v", err)
	}

	if jsonOutput {
		return outputJSON(status)
	}

	renderSwarmStatus(status)
	return nil
}

View on GitHub (pinned to 71377f2769)

Solutions

1. Read the wrapped %v cause and fix the underlying storage error
2. Retry after concurrent bd/dolt operations finish
3. Run `bd doctor` to validate the local database
4. Reduce fan-out by splitting an oversized epic into smaller swarms

// ensure no conflicting bd/dolt process is running and DB is healthy
bd doctor

status, err := getSwarmStatus(ctx, r, epic)
if err != nil {
    if isTransientStorageErr(err) {
        // back off and retry once the concurrent operation completes
    }
    return err
}

When it happens

Trigger: getSwarmStatus(ctx, r, epic) fails because dependency/state queries for the epic's children error out — DB unavailability, context cancellation, or a corrupted dependency graph beneath a valid epic.

Common situations: Large epics whose child queries time out; embedded Dolt DB locked by a concurrent `bd dolt` operation; running the swarm command while a sync merge is mid-flight.

Related errors

• failed to get swarm dependencies: %v
• no store is open for this workspace
• not found
• db: ChildCounterSQLRepository.NextChildID: parentID must not
• db: DependencySQLRepository.Insert: dep must not be nil

AI-assisted analysis of gastownhall/beads@71377f2769 (2026-08-30). Data as JSON: /api/errors/b62f2f35dc3c490b. Report an issue: GitHub.