go-delve/delve · error

you must provide a path to a binary

Error message

you must provide a path to a binary

What it means

Error "you must provide a path to a binary" thrown in go-delve/delve.

Source

Thrown at cmd/dlv/cmds/commands.go:289

	must(debugCommand.MarkFlagFilename("tty"))
	debugCommand.Flags().BoolVarP(&rrDelOnDetach, "rr-cleanup", "", true,
		"Delete directory containing debug recording on detach.")
	rootCommand.AddCommand(debugCommand)

	// 'exec' subcommand.
	execCommand := &cobra.Command{
		Use:   "exec <path/to/binary>",
		Short: "Execute a precompiled binary, and begin a debug session.",
		Long: `Execute a precompiled binary and begin a debug session.

This command will cause Delve to exec the binary and immediately attach to it to
begin a new debug session. Please note that if the binary was not compiled with
optimizations disabled, it may be difficult to properly debug it. Please
consider compiling debugging binaries with -gcflags="all=-N -l" on Go 1.10
or later, -gcflags="-N -l" on earlier versions of Go.`,
		PersistentPreRunE: func(cmd *cobra.Command, args []string) error {
			if len(args) == 0 {
				return errors.New("you must provide a path to a binary")
			}
			return nil
		},
		Run: func(cmd *cobra.Command, args []string) {
			os.Exit(execute(0, args, conf, "", debugger.ExecutingExistingFile, args, buildFlags))
		},
		ValidArgsFunction: func(cmd *cobra.Command, args []string, toComplete string) ([]string, cobra.ShellCompDirective) {
			if len(args) != 0 {
				return nil, cobra.ShellCompDirectiveNoFileComp
			}
			return nil, cobra.ShellCompDirectiveDefault
		},
	}
	execCommand.Flags().StringVar(&tty, "tty", "", "TTY to use for the target program")
	must(execCommand.MarkFlagFilename("tty"))
	execCommand.Flags().BoolVar(&continueOnStart, "continue", false, "Continue the debugged process on start.")
	execCommand.Flags().BoolVarP(&rrDelOnDetach, "rr-cleanup", "", true,
		"Delete directory containing debug recording on detach.")

View on GitHub (pinned to a23773e6c3)

When it happens

Trigger: Thrown at cmd/dlv/cmds/commands.go:289 when the library encounters an invalid state.

Common situations: See trigger scenarios.

AI-assisted analysis of go-delve/delve@a23773e6c3 (2026-08-31). Data as JSON: /api/errors/2790b594b3eff005. Report an issue: GitHub.