What causes "Workspace path ${resolvedPath} is not a directory" in google-gemini/gemini-cli?

Point CODER_AGENT_WORKSPACE_PATH at the parent directory, not a file.

google-gemini/gemini-cli · error · Error

Workspace path ${resolvedPath} is not a directory

Error message

Workspace path ${resolvedPath} is not a directory

What it means

Thrown by validateWorkspacePath when fs.stat succeeds but stats.isDirectory() is false. The resolved workspace path exists but is a regular file (or socket/device), not a directory. The agent needs a directory to operate as the workspace root.

Source

Thrown at packages/a2a-server/src/config/config.ts:496

      if (
        err &&
        typeof err === 'object' &&
        'code' in err &&
        err.code === 'ENOENT'
      ) {
        if (isTestEnv) {
          await fs.promises.mkdir(resolvedPath, { recursive: true });
          stats = await fs.promises.stat(resolvedPath);
        } else {
          throw new Error(`Workspace path ${resolvedPath} does not exist`);
        }
      } else {
        throw err;
      }
    }

    if (!stats.isDirectory()) {
      throw new Error(`Workspace path ${resolvedPath} is not a directory`);
    }

    return resolvedPath;
  } catch (e) {
    logger.error(`[CoderAgentExecutor] Error resolving workspace path: ${e}`);
    throw e;
  }
}

export async function loadEnvironment(
  isTrusted: boolean = false,
  workspacePath: string = process.cwd(),
): Promise<Record<string, string>> {
  // For untrusted workspaces, we completely bypass workspace-level .env loading
  // and only load environment variables from the user's trusted home directory.
  let envFilePath: string | null = null;
  if (isTrusted) {
    envFilePath = await findEnvFile(workspacePath);

View on GitHub (pinned to 5024443c72)

Solutions

Point CODER_AGENT_WORKSPACE_PATH at the parent directory, not a file.
If a file is squatting on the directory name, remove/rename it and recreate the directory.
Add a startup assertion in your deploy script: [ -d "$CODER_AGENT_WORKSPACE_PATH" ] || exit 1.

Example fix

# before
export CODER_AGENT_WORKSPACE_PATH=/home/user/myproject/GEMINI.md
# throws: is not a directory

# after
export CODER_AGENT_WORKSPACE_PATH=/home/user/myproject

Defensive patterns

Strategy: validation

Validate before calling

import fs from 'node:fs';

const ws = process.env.CODER_AGENT_WORKSPACE_PATH!;
if (!fs.statSync(ws).isDirectory()) {
  throw new Error(`CODER_AGENT_WORKSPACE_PATH (${ws}) must be a directory, not a file.`);
}

Prevention

Always point CODER_AGENT_WORKSPACE_PATH at a project directory, never a file inside it.
Add a preflight script: [ -d "$WS" ] || exit 1.
If a file is squatting on the name, remove it and recreate as a directory.
Validate in your deploy tooling, not just at runtime.

When it happens

Trigger: CODER_AGENT_WORKSPACE_PATH resolves to a file (e.g. a package.json, a README, a tarball) rather than its parent directory; a path that was a directory replaced by a file.

Common situations: User sets the path to /repo/package.json by mistake; a deploy artifact overwrote a directory with a file; misconfigured init script passing a file path.

Related errors

AI-assisted analysis of google-gemini/gemini-cli@5024443c72 (2026-08-12). Data as JSON: /api/errors/02cf1b44354c2b94. Report an issue: GitHub.