gotify/server · error

migrate-config requires one argument: the path to the old co

Error message

migrate-config requires one argument: the path to the old config.yml

What it means

Argument validation error from the migrate-config subcommand (config/migrate/migrate.go Config function). The command converts an old config.yml to the new format and requires exactly one argument — the path to the old config file. An empty path yields this error before any file I/O.

Source

Thrown at config/migrate/migrate.go:76

	PassStrength      *int
	UploadedImagesDir *string
	PluginsDir        *string
	Registration      *bool
	OIDC              struct {
		Enabled       *bool
		Issuer        *string
		ClientID      *string
		ClientSecret  *string
		UsernameClaim *string
		RedirectURL   *string
		AutoRegister  *bool
		Scopes        []string
	}
}

func Config(file string) (string, error) {
	if file == "" {
		return "", errors.New("migrate-config requires one argument: the path to the old config.yml")
	}
	data, err := os.ReadFile(file)
	if err != nil {
		return "", fmt.Errorf("cannot read config file %s: %w", file, err)
	}

	var migrated oldConfig
	if err := yaml.Unmarshal(data, &migrated); err != nil {
		return "", fmt.Errorf("cannot parse config file %s: %w", file, err)
	}

	content, err := godotenv.Marshal(buildEnv(migrated))
	if err != nil {
		return "", fmt.Errorf("cannot render config: %w", err)
	}

	return content, nil
}

View on GitHub (pinned to 14bfc25627)

Solutions

1. Invoke migrate-config with the path as its single argument, e.g. gitea migrate-config /etc/gitea-old/config.yml
2. Verify the variable holding the path is non-empty before invoking (e.g. [ -n "$OLD_CONF" ] || exit 1)
3. Check your flag parsing — ensure the positional path isn't swallowed by a flag definition
4. Quote paths with spaces so the shell passes them as one argument

Example fix

# before
gitea migrate-config
# after
gitea migrate-config /etc/gitea/config.yml

if len(os.Args) < 2 || os.Args[1] == "" {
    fmt.Fprintln(os.Stderr, "usage: migrate-config <path-to-old-config.yml>")
    os.Exit(2)
}
oldConf := os.Args[1]

func hasConfigPathArg(args []string) bool {
    return len(args) > 0 && args[0] != ""
}

newConf, err := migrate.Config(oldConf)
if err != nil {
    if strings.Contains(err.Error(), "requires one argument") {
        return fmt.Errorf("usage: migrate-config <path-to-old-config.yml>")
    }
    return err
}

When it happens

Trigger: Running the migrate-config command with no arguments; passing an empty string variable; wiring run/runMigrate so the path argument is dropped (e.g. flag parsing consumed it or os.Args indexing is wrong); tests calling Config("").

Common situations: Forgetting the positional argument in a shell script or Docker CMD; the path stored in an unset env var; migrating run scripts where flags were reordered and the argument ended up empty.

Understand the failure class

Background: "missing required argument" and "the following required arguments were not provided": what required-argument errors mean and how to fix them — this error's family across 20 libraries.

Related errors

• username claim was empty
• unknown log level
• cannot read config file %s: %w
• read file for %s_FILE (%s): %w
• invalid int for %s (%q): %w

AI-assisted analysis of gotify/server@14bfc25627 (2026-09-05). Data as JSON: /api/errors/a08c12bfb4fdd6fe. Report an issue: GitHub.