jackwener/OpenCLI · error · CommandExecutionError

semanticscholar ${label} row has malformed authors

Error message

semanticscholar ${label} row has malformed authors

What it means

normalizePaperRow tolerates a missing authors field but rejects one that is present and not an array (`paper.authors != null && !Array.isArray(paper.authors)`), throwing this CommandExecutionError. It enforces that author data, when supplied, follows the expected [{name: string}] shape.

Source

Thrown at clis/semanticscholar/utils.js:173

    if (value == null) return null;
    if (typeof value !== 'number' || !Number.isFinite(value)) {
        throw new CommandExecutionError(`semanticscholar ${label} must be a number when present`);
    }
    return value;
}

export function normalizePaperRow(paper, label, { rank } = {}) {
    if (!paper || typeof paper !== 'object') {
        throw new CommandExecutionError(`semanticscholar ${label} row is not an object`);
    }
    if (typeof paper.paperId !== 'string' || !paper.paperId.trim()) {
        throw new CommandExecutionError(`semanticscholar ${label} row is missing paperId`);
    }
    if (typeof paper.title !== 'string' || !paper.title.trim()) {
        throw new CommandExecutionError(`semanticscholar ${label} row is missing title`);
    }
    if (paper.authors != null && !Array.isArray(paper.authors)) {
        throw new CommandExecutionError(`semanticscholar ${label} row has malformed authors`);
    }
    const row = {
        paperId: paper.paperId.trim(),
        doi: pickDoi(paper.externalIds),
        title: paper.title.trim(),
        year: optionalNumber(paper.year, `${label} year`),
        firstAuthor: firstAuthorName(paper.authors),
        citationCount: optionalNumber(paper.citationCount, `${label} citationCount`),
        url: typeof paper.url === 'string' && paper.url.trim()
            ? paper.url.trim()
            : `https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/${paper.paperId.trim()}`,
    };
    if (rank != null) return { rank, ...row };
    return row;
}

/** Strip the typed prefix from `externalIds.DOI` and similar. */
export function pickDoi(externalIds) {

View on GitHub (pinned to 49907e53dc)

Solutions

1. Inspect the raw row's authors value and conform the fixture/caller to an array of {name} objects.
2. Coerce common shapes: wrap a single author string in [{name: s}] or extract Object.values if it's an object map.
3. Check for API version changes and update the adapter's field handling.
4. Drop the malformed field (set authors to null) so firstAuthorName returns '' instead of failing.

Example fix

// before
authors: paper.authors,
// after: coerce or null out malformed authors
let authors = paper.authors;
if (authors != null && !Array.isArray(authors)) {
  authors = typeof authors === 'string' ? [{ name: authors }] : null;
}

function sanitizeAuthors(a) {
  if (a == null) return null;
  if (Array.isArray(a)) return a;
  if (typeof a === 'string' && a.trim()) return [{ name: a.trim() }];
  return null; // drop malformed shapes
}

function isAuthorList(v) {
  return v == null || (Array.isArray(v) && v.every(x => x && typeof x === 'object' && typeof x.name === 'string'));
}

try {
  return normalizePaperRow(paper, 'citation');
} catch (err) {
  if (/malformed authors/.test(err.message)) {
    return normalizePaperRow({ ...paper, authors: null }, 'citation');
  }
  throw err;
}

When it happens

Trigger: The API (or an intermediary/proxy) returns authors as an object, string, or other non-array value on a paper row that normalizePaperRow is processing.

Common situations: Semantic Scholar schema drift changing the authors container; a proxy caching an older response shape; hand-written fixtures with authors: 'Smith, J.' instead of an array.

Understand the failure class

Background: Schema validation failed / invalid input schema: payload rejected because its shape doesn't match the expected schema — this error's family across 28 libraries.

• Parsing and encoding errors: unexpected token, malformed input — why parsers reject input and how to find the real culprit.

Related errors

• semanticscholar ${label} row is not an object
• semanticscholar ${label} must be a number when present
• semanticscholar ${label} row is missing paperId
• semanticscholar ${label} row is missing title
• ${label} must be an integer between ${min} and ${max}, got $

AI-assisted analysis of jackwener/OpenCLI@49907e53dc (2026-08-29). Data as JSON: /api/errors/bbc56ea2c33065c8. Report an issue: GitHub.