What causes "a glob is required" in jdx/mise?

Pass the glob explicitly: `mise dot paths exclude 'secrets/*'`

a glob is required

Error message

a glob is required

What it means

Validation in the `mise dotfiles` paths command (edit_exclude flow, src/cli/dotfiles/paths.rs). The `mise dot exclude` command requires a glob pattern argument to add to the exclusion list; this error fires when the subcommand is invoked with no glob (or an empty argument), so there is no pattern to persist to the dotfiles watch configuration.

Solutions

Pass the glob explicitly: `mise dot paths exclude 'secrets/*'`
Quote the argument in scripts: `mise dot paths exclude "$GLOB"` and validate $GLOB is non-empty first
Use `mise dot paths` to list current exclusions and confirm the pattern you want

Example fix

// before
GLOB=""
mise dot paths exclude $GLOB
// after
GLOB="secrets/*"
mise dot paths exclude "$GLOB"

Defensive patterns

Strategy: validation

Validate before calling

[ -n "${GLOB:-}" ] && [ -n "$(echo "$GLOB" | tr -d '[:space:]')" ] || { echo "glob required"; exit 1; }

Try / catch

if ! mise dot paths exclude "$GLOB"; then
  echo "provide a non-empty glob, e.g. mise dot paths exclude 'secrets/*'"
fi

Prevention

Quote glob variables in shell scripts
Default empty variables before invoking the command
Validate globs non-empty after trimming whitespace
List current exclusions (`mise dot paths`) to sanity-check patterns

When it happens

Trigger: Calling `mise dot paths exclude` / `--add` with an empty string or only whitespace as the glob argument (after `glob.trim()` it is empty).

Common situations: Shell scripts with an unquoted/unset variable: `mise dot paths exclude $GLOB` where GLOB is empty; accidental double-space or missing argument in an alias.

Understand the failure class

Background: "must not be empty", "cannot be empty" — required-field validation errors across open-source libraries — this error's family across 41 libraries.

Related errors

AI-assisted analysis of jdx/mise@533346cc37 (2026-09-17). Data as JSON: /api/errors/0ed942ecf185ca2e. Report an issue: GitHub.

Appendix: source

Thrown at src/cli/dotfiles/paths.rs:179

                crate::system::history::watch::runtime::humantime(std::time::Duration::from_secs(
                    noisy.interval_secs,
                )),
                noisy.pending_changes.to_string(),
                noisy.last_seen.clone(),
            ]);
        }
        table.print()?;
        miseprintln!(
            "These paths keep changing, so the watcher saves them ever more rarely (never excluded or switched to manual saving on its own). Exclude a log, cache, or database with `mise dot exclude '<glob>'`; track configuration that changes constantly with `--no-autosave` and save it explicitly."
        );
        Ok(())
    }
}

pub(crate) fn edit_exclude(glob: &str, add: bool) -> Result<()> {
    let glob = glob.trim();
    if glob.is_empty() {
        eyre::bail!("a glob is required");
    }
    let global = crate::config::global_config_path();
    let changed = crate::cli::dotfiles::track::edit_exclude(glob, add)?;
    match (add, changed) {
        (true, true) => info!(
            "history: {glob} is excluded from capture ({})",
            display_path(&global)
        ),
        (true, false) => info!("history: {glob} was already excluded"),
        (false, true) => info!(
            "history: {glob} is captured again ({})",
            display_path(&global)
        ),
        (false, false) => info!("history: {glob} was not excluded"),
    }
    Ok(())
}

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