junegunn/fzf · error

at least one of 'file' or 'dir' should be specified

Error message

at least one of 'file' or 'dir' should be specified

What it means

Thrown while parsing the --walker option. The walker option list must explicitly include 'file' and/or 'dir' to tell fzf which entry types to emit; every other token (hidden, follow, or skip patterns) only refines the traversal. If neither 'file' nor 'dir' appears, the parsed walkerOpts has both flags false and options parsing aborts.

Source

Thrown at src/options.go:1649

	opts := walkerOpts{}
	for _, str := range strings.Split(strings.ToLower(str), ",") {
		switch str {
		case "file":
			opts.file = true
		case "dir":
			opts.dir = true
		case "hidden":
			opts.hidden = true
		case "follow":
			opts.follow = true
		case "":
			// Ignored
		default:
			return opts, errors.New("invalid walker option: " + str)
		}
	}
	if !opts.file && !opts.dir {
		return opts, errors.New("at least one of 'file' or 'dir' should be specified")
	}
	return opts, nil
}

var (
	argActionRegexp  *regexp.Regexp
	splitRegexp      *regexp.Regexp
	actionNameRegexp *regexp.Regexp
)

func firstKey(keymap map[tui.Event]string) tui.Event {
	for k := range keymap {
		return k
	}
	return tui.EventType(0).AsEvent()
}

const (

View on GitHub (pinned to bd4efa277b)

Solutions

1. Include 'file' or 'dir' explicitly: `--walker file,dir,hidden,follow`
2. Check spelling of every token: singular 'file'/'dir', not 'files'/'dirs'
3. Remove --walker entirely if the default file+dir walking is acceptable

Example fix

# before
fzf --walker hidden
# after
fzf --walker file,dir,hidden

# bash: require file or dir token in --walker
walker_ok() {
  case ",$1," in
    *,file,*|*,dir,*) return 0;;
    *) echo "--walker needs 'file' or 'dir'" >&2; return 1;;
  esac
}
walker_ok "$WALKER" && fzf --walker "$WALKER"

When it happens

Trigger: Passing --walker with only modifier tokens, e.g. `--walker hidden`, `--walker follow`, `--walker skip:node_modules`, or `--walker hidden,follow` — none of which contains 'file' or 'dir'.

Common situations: A developer adds --walker hidden expecting 'hidden files in addition to defaults', not knowing that file/dir selection is opt-in and not defaulted; or a typo like 'files' or 'dirs' (plural) silently falls through to the invalid-walker-option/default path.

Related errors

• no directory specified
• invalid walker option: ${str}
• unable to put non-printable character
• unknown action: ${spec}
• key name required

AI-assisted analysis of junegunn/fzf@bd4efa277b (2026-08-15). Data as JSON: /api/errors/192d3b541744af99. Report an issue: GitHub.