kovidgoyal/kitty · error

Failed to read data from the clipboard with error: %w

Error message

Failed to read data from the clipboard with error: %w

What it means

In the data-transfer phase, once the peer has agreed on a MIME type, any response status other than DATA/OK/DONE is wrapped as 'Failed to read data from the clipboard' around error_from_status. The inner message names the concrete failure that aborted the payload download.

Source

Thrown at kittens/clipboard/read.go:414

						}
						getting_data_for = current_mime
					}
					if !o.all_data_received {
						o.add_data(payload)
					}
				}
			case "OK":
			case "DONE":
				if prev := requested_mimes[getting_data_for]; getting_data_for != "" && prev != nil && !prev.all_data_received {
					prev.all_data_received = true
					wg.Go(func() {
						prev.commit()
					})
					getting_data_for = ""
				}
				lp.Quit(0)
			default:
				return fmt.Errorf("Failed to read data from the clipboard with error: %w", error_from_status(metadata["status"]))
			}
		}
		return
	}

	esc_count := 0
	lp.OnKeyEvent = func(event *loop.KeyEvent) error {
		if event.MatchesPressOrRepeat("ctrl+c") || event.MatchesPressOrRepeat("esc") {
			event.Handled = true
			esc_count++
			if esc_count < 2 {
				key := "Esc"
				if event.MatchesPressOrRepeat("ctrl+c") {
					key = "Ctrl+C"
				}
				lp.QueueWriteString(fmt.Sprintf("Waiting for response from terminal, press %s again to abort. This could cause garbage to be spewed to the screen.\r\n", key))
			} else {
				return fmt.Errorf("Aborted by user!")

View on GitHub (pinned to 6d5d0c4406)

Solutions

1. Inspect the inner status message: EPERM → approve/authorize; EBUSY → retry after a delay; unknown → update kitty versions
2. Re-copy the content on the sender and retry the whole get operation
3. For large payloads prefer getfile to avoid inline transfer limits
4. Stabilize the transport (avoid tmux reflow, enable passthrough)

Example fix

# before
kitten clipboard get big.png   # aborts mid-transfer
# after
kitten clipboard getfile --mime image/png big.png

for i in 1 2 3; do kitten clipboard getfile --mime image/png out.png && break; sleep 1; done

When it happens

Trigger: `kitten clipboard get dest` after the MIME negotiation succeeded, when the peer aborts mid-transfer with EPERM (revoked permission), EBUSY (owner busy), or an unknown status; large payloads failing partway also surface here.

Common situations: User denying the confirmation after negotiation started; clipboard owner replacing content mid-read; ssh/mosh connections dropping during transfer; tmux mangling long sequences.

Related errors

• Failed to read list of available data types in the clipboard
• Too much piped data
• Failed to read from STDIN pipe with error: %w
• Failed to create a temporary from STDIN pipe with error: %w
• Failed to copy data from STDIN pipe to temp file with error:

AI-assisted analysis of kovidgoyal/kitty@6d5d0c4406 (2026-08-27). Data as JSON: /api/errors/acaa8960568e4c7a. Report an issue: GitHub.