kovidgoyal/kitty · error · ValueError

Invalid paste actions: {q - s}, ignoring

Error message

Invalid paste actions: {q - s}, ignoring

What it means

kitty validates paste_actions as a comma-separated subset of a fixed frozenset of allowed action names; unknown tokens cause this ValueError listing the invalid ones.

Source

Thrown at kitty/options/utils.py:1202

def underline_exclusion(x: str) -> tuple[float, Literal['', 'px', 'pt']]:
    try:
        return float(x), ''
    except Exception:
        unit: Literal['pt', 'px'] = x[-2:]  # type: ignore
        if unit not in ('px', 'pt'):
            raise ValueError(f'Invalid underline_exclusion with unrecognized unit: {x}')
        try:
            val = float(x[:-2])
        except Exception:
            raise ValueError(f'Invalid underline_exclusion with non numeric value: {x}')
        return val, unit


def paste_actions(x: str) -> frozenset[str]:
    s = frozenset({'quote-urls-at-prompt', 'confirm', 'filter', 'confirm-if-large', 'replace-dangerous-control-codes', 'replace-newline', 'no-op'})
    q = frozenset(x.lower().split(','))
    if not q.issubset(s):
        raise ValueError(f'Invalid paste actions: {q - s}, ignoring')
    return q


def action_alias(val: str) -> Iterable[tuple[str, str]]:
    parts = val.split(maxsplit=1)
    if len(parts) > 1:
        alias_name, rest = parts
        yield alias_name, rest


kitten_alias = action_alias


def symbol_map_parser(val: str, min_size: int = 2) -> Iterable[tuple[tuple[int, int], str]]:
    parts = val.split()

    if len(parts) < min_size:
        raise ValueError('must have codepoints AND font name')

View on GitHub (pinned to 6d5d0c4406)

Solutions

1. Correct the action name to one of the allowed values
2. Check the allowed list in the error/kitty docs for your kitty version
3. Split multiple actions with commas and no invalid extras

Example fix

# before
paste_actions confirm, sanitize
# after
paste_actions confirm, filter

ALLOWED = {'quote-urls-at-prompt','confirm','filter','confirm-if-large','replace-dangerous-control-codes','replace-newline','no-op'}
def valid_paste_actions(v: str) -> bool:
    return set(map(str.lower, v.split(','))) <= ALLOWED

def is_valid_paste_actions(v: str) -> bool:
    ALLOWED = {'quote-urls-at-prompt','confirm','filter','confirm-if-large','replace-dangerous-control-codes','replace-newline','no-op'}
    return bool(v) and set(map(str.lower, v.split(','))) <= ALLOWED

When it happens

Trigger: Setting paste_actions to include tokens not in {'quote-urls-at-prompt','confirm','filter','confirm-if-large','replace-dangerous-control-codes','replace-newline','no-op'}, e.g. 'confirm, sanitize' or a misspelled name.

Common situations: Misspelling an action, using an action removed/renamed between kitty versions, or adding spaces/extra tokens.

Related errors

• The value {x} is not a known choice
• The value {val} is not a valid choice for progress_bar
• The value {val} is not a valid choice for scrollbar
• The value {val} is not a valid choice for strip_trailing_spa
• The value {val} is not a valid choice for tab_bar_align

AI-assisted analysis of kovidgoyal/kitty@6d5d0c4406 (2026-08-27). Data as JSON: /api/errors/59c1c52622f1b007. Report an issue: GitHub.