kovidgoyal/kitty · error · SystemExit

No password was found

Error message

No password was found

What it means

When --use-password=always, the client must find a password (from the file or --password-env); if none is found it exits via SystemExit 'No password was found'.

Source

Thrown at kitty/remote_control.py:516

            else:
                ans = sys.stdin.read().rstrip()
                try:
                    tty_fd = os.open(os.ctermid(), os.O_RDONLY | os.O_CLOEXEC)
                except OSError:
                    pass
                else:
                    with open(tty_fd, closefd=True):
                        os.dup2(tty_fd, sys.stdin.fileno())
        else:
            try:
                with open(resolve_custom_file(opts.password_file)) as f:
                    ans = f.read().rstrip()
            except OSError:
                pass
    if not ans and opts.password_env:
        ans = os.environ.get(opts.password_env, '')
    if not ans and opts.use_password == 'always':
        raise SystemExit('No password was found')
    if ans and len(ans) > 1024:
        raise SystemExit('Specified password is too long')
    return ans


def get_pubkey() -> tuple[str, bytes]:
    raw = os.environ.get('KITTY_PUBLIC_KEY', '')
    if not raw:
        raise SystemExit('Password usage requested but KITTY_PUBLIC_KEY environment variable is not available')
    version, pubkey = raw.split(':', 1)
    if version != RC_ENCRYPTION_PROTOCOL_VERSION:
        raise SystemExit('KITTY_PUBLIC_KEY has unknown version, if you are running on a remote system, update kitty on this system')
    from base64 import b85decode

    return version, b85decode(pubkey)

View on GitHub (pinned to 6d5d0c4406)

Solutions

1. Set the password environment variable (e.g. KITTY_RC_PASSWORD) matching --password-env
2. Or write the password to the expected file path
3. Or use --use-password=no if authentication is not required

Example fix

# before
kitten @send-text --use-password always 'hi'
# after
KITTY_RC_PASSWORD=secret kitten @send-text --use-password always --password-env KITTY_RC_PASSWORD 'hi'

import os
assert os.environ.get(PASSWORD_ENV), 'password env var not set'

When it happens

Trigger: Running kitten remote-control with use_password='always' but no password file readable and the password_env variable unset/empty.

Common situations: Scripts requiring authentication without provisioning the password environment variable or file.

Related errors

• The remote control password was invalid: {data!r}
• Password usage requested but KITTY_PUBLIC_KEY environment va
• This should be run as kitten icat
• This should be run as `kitten notify ...`
• Remote control not enabled, this kitten should be run via a

AI-assisted analysis of kovidgoyal/kitty@6d5d0c4406 (2026-08-27). Data as JSON: /api/errors/b655b0577ee8d93f. Report an issue: GitHub.