mikefarah/yq · error

%v has no keys

Error message

%v has no keys

What it means

to_entries requires each matched node to be a mapping or sequence (both yield key/value entries); nulls are silently skipped. Any other kind — the tag is printed, typically !!str or !!bool — reaches the default branch and errors, because a scalar fundamentally has no keys to enumerate.

Source

Thrown at pkg/yqlib/operator_entries.go:56

		sequence.AddChild(entrySeqFor(key, value))
	}
	return sequence
}

func toEntriesOperator(_ *dataTreeNavigator, context Context, _ *ExpressionNode) (Context, error) {
	var results = list.New()
	for el := context.MatchingNodes.Front(); el != nil; el = el.Next() {
		candidate := el.Value.(*CandidateNode)

		switch candidate.Kind {
		case MappingNode:
			results.PushBack(toEntriesFromMap(candidate))

		case SequenceNode:
			results.PushBack(toEntriesfromSeq(candidate))
		default:
			if candidate.Tag != "!!null" {
				return Context{}, fmt.Errorf("%v has no keys", candidate.Tag)
			}
		}
	}

	return context.ChildContext(results), nil
}

func parseEntry(candidateNode *CandidateNode, position int) (*CandidateNode, *CandidateNode, error) {
	prefs := traversePreferences{DontAutoCreate: true}

	keyResults, err := traverseMap(Context{}, candidateNode, createStringScalarNode("key"), prefs, false)

	if err != nil {
		return nil, nil, err
	} else if keyResults.Len() != 1 {
		return nil, nil, fmt.Errorf("expected to find one 'key' entry but found %v in position %v", keyResults.Len(), position)
	}

View on GitHub (pinned to 8b5af0694b)

Solutions

1. Apply to_entries only to maps/arrays: . | to_entries
2. Wrap scalars if needed: {value: .} | to_entries
3. Filter non-map nodes first with select(type == "!!map")

When it happens

Trigger: Thrown at pkg/yqlib/operator_entries.go:56 when the library encounters an invalid state.

Common situations: See trigger scenarios.

AI-assisted analysis of mikefarah/yq@8b5af0694b (2026-09-05). Data as JSON: /api/errors/2caa0108aa8694ff. Report an issue: GitHub.