oraios/serena · error

Pass either content or source_file_path

Error message

Pass either content or source_file_path

What it means

TextUtils.search_text requires the text to search: it accepts either raw content or a source_file_path it reads itself. If both are absent (content is None after optional file read) it raises ValueError, since searching an empty input would silently return no matches.

Source

Thrown at src/serena/util/text_utils.py:145

    """
    Search for a pattern in text content. Supports both regex and glob-like patterns.

    :param pattern: Pattern to search for (regex or glob-like pattern)
    :param content: The text content to search. May be None if source_file_path is provided.
    :param source_file_path: Optional path to the source file. If content is None,
        this has to be passed and the file will be read.
    :param context_lines_before: Number of context lines to include before matches
    :param context_lines_after: Number of context lines to include after matches
    :param multiline: whether to apply multi-line matching, enabling the flags re.DOTALL and re.MULTILINE
    :return: List of `TextSearchMatch` objects
    :raises: ValueError if the pattern is not valid
    """
    if source_file_path and content is None:
        with open(source_file_path) as f:
            content = f.read()

    if content is None:
        raise ValueError("Pass either content or source_file_path")

    matches = []
    lines = TextUtils.split_lines(content)
    total_lines = len(lines)

    # For multiline matches, optionally use DOTALL so '.' matches newlines
    flags = (re.MULTILINE | re.DOTALL) if multiline else 0
    compiled_pattern = re.compile(pattern, flags)
    # Search across the entire content as a single string
    for match in compiled_pattern.finditer(content):
        start_pos = match.start()
        end_pos = match.end()

        # Find the line numbers for the start and end positions
        start_line_num = TextUtils.get_line_from_index(content, start_pos)
        end_line_num = TextUtils.get_line_from_index(content, end_pos)
        if end_line_num > start_line_num and TextUtils.get_line_col_from_index(content, end_pos)[1] == 0:
            # `end_pos` is exclusive, so if it is at the start of a line, the match ends with the

View on GitHub (pinned to 7fcbca7e62)

Solutions

1. Pass source_file_path pointing to an existing file
2. Or read the file yourself and pass content=<string>
3. Validate inputs before the call and raise a clearer domain-specific error
4. Fix callers that pass None after a failed file read

Example fix

// before
TextUtils.search_text('pattern')  # ValueError
// after
TextUtils.search_text('pattern', source_file_path='src/main.py')
# or
content = open('src/main.py').read()
TextUtils.search_text('pattern', content=content)

def safe_search(pattern: str, path: str | None = None, content: str | None = None):
    if content is None and path is None:
        raise ValueError("search_text needs content or source_file_path")
    return TextUtils.search_text(pattern, source_file_path=path, content=content)

try:
    matches = TextUtils.search_text(pattern, source_file_path=path)
except ValueError as e:
    log.error("search_text misused: %s", e)

When it happens

Trigger: Calling search_text(pattern) with neither content nor source_file_path, or with source_file_path set but content explicitly None and the path handling skipped — e.g. search_text(pattern, content=None, source_file_path=None).

Common situations: Programmatic callers passing variables that are None because a previous read failed; refactors changing the function signature; tests forgetting required arguments.

Understand the failure class

Background: "missing required argument" and "the following required arguments were not provided": what required-argument errors mean and how to fix them — this error's family across 20 libraries.

Related errors

• Tool named '{tool_name}' not found.
• Invalid tool name: {tool_name}{caller_context_for_logging}
• Invalid topic: {topic}
• Invalid glob brace expression in {pattern!r}: empty braces a
• Invalid glob brace expression in {pattern!r}: unmatched brac

AI-assisted analysis of oraios/serena@7fcbca7e62 (2026-08-29). Data as JSON: /api/errors/6a82038fd7db0a97. Report an issue: GitHub.