ruby/rubygems · error · ArgumentError

dependency name must be a String, was #{name.inspect}

Error message

dependency name must be a String, was #{name.inspect}

What it means

Error "dependency name must be a String, was #{name.inspect}" thrown in ruby/rubygems.

Source

Thrown at lib/rubygems/dependency.rb:44

  ##
  # Allows you to force this dependency to be a prerelease.

  attr_writer :prerelease

  ##
  # Constructs a dependency with +name+ and +requirements+. The last
  # argument can optionally be the dependency type, which defaults to
  # <tt>:runtime</tt>.

  def initialize(name, *requirements)
    case name
    when String then # ok
    when Regexp then
      msg = ["NOTE: Dependency.new w/ a regexp is deprecated.",
             "Dependency.new called from #{Gem.location_of_caller.join(":")}"]
      warn msg.join("\n") unless Gem::Deprecate.skip
    else
      raise ArgumentError,
            "dependency name must be a String, was #{name.inspect}"
    end

    type         = Symbol === requirements.last ? requirements.pop : :runtime
    requirements = requirements.first if requirements.length == 1 # unpack

    unless TYPES.include? type
      raise ArgumentError, "Valid types are #{TYPES.inspect}, " \
                           "not #{type.inspect}"
    end

    @name        = name
    @requirement = Gem::Requirement.create requirements
    @type        = type
    @prerelease  = false

    # This is for Marshal backwards compatibility. See the comments in
    # +requirement+ for the dirty details.

View on GitHub (pinned to 86cbb817a3)

When it happens

Trigger: Thrown at lib/rubygems/dependency.rb:44 when the library encounters an invalid state.

Common situations: See trigger scenarios.

AI-assisted analysis of ruby/rubygems@86cbb817a3 (2026-08-23). Data as JSON: /api/errors/a25cd9b67800111f. Report an issue: GitHub.