What causes "✗ invalid install target %q: %w" in sipeed/picoclaw?

Use the exact target form the registry expects (slug or owner/repo) per its docs.

✗ invalid install target %q: %w

Error message

✗  invalid install target %q: %w

What it means

The install target (the part after the registry name) was rejected by registry.ResolveInstallDirName, which normalizes a slug or owner/repo form into an on-disk directory name under <workspace>/skills. Empty, malformed, or unmappable targets fail here, before any download starts.

Source

Thrown at cmd/picoclaw/internal/skills/helpers.go:66

}

// skillsInstallFromRegistry installs a skill from a named registry (e.g. clawhub).
func skillsInstallFromRegistry(cfg *config.Config, registryName, target string) error {
	err := utils.ValidateSkillIdentifier(registryName)
	if err != nil {
		return fmt.Errorf("✗  invalid registry name: %w", err)
	}

	registryMgr := skills.NewRegistryManagerFromToolsConfig(cfg.Tools.Skills)

	registry := registryMgr.GetRegistry(registryName)
	if registry == nil {
		return fmt.Errorf("✗  registry '%s' not found or not enabled. check your config.json.", registryName)
	}

	dirName, err := registry.ResolveInstallDirName(target)
	if err != nil {
		return fmt.Errorf("✗  invalid install target %q: %w", target, err)
	}

	fmt.Printf("Installing skill '%s' from %s registry...\n", target, registryName)

	workspace := cfg.WorkspacePath()
	targetDir := filepath.Join(workspace, "skills", dirName)

	if _, err = os.Stat(targetDir); err == nil {
		return fmt.Errorf("\u2717 skill '%s' already installed at %s", dirName, targetDir)
	}

	ctx, cancel := context.WithTimeout(context.Background(), 60*time.Second)
	defer cancel()

	if err = os.MkdirAll(filepath.Join(workspace, "skills"), 0o755); err != nil {
		return fmt.Errorf("\u2717 failed to create skills directory: %w", err)
	}

View on GitHub (pinned to 49183d7e8d)

Solutions

Use the exact target form the registry expects (slug or owner/repo) per its docs.
Strip trailing slashes and stray quotes.
Read the wrapped error for the specific rule broken.
Confirm the target exists on the registry before installing.

Example fix

# before
picoclaw skills install clawhub/owner/
# after
picoclaw skills install clawhub/owner/repo

Defensive patterns

Strategy: validation

Validate before calling

target = strings.Trim(target, "/")
if _, err := registry.ResolveInstallDirName(target); err != nil {
    return fmt.Errorf("invalid install target %q: %w", target, err)
}

Type guard

func validInstallTarget(r skills.Registry, t string) bool {
    _, err := r.ResolveInstallDirName(t)
    return err == nil
}

Prevention

Trim trailing slashes and reject empty path segments before calling install.
Document the target syntax (slug vs owner/repo) in command help.
Validate against the same rules the registry uses when building install scripts.

When it happens

Trigger: Targets like "owner/" (empty repo), "/repo" (empty owner), strings with unexpected path separators or invalid characters, or anything ResolveInstallDirName cannot map — helpers.go:66.

Common situations: Copy-pasting a URL fragment instead of the slug, a trailing slash left by shell tab-completion, or a registry whose expected target syntax differs from what was typed.

Related errors

AI-assisted analysis of sipeed/picoclaw@49183d7e8d (2026-08-15). Data as JSON: /api/errors/e0ce79a125a136bb. Report an issue: GitHub.