wavetermdev/waveterm · error

empty object reference

Error message

empty object reference

What it means

UpdateObjectMeta requires a non-empty waveobj.ORef identifying the object whose metadata should change. An ORef encodes type and ID; an empty one carries no target at all, so the library rejects it up front rather than failing deeper in the transaction.

Source

Thrown at pkg/wstore/wstore.go:60

func UpdateTabName(ctx context.Context, tabId, name string) error {
	return WithTx(ctx, func(tx *TxWrap) error {
		tab, _ := DBGet[*waveobj.Tab](tx.Context(), tabId)
		if tab == nil {
			return fmt.Errorf("tab not found: %q", tabId)
		}
		if tabId != "" {
			tab.Name = name
			DBUpdate(tx.Context(), tab)
		}
		return nil
	})
}

func UpdateObjectMeta(ctx context.Context, oref waveobj.ORef, meta waveobj.MetaMapType, mergeSpecial bool) error {
	return WithTx(ctx, func(tx *TxWrap) error {
		if oref.IsEmpty() {
			return fmt.Errorf("empty object reference")
		}
		obj, _ := DBGetORef(tx.Context(), oref)
		if obj == nil {
			return ErrNotFound
		}
		objMeta := waveobj.GetMeta(obj)
		if objMeta == nil {
			objMeta = make(map[string]any)
		}
		newMeta := waveobj.MergeMeta(objMeta, meta, mergeSpecial)
		waveobj.SetMeta(obj, newMeta)
		DBUpdate(tx.Context(), obj)
		return nil
	})
}

View on GitHub (pinned to a4447c1563)

Solutions

1. Check oref.IsEmpty() at the call site and skip or fix the caller that produced the empty reference
2. Validate the source string with waveobj.ParseORef and handle its error instead of discarding it
3. Ensure the object field carrying the ORef is populated before invoking meta updates

Example fix

// before
wstore.UpdateObjectMeta(ctx, oref, meta, true) // oref may be zero
// after
if oref.IsEmpty() {
	return nil
}
wstore.UpdateObjectMeta(ctx, oref, meta, true)

if oref.IsEmpty() {
	return fmt.Errorf("no target object for meta update")
}

func hasORef(oref waveobj.ORef) bool { return !oref.IsEmpty() }

if err := wstore.UpdateObjectMeta(ctx, oref, meta, true); err != nil {
	if strings.Contains(err.Error(), "empty object reference") {
		return populateORefAndRetry()
	}
	return err
}

When it happens

Trigger: Passing the zero value of waveobj.ORef (e.g. ORef{} from an unpopulated struct or a failed ParseORef whose error was ignored) into wstore.UpdateObjectMeta.

Common situations: Constructing an ORef from an empty oref string field on a partially initialized object; ignoring the error from waveobj.ParseORef and using the zero ORef; default-struct fields never assigned before a meta update.

Related errors

• badge oref must be a block or tab (got %q)
• invalid object reference: %q
• error parsing object reference: %w
• invalid oref string: %v
• cannot convert %T to %s (idx %d) error: %v

AI-assisted analysis of wavetermdev/waveterm@a4447c1563 (2026-09-01). Data as JSON: /api/errors/77960f4cfbbbfd8a. Report an issue: GitHub.