wavetermdev/waveterm · error

getting file info: %w

Error message

getting file info: %w

What it means

fileInfoRun calls the FileInfoCommand RPC and wraps failures with 'getting file info:'. This fires when the RPC to fetch file metadata on the target host fails at the transport level (not for a simply-missing file, which is handled separately).

Source

Thrown at cmd/wsh/cmd/wshcmd-file.go:199

		return fmt.Errorf("reading file: %w", err)
	}

	return nil
}

func fileInfoRun(cmd *cobra.Command, args []string) error {
	path, err := fixRelativePaths(args[0])
	if err != nil {
		return err
	}
	fileData := wshrpc.FileData{
		Info: &wshrpc.FileInfo{
			Path: path}}

	info, err := wshclient.FileInfoCommand(RpcClient, fileData, &wshrpc.RpcOpts{Timeout: fileTimeout})
	err = convertNotFoundErr(err)
	if err != nil {
		return fmt.Errorf("getting file info: %w", err)
	}

	if info.NotFound {
		return fmt.Errorf("%s: no such file", path)
	}

	WriteStdout("name:\t%s\n", info.Name)
	if info.Mode != 0 {
		WriteStdout("mode:\t%s\n", info.Mode.String())
	}
	WriteStdout("mtime:\t%s\n", time.Unix(info.ModTime/1000, 0).Format(time.DateTime))
	if !info.IsDir {
		WriteStdout("size:\t%d\n", info.Size)
	}
	if info.Meta != nil && len(*info.Meta) > 0 {
		WriteStdout("metadata:\n")
		for k, v := range *info.Meta {
			WriteStdout("\t\t\t%s: %v\n", k, v)

View on GitHub (pinned to a4447c1563)

Solutions

1. Check connectivity to the target host and re-run the command.
2. Retry on transient timeouts; increase fileTimeout if the network is slow.
3. Ensure the remote wsh server version matches the client; update wsh remotely.
4. Confirm you are connected (wsh conn status) before running file commands.

// confirm connectivity before the RPC
if err := checkConnection(); err != nil {
    return fmt.Errorf("not connected: %w", err)
}
info, err := wshclient.FileInfoCommand(RpcClient, fileData, &wshrpc.RpcOpts{Timeout: fileTimeout})

info, err := wshclient.FileInfoCommand(RpcClient, fileData, &wshrpc.RpcOpts{Timeout: fileTimeout})
if err != nil {
    // transient? retry once with backoff before surfacing
    return fmt.Errorf("getting file info: %w", err)
}

When it happens

Trigger: `wsh file info <path>` where the RPC fails: no RPC connection, timeout (fileTimeout exceeded), remote wsh server not running, or connection dropped during the call.

Common situations: Querying info on a remote host that is offline or whose wsh server is stale, slow network exceeding the RPC timeout, running the command without a connected wave terminal.

Related errors

• unable to obtain client info: %w
• nil wshrpc passed to wshclient
• failed to list workspaces: %v
• failed to list blocks from all %d workspace(s)
• no route id available

AI-assisted analysis of wavetermdev/waveterm@a4447c1563 (2026-09-01). Data as JSON: /api/errors/c60aa9f0f5873f82. Report an issue: GitHub.