fix: clarify scope error while creating issues for projects by elijahthis · Pull Request #12596 · cli/cli

elijahthis · 2026-02-01T22:34:42Z

Summary

Enhanced GraphQL error handling to provide more user-friendly and actionable messages when a token lacks the necessary permissions. Instead of a verbose technical trace, users now receive a concise list of missing scopes and a direct command to resolve the issue via gh auth refresh.

Changes

Modified handleResponse to intercept GraphQL errors and check for INSUFFICIENT_SCOPES types.
Implemented GenerateScopeErrorForGQL to extract specific required scopes from the API response message.
Added requiredScopesFromServerMessage using regex to parse scope requirements (e.g., project, repo) from the server's text.

Note

I basically replicated the logic being used for queries (handleError found in pkg/cmd/project/shared/queries/queries.go)

Example

Before (Raw GraphQL Trace):

GraphQL: Your token has not been granted the required scopes to execute this query. The 'addProjectV2ItemById' field requires one of the following scopes: ['project'], but your token has only been granted the: ['gist', 'read:org', 'read:project', 'repo', 'workflow'] scopes. Please modify your token's scopes at: https://github.com/settings/tokens.

Now (Clean CLI Error):

error: your authentication token is missing required scopes [project]
To request it, run:  gh auth refresh -s project

Test plan

Added test cases for newly-created functions
All existing tests pass

Fixes #12585

…ssage

BagToad · 2026-02-03T20:40:38Z

Hey @elijahthis, thank you for the PR. It looks like there are some issues with the tests. Could you have a look at those and @ mention me when it's ready for review? 🙏

elijahthis · 2026-02-03T22:47:26Z

Hey @elijahthis, thank you for the PR. It looks like there are some issues with the tests. Could you have a look at those and @ mention me when it's ready for review? 🙏

On it!

elijahthis · 2026-02-03T23:14:35Z

Hii @BagToad seems GitHub Actions was down when I pushed the last time. Just pushed an empty commit and checks all pass.

Ready for review !

elijahthis · 2026-02-12T23:41:04Z

Hi @BagToad
Any update on this?

gcomneno · 2026-02-28T09:04:14Z

Tested PR #12596 locally on Ubuntu 24.04 (linux/amd64) with Go 1.25.6.

Commands run:
gh pr checkout -R cli/cli 12596
go test ./...

Result:
All packages passed.

I also grepped the implementation: the missing-scope detection appears to rely on parsing the GraphQL error message text via requiredScopesFromServerMessage(...) (e.g. in api/client.go and pkg/cmd/project/shared/queries/queries.go), rather than deriving required scopes from a structured field/header.

This seems fine as a pragmatic fix, but it is potentially brittle if GitHub changes the wording. To reduce risk, it may be worth adding/keeping a regression test that uses the exact message shown in #12585 (including the addProjectV2ItemById case) to lock the behavior.

BagToad

@elijahthis, apologies for the delay. The team has been busy.

Tested this locally and it works correctly for the exact error from #12585, multi-scope scenarios, and non-scope errors. Approving as-is. I've opened #12823 to track deduplicating the scope error handling between api/client.go and queries.go - I do think we should do this at some point or at least document why it's not possible or practical.

@elijahthis, if you want to take a stab at that cleanup I've opened that issue up for contributing.

elijahthis · 2026-03-02T18:18:58Z

Thanks for the heads-up @BagToad ! Happy to try my hands at #12823 .

camjac251 · 2026-03-12T05:33:15Z

Hey @elijahthis, this PR appears to have introduced a regression that is now tracked in #12904.

The issue: GenerateScopeErrorForGQL() in api/client.go:184-186 rewrites INSUFFICIENT_SCOPES GraphQL errors inside handleResponse() before callers see the original error. This breaks ProjectsV2IgnorableError() (api/queries_projects_v2.go:328-339), which checks for the original API substring:

"field requires one of the following scopes: ['read:project']"

After rewriting, the error says:

"your authentication token is missing required scopes [read:project]"

The ignorable-error check no longer matches, so an optional projectItems query failure becomes fatal, breaking gh pr view, gh pr edit, etc. for any token without read:project (which was never required before).

Call chain: gh pr view/edit -> finder.Find() -> ProjectsV2ItemsForPullRequest() -> client.Query() -> handleResponse() rewrites error -> ProjectsV2IgnorableError() fails to match -> fatal error.

#12845 (cc @yuvrajangadsingh) further refactored this path but inherited the same issue.

Suggested fix: The simplest correct fix would be to move GenerateScopeErrorForGQL out of handleResponse() and into the specific callers that need fatal scope errors (e.g. gh issue create --project). The original behavior was correct: scope errors were non-fatal by default, and ProjectsV2IgnorableError could recognize and suppress them. Making all scope errors fatal at the lowest level, then expecting callers to un-fatalize them via brittle string matching, inverts that contract.

Alternatively, a typed ScopeError struct that ProjectsV2IgnorableError can check with errors.As would also work and be more future-proof.

yuvrajangadsingh · 2026-03-12T10:36:15Z

@camjac251 good catch, yeah #12845 inherited this. opened #12913 to fix it, just removes the GenerateScopeErrorForGQL call from handleResponse so the original GraphQLError flows through to ProjectsV2IgnorableError. project commands still handle scope errors through their own handleError.

williammartin · 2026-03-12T12:06:06Z

Hey @elijahthis, I've reverted this PR in #12915 because it unfortunately resulted in a pretty bad bug. Don't worry about it though, it was the result some nasty fragile code far away in the codebase that you never could have predicated, and was even hard to catch for us in review. I've reopened the original issue.

This MR contains the following updates: | Package | Update | Change | |---|---|---| | [cli/cli](https://github.com/cli/cli) | minor | `v2.87.3` → `v2.88.1` | MR created with the help of [el-capitano/tools/renovate-bot](https://gitlab.com/el-capitano/tools/renovate-bot). **Proposed changes to behavior should be submitted there as MRs.** --- ### Release Notes <details> <summary>cli/cli (cli/cli)</summary> ### [`v2.88.1`](https://github.com/cli/cli/releases/tag/v2.88.1): GitHub CLI 2.88.1 [Compare Source](cli/cli@v2.88.0...v2.88.1) #### Fix `pr` commands failing with `read:project` scope error v2.88.0 introduced a regression where `pr` commands would fail with the error: ``` error: your authentication token is missing required scopes [read:project] To request it, run: gh auth refresh -s read:project ``` Previously, missing read:project scope was gracefully handled, and project data was silently skipped. A change inadvertently broke the error matching that enabled this graceful degradation. v2.88.1 reverts these changes so that `pr` commands work correctly without requiring the `read:project` scope. #### What's Changed - Migrate Windows code signing from client secret to OIDC by [@BagToad](https://github.com/BagToad) in [#12911](cli/cli#12911) - Revert "refactor: deduplicate scope error handling between api/client.go and project queries" by [@williammartin](https://github.com/williammartin) in [#12914](cli/cli#12914) - Revert "fix: clarify scope error while creating issues for projects" by [@williammartin](https://github.com/williammartin) in [#12915](cli/cli#12915) **Full Changelog**: <cli/cli@v2.88.0...v2.88.1> ### [`v2.88.0`](https://github.com/cli/cli/releases/tag/v2.88.0): GitHub CLI 2.88.0 [Compare Source](cli/cli@v2.87.3...v2.88.0) ####

Request Copilot Code Review from `gh` <img width="80%" height="80%" alt="image" src="proxy.php?url=https%3A%2F%2Fgithub.com%2F%3Ca+href%3D"https://github.com/user-attachments/assets/c9b86700-5934-44b6-9210-227495a18d8e">https://github.com/user-attachments/assets/c9b86700-5934-44b6-9210-227495a18d8e" /> `gh pr create` and `gh pr edit` now support [Copilot Code Review](https://docs.github.com/en/copilot/using-github-copilot/code-review/using-copilot-code-review) as a reviewer. Request a review with `--add-reviewer @copilot`, or select Copilot interactively from the searchable reviewer prompt. Create a pull request and request review from Copilot: ``` gh pr create --reviewer @copilot ``` Edit a pull request and request review from Copilot: ``` gh pr edit --add-reviewer @copilot ``` #### Close issues as duplicates with `gh issue close --duplicate-of` You can now close issues as duplicates and link to a duplicate issue directly from the CLI. The new `--duplicate-of` flag accepts an issue number or URL and marks the closed issue as a duplicate of the referenced one. You can also use `--reason duplicate` to set the close reason without linking a specific issue. ``` # Close as duplicate, linking to the original issue gh issue close 123 --duplicate-of 456 # Close with duplicate reason only gh issue close 123 --reason duplicate ``` #### JSON support for `gh agent-task` `gh agent-task list` and `gh agent-task view` now support `--json`, `--jq`, and `--template` flags, consistent with other `gh` commands. ``` gh agent-task list --json id,name,state gh agent-task view <id> --json state --jq '.state' ``` #### What's Changed ##### ✨ Features - `gh pr create`: login-based reviewer requests and search-based interactive selection by [@BagToad](https://github.com/BagToad) in [#12627](cli/cli#12627) - `gh pr view` and `gh issue view`: show friendly display names for all actors by [@BagToad](https://github.com/BagToad) in [#12854](cli/cli#12854) - `gh issue close`: add `--duplicate-of` flag and duplicate reason by [@tksohishi](https://github.com/tksohishi) in [#12811](cli/cli#12811) - `gh pr diff`: add `--exclude` flag to filter files from diff output by [@yuvrajangadsingh](https://github.com/yuvrajangadsingh) in [#12655](cli/cli#12655) - `gh pr view/list`: add `changeType` field to files JSON output by [@yuvrajangadsingh](https://github.com/yuvrajangadsingh) in [#12657](cli/cli#12657) - `gh repo clone`: add `--no-upstream` flag by [@4RH1T3CT0R7](https://github.com/4RH1T3CT0R7) in [#12686](cli/cli#12686) - `gh repo edit`: add `--squash-merge-commit-message` flag by [@yuvrajangadsingh](https://github.com/yuvrajangadsingh) in [#12846](cli/cli#12846) - `gh browse`: add `--blame` flag by [@masonmcelvain](https://github.com/masonmcelvain) in [#11486](cli/cli#11486) - `gh agent-task list`: add `--json` support by [@maxbeizer](https://github.com/maxbeizer) in [#12806](cli/cli#12806) - `gh agent-task view`: add `--json` support by [@maxbeizer](https://github.com/maxbeizer) in [#12807](cli/cli#12807) - `gh copilot`: set `COPILOT_GH` env var when launching Copilot CLI by [@devm33](https://github.com/devm33) in [#12821](cli/cli#12821) ##### 🐛 Fixes - Fix `gh project item-edit` error when editing Draft Issue with only one (`--title`/`--body`) flag by [@ManManavadaria](https://github.com/ManManavadaria) in [#12787](cli/cli#12787) - Fix extension install error message showing raw struct instead of `owner/repo` by [@Copilot](https://github.com/Copilot) in [#12836](cli/cli#12836) - Fix incorrect integer conversion from int to uint16 in port forwarder by [@BagToad](https://github.com/BagToad) in [#12831](cli/cli#12831) - Fix invalid ANSI SGR escape code in JSON and diff colorization by [@BagToad](https://github.com/BagToad) in [#12720](cli/cli#12720) - Fix assignees `databaseId` always being `0` in `--json` output by [@srt32](https://github.com/srt32) in [#12783](cli/cli#12783) - Fix error when `--remote` flag used with repo argument by [@majiayu000](https://github.com/majiayu000) in [#12375](cli/cli#12375) - Fix redundant API call in `gh issue view --comments` by [@VishnuVV27](https://github.com/VishnuVV27) in [#12652](cli/cli#12652) - Clarify scope error while creating issues for projects by [@elijahthis](https://github.com/elijahthis) in [#12596](cli/cli#12596) - Reject pull request-only search qualifiers in `gh issue list` by [@LouisLau-art](https://github.com/LouisLau-art) in [#12623](cli/cli#12623) - Prevent `.git/config` corruption on repeated `issue develop --name` invocation by [@gunadhya](https://github.com/gunadhya) in [#12651](cli/cli#12651) - Use pre-compiled regexp for matching Content-Type by [@itchyny](https://github.com/itchyny) in [#12781](cli/cli#12781) - Isolate generated licenses per platform (os/arch) by [@babakks](https://github.com/babakks) in [#12774](cli/cli#12774) ##### 📚 Docs & Chores - Add examples to `gh issue close` help text by [@BagToad](https://github.com/BagToad) in [#12830](cli/cli#12830) - Customizable install `prefix` in Makefile by [@scarf005](https://github.com/scarf005) in [#11714](cli/cli#11714) - Deduplicate scope error handling between `api/client.go` and project queries by [@yuvrajangadsingh](https://github.com/yuvrajangadsingh) in [#12845](cli/cli#12845) - Remove unnecessary `StateReason` and `StateReasonDuplicate` feature detection by [@BagToad](https://github.com/BagToad) in [#12838](cli/cli#12838) - Update Go version requirement to 1.26+ by [@BagToad](https://github.com/BagToad) in [#12864](cli/cli#12864) - Add monthly pitch surfacing workflow by [@tidy-dev](https://github.com/tidy-dev) in [#12894](cli/cli#12894) #####

Dependencies - Bump Go from 1.25.7 to 1.26.1 by [@BagToad](https://github.com/BagToad) in [#12860](cli/cli#12860) - chore(deps): bump golang.org/x/sync from 0.19.0 to 0.20.0 by [@dependabot](https://github.com/dependabot)\[bot] in [#12886](cli/cli#12886) - chore(deps): bump google.golang.org/grpc from 1.79.1 to 1.79.2 by [@dependabot](https://github.com/dependabot)\[bot] in [#12851](cli/cli#12851) - chore(deps): bump github.com/docker/cli from 29.0.3+incompatible to 29.2.0+incompatible by [@dependabot](https://github.com/dependabot)\[bot] in [#12842](cli/cli#12842) - chore(deps): bump google.golang.org/grpc from 1.78.0 to 1.79.1 by [@dependabot](https://github.com/dependabot)\[bot] in [#12759](cli/cli#12759) - chore(deps): bump goreleaser/goreleaser-action from 6.4.0 to 7.0.0 by [@dependabot](https://github.com/dependabot)\[bot] in [#12760](cli/cli#12760) - chore(deps): bump actions/upload-artifact from 6 to 7 by [@dependabot](https://github.com/dependabot)\[bot] in [#12797](cli/cli#12797) - chore(deps): bump actions/download-artifact from 7 to 8 by [@dependabot](https://github.com/dependabot)\[bot] in [#12796](cli/cli#12796) - chore(deps): bump actions/attest-build-provenance from 3.2.0 to 4.1.0 by [@dependabot](https://github.com/dependabot)\[bot] in [#12795](cli/cli#12795) - chore(deps): bump github.com/gabriel-vasile/mimetype from 1.4.11 to 1.4.13 by [@dependabot](https://github.com/dependabot)\[bot] in [#12615](cli/cli#12615) #### New Contributors - [@srt32](https://github.com/srt32) made their first contribution in [#12783](cli/cli#12783) - [@itchyny](https://github.com/itchyny) made their first contribution in [#12781](cli/cli#12781) - [@VishnuVV27](https://github.com/VishnuVV27) made their first contribution in [#12652](cli/cli#12652) - [@elijahthis](https://github.com/elijahthis) made their first contribution in [#12596](cli/cli#12596) - [@ManManavadaria](https://github.com/ManManavadaria) made their first contribution in [#12787](cli/cli#12787) - [@maxbeizer](https://github.com/maxbeizer) made their first contribution in [#12806](cli/cli#12806) - [@LouisLau-art](https://github.com/LouisLau-art) made their first contribution in [#12623](cli/cli#12623) - [@4RH1T3CT0R7](https://github.com/4RH1T3CT0R7) made their first contribution in [#12686](cli/cli#12686) - [@yuvrajangadsingh](https://github.com/yuvrajangadsingh) made their first contribution in [#12657](cli/cli#12657) - [@masonmcelvain](https://github.com/masonmcelvain) made their first contribution in [#11486](cli/cli#11486) - [@scarf005](https://github.com/scarf005) made their first contribution in [#11714](cli/cli#11714) - [@tksohishi](https://github.com/tksohishi) made their first contribution in [#12811](cli/cli#12811) - [@tidy-dev](https://github.com/tidy-dev) made their first contribution in [#12894](cli/cli#12894) **Full Changelog**: <cli/cli@v2.87.3...v2.88.0> </details> --- ### Configuration 📅 **Schedule**: Branch creation - At any time (no schedule defined), Automerge - At any time (no schedule defined). 🚦 **Automerge**: Disabled by config. Please merge this manually once you are satisfied. ♻ **Rebasing**: Whenever MR becomes conflicted, or you tick the rebase/retry checkbox. 🔕 **Ignore**: Close this MR and you won't be reminded about this update again. --- - [ ] If you want to rebase/retry this MR, check this box --- This MR has been generated by [Renovate Bot](https://github.com/renovatebot/renovate).

elijahthis added 2 commits February 1, 2026 23:12

fix: clarify scope error while creating issues for projects

6f73903

test: TestGenerateScopeErrorForGQL and TestRequiredScopesFromServerMe…

71564fd

…ssage

elijahthis requested a review from a team as a code owner February 1, 2026 22:34

elijahthis requested a review from babakks February 1, 2026 22:34

elijahthis temporarily deployed to cli-automation February 1, 2026 22:34 — with GitHub Actions Inactive

cliAutomation added the external pull request originating outside of the CLI core team label Feb 1, 2026

BagToad mentioned this pull request Feb 3, 2026

fix(project): suggest 'project' scope instead of 'read:project' #12601

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BagToad self-requested a review February 4, 2026 17:15

This was referenced Mar 2, 2026

Add regression test for required scopes parsing #12803

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Deduplicate scope error handling between api/client.go and project queries #12823

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BagToad approved these changes Mar 2, 2026

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BagToad merged commit e725e38 into cli:trunk Mar 2, 2026
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This was referenced Mar 12, 2026

Spurious missing read:project scope warnings #12904

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fix: preserve GraphQL error type for scope errors in handleResponse #12913

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williammartin mentioned this pull request Mar 12, 2026

Revert "fix: clarify scope error while creating issues for projects" #12915

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raajheshkannaa mentioned this pull request Mar 14, 2026

fix: suggest gh auth refresh for GraphQL scope errors #12938

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fix: clarify scope error while creating issues for projects#12596

fix: clarify scope error while creating issues for projects#12596
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Note

Example

Before (Raw GraphQL Trace):

Now (Clean CLI Error):

Test plan

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