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Add context to JSON parse errors - #4161

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mbg/improve-json-failures
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mbg wants to merge 8 commits into
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mbg/improve-json-failures

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@mbg

@mbg mbg commented Sep 22, 2026

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This PR wraps a few existing JSON.parse calls in try/catch blocks in order to (essentially) re-throw errors with more context added to them about the specific JSON.parse call that failed. That can help with troubleshooting in cases where the context of the failure isn't otherwise apparent from a downstream error handler. This doesn't change any behaviour.

Risk assessment

For internal use only. Please select the risk level of this change:

  • Low risk: Changes are fully under feature flags, or have been fully tested and validated in pre-production environments and are highly observable, or are documentation or test only.

Which use cases does this change impact?

Workflow types:

  • Advanced setup - Impacts users who have custom CodeQL workflows.
  • Managed - Impacts users with dynamic workflows (Default Setup, Code Quality, ...).

Products:

  • Code Scanning - The changes impact analyses when analysis-kinds: code-scanning.
  • Code Quality - The changes impact analyses when analysis-kinds: code-quality.
  • Other first-party - The changes impact other first-party analyses.
  • Third-party analyses - The changes affect the upload-sarif action.

Environments:

  • Dotcom - Impacts CodeQL workflows on github.com and/or GitHub Enterprise Cloud with Data Residency.
  • GHES - Impacts CodeQL workflows on GitHub Enterprise Server.

How did/will you validate this change?

  • Unit tests - I am depending on unit test coverage (i.e. tests in .test.ts files).
  • End-to-end tests - I am depending on PR checks (i.e. tests in pr-checks).

If something goes wrong after this change is released, what are the mitigation and rollback strategies?

  • Rollback - Change can only be disabled by rolling back the release or releasing a new version with a fix.

How will you know if something goes wrong after this change is released?

  • Telemetry - I rely on existing telemetry or have made changes to the telemetry.
    • Dashboards - I will watch relevant dashboards for issues after the release. Consider whether this requires this change to be released at a particular time rather than as part of a regular release.
    • Alerts - New or existing monitors will trip if something goes wrong with this change.

Are there any special considerations for merging or releasing this change?

  • No special considerations - This change can be merged at any time.

Merge / deployment checklist

  • Confirm this change is backwards compatible with existing workflows.
  • Consider adding a changelog entry for this change.
  • Confirm the readme and docs have been updated if necessary.

@mbg
mbg requested a review from henrymercer September 22, 2026 17:58
@mbg
mbg requested a review from a team as a code owner September 22, 2026 17:58
Copilot AI balanced review requested due to automatic review settings September 22, 2026 17:58
@github-actions github-actions Bot added the size/S Should be easy to review label Sep 22, 2026

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Warning

  • Copilot's review of this pull request may be incomplete because some of the changed files are excluded by your Copilot content exclusion settings. See Excluding content from Copilot for details.

Copilot review overview

🟡 Changes recommended

Restoring inputs now fails when no persisted state exists, breaking the previous no-op behavior.

Get a fresh assessment by requesting another Copilot review.

Review effort: Balanced
Findings: 1 Medium severity

Open (1)
What changed in this PR

Adds contextual error messages to JSON parsing failures across action inputs, CLI output, tracer configuration, and SARIF handling.

Changes:

  • Wraps several JSON.parse calls with contextual errors.
  • Includes relevant paths, inputs, or language details in failures.
  • Updates the generated JavaScript bundle.
File Description
src/​util.ts Adds context to matrix parsing and object cloning errors.
src/​tracer-config.ts Identifies the tracing configuration file on failure.
src/​sarif/​index.ts Identifies the SARIF file on parsing failure.
src/​codeql.ts Adds language and CLI output to extractor parsing errors.
src/​actions-util.ts Adds context when restoring persisted inputs.
lib/​entry-points.js Generated bundle; excluded from review by policy.
Files excluded by content exclusion policy (1)
  • lib/entry-points.js

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