error messaging for invalid macaroon could be improved
Metadata
Current evaluation
Snapcraft shows a confusing 'missing a valid macaroon' error when the store macaroon expires; suggests guiding users to snapcraft login. 7 years old, no labels, no comments, no maintainer response. Related craft-store#97 tracks the same problem class.
Suggested action: needs triage
Reason: The issue has no labels, no assignee, and zero comments in 7 years, so it has never been assessed by a maintainer. It is not safe to close as stale because craft-store#97 (open, triaged with Jira ticket CRAFT-3385, active ~11 months ago) shows the same problem class is still being tracked, and I could not inspect current code to confirm the message is still unhelpful. A maintainer should decide whether to fold this into craft-store#97 or address it in snapcraft's error handling.
Impact:
25
Quick Win:
18.75
Staleness:
85
Complexity:
25
Confidence:
55
Support Request:
25
Issue body
Today I went to use 'snapcraft list-revisions' and was greeted with:
$ snapcraft list-revisions snappy-debug
Error fetching account information from store: The request is missing an Authorization header field containing a valid macaroon
[2]
I tried other snaps I own and they were all the same. Googling didn't help me and the error message made me think something was wrong with the store. It then occurred to me that perhaps the macaroon expired, so I did 'snapcraft login' and everything started working again. Assuming the issue was actually that the macaroon expired and I did the right thing instead of working around the problem, I suspect the error message could be improved to guide people to snapcraft login.
Evaluation history
| Date | Model | Scores | Action | Summary |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| qwen/qwen3.8-27b |
Impact:
25
Quick Win:
18.75
Staleness:
85
Complexity:
25
Confidence:
55
Support Request:
25
|
needs triage | Snapcraft shows a confusing 'missing a valid macaroon' error when the store macaroon expires; suggests guiding users to snapcraft login. 7 years old, no labels, no comments, no maintainer response. Related craft-store#97 tracks the same problem class. | |
| qwen/qwen3.6-35b-a3b |
Staleness:
95
Complexity:
10
Confidence:
85
Support Request:
10
|
close stale | Suggests improving the error message for invalid or expired macaroons in snapcraft to guide users to run snapcraft login. Unlabelled, no maintainer comments, inactive for ~3 years. | |
| qwen/qwen3.6-35b-a3b |
Staleness:
95
Complexity:
10
Confidence:
85
Support Request:
10
|
close stale | Suggests improving the error message for invalid macaroons in snapcraft to guide users to run snapcraft login. Unlabelled, zero comments, inactive for ~3 years, and over 7 years old. | |
| qwen3.6-35b-a3b-mtp-q6 |
Staleness:
95
Complexity:
10
Confidence:
75
Support Request:
10
|
close stale | Request to improve error messaging when snapcraft auth macaroons expire, suggesting guidance to run snapcraft login. Unlabelled and inactive for over three years. | |
| qwen3.6-35b-a3b-mtp-q6 |
Staleness:
95
Complexity:
15
Confidence:
75
Support Request:
10
|
needs triage | Suggests improving the error message for invalid macaroons in snapcraft to guide users to run snapcraft login. Issue is unlabelled, has no maintainer comments, and is over 7 years old. |
Update history
No update history recorded yet.
Related work
-
Related To:
craft-store#97
(confidence 80%)
Open, triaged with Jira ticket CRAFT-3385; same problem class - confusing error on expired macaroon that should tell users to re-login, in the store client library snapcraft uses.
Related issues
| Issue | Project | State | Summary | Similarity |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| #97 Confusing error message on expired macaroon | craft-store | open | craft-store shows a confusing 'macaroon-permission-required' error when store credentials expire instead of telling users to re-login. Triaged by a maintainer with a Jira ticket (CRAFT-3385), but no code work; last activity ~11 months ago. | |
| #1930592 Handle macaroon-authorization-required error response | snapcraft (launchpad) | open | snapcraft whoami shows a generic 'Store Error: whoami failed.' instead of prompting re-authentication when credentials are missing/expired (401 macaroon-authorization-required). Open since 2021, zero comments, no maintainer activity or labels. | |
| #1745264 error message for expired macaroon is not helpful | snapcraft (launchpad) | closed | Closed without discussion or a formal fix. The report highlighted an unhelpful 401 error for an expired Travis CI macaroon during snap uploads, likely resolved by updating credentials or abandoned. | |
| #1674124 trying to push with the wrong macaroon return non user-friendly error | snapcraft (launchpad) | open | Snapcraft push with a macaroon attenuated to a different snap returns a raw 403 JSON blob instead of a user-friendly error. Opened by maintainer elopio ~9.4 years ago, zero comments, no labels beyond bitesize/store/ui, no recorded fix. | |
| #1856502 Obscure error message from snapcraft release when not logged in correctly | snapcraft (launchpad) | open | snapcraft release prints an obscure 401 macaroon error when not logged in; user suggests a friendlier message pointing to 'snapcraft login'. No labels, no comments, ~6.5 years inactive. Same problem class tracked in craft-store#97 and LP 1834469. | |
| #1843404 snapcraft export-login doesn't provide meaningful error messages when an argument is wrong | snapcraft (launchpad) | open | snapcraft export-login returns a generic 'Authentication error: Failed to get macaroon' instead of a meaningful message when an argument (e.g. snap name) is wrong. Unlabelled, zero comments, no maintainer interaction for ~7 years. |