/codeql

CodeQL Troubleshooting Reference

Comprehensive guide for diagnosing and resolving CodeQL analysis errors, SARIF upload issues, and common configuration problems.

Build and Analysis Errors

"No source code was seen during the build"

Cause: CodeQL extractor did not find any source files during database creation.

Solutions:

• Verify the --source-root points to the correct directory
• For compiled languages, ensure the build command actually compiles source files
• Check that autobuild is detecting the correct build system
• Switch from autobuild to manual build mode with explicit build commands
• Verify the language specified matches the actual source code language

Automatic Build Failed

Cause: autobuild could not detect or run the project's build system.

Solutions:

• Switch to build-mode: manual and provide explicit build commands
• Ensure all build dependencies are installed on the runner
• For C/C++: verify gcc, make, cmake, or msbuild are available
• For C#: verify .NET SDK or MSBuild is installed
• For Java: verify gradle or maven is installed
• Check the autobuild logs for the specific detection step that failed

C# Compiler Unexpectedly Failing

Cause: The CodeQL tracer injects compiler flags that may conflict with project configuration.

Details: CodeQL injects /p:EmitCompilerGeneratedFiles=true which can cause issues with:

• Legacy .NET Framework projects
• Projects using .sqlproj files

Solutions:

• Add <EmitCompilerGeneratedFiles>false</EmitCompilerGeneratedFiles> to problematic project files
• Use build-mode: none for C# if build accuracy is acceptable
• Exclude problematic projects from the CodeQL analysis

Analysis Takes Too Long

Cause: Large codebase, complex queries, or insufficient resources.

Solutions:

• Use build-mode: none where accuracy is acceptable (significantly faster)
• Enable dependency caching: dependency-caching: true
• Set timeout-minutes on the job to prevent hung workflows
• Use --threads=0 (CLI) to use all available CPU cores
• Reduce query scope: use default suite instead of security-and-quality
• For self-hosted runners, ensure hardware meets recommendations:
  • Small (<100K LOC): 8 GB RAM, 2 cores
  • Medium (100K–1M LOC): 16 GB RAM, 4–8 cores
  • Large (>1M LOC): 64 GB RAM, 8 cores
• Configure larger GitHub-hosted runners if available
• Use paths in config file to limit analyzed directories

CodeQL Scanned Fewer Lines Than Expected

Cause: Build command didn't compile all source files, or build-mode: none missed generated code.

Solutions:

• Switch from none to autobuild or manual build mode
• Ensure the build command compiles the full codebase (not just a subset)
• Check the code scanning logs for extraction metrics:
  • Lines of code in codebase (baseline)
  • Lines of code extracted
  • Lines excluding auto-generated files
• Verify language detection includes all expected languages

Kotlin Detected in No-Build Mode

Cause: Repository uses build-mode: none (Java only) but also contains Kotlin code.

Solutions:

• Disable default setup and re-enable it (switches to autobuild)
• Or switch to advanced setup with build-mode: autobuild for java-kotlin
• Kotlin requires a build to be analyzed; none mode only works for Java

Permission and Access Errors

Error: 403 "Resource not accessible by integration"

Cause: GITHUB_TOKEN lacks required permissions.

Solutions:

• Add explicit permissions to the workflow:

  permissions:
    security-events: write
    contents: read
    actions: read

• For Dependabot PRs, use pull_request_target instead of pull_request
• Verify the repository has GitHub Code Security enabled (for private repos)

Cannot Enable CodeQL in a Private Repository

Cause: GitHub Code Security is not enabled.

Solution: Enable GitHub Code Security in repository Settings → Advanced Security.

Error: "GitHub Code Security or Advanced Security must be enabled"

Cause: Attempting to use code scanning on a private repo without the required license.

Solutions:

• Enable GitHub Code Security for the repository
• Contact organization admin to enable Advanced Security

Configuration Errors

Two CodeQL Workflows Running

Cause: Both default setup and a pre-existing codeql.yml workflow are active.

Solutions:

• Disable default setup if using advanced setup, or
• Delete the old workflow file if using default setup
• Check repository Settings → Advanced Security for active configurations

Some Languages Not Analyzed

Cause: Matrix configuration doesn't include all languages.

Solutions:

• Add missing languages to the matrix.include array
• Verify language identifiers are correct (e.g., javascript-typescript not just javascript)
• Check that each language has an appropriate build-mode

Unclear What Triggered a Workflow Run

Solutions:

• Check the tool status page in repository Settings → Advanced Security
• Review workflow run logs for trigger event details
• Look at the on: triggers in the workflow file

Error: "is not a .ql file, .qls file, a directory, or a query pack specification"

Cause: Invalid query or pack reference in the workflow.

Solutions:

• Verify query pack names and versions exist
• Use correct format: owner/pack-name@version or owner/pack-name:path/to/query.ql
• Run codeql resolve packs to verify available packs

Resource Errors

"Out of disk" or "Out of memory"

Cause: Runner lacks sufficient resources for the analysis.

Solutions:

• Use larger GitHub-hosted runners (if available)
• For self-hosted runners, increase RAM and disk (SSD with ≥14 GB)
• Reduce analysis scope with paths configuration
• Analyze fewer languages per job
• Use build-mode: none to reduce resource usage

Extraction Errors in Database

Cause: Some source files couldn't be processed by the CodeQL extractor.

Solutions:

• Check extraction metrics in workflow logs for error counts
• Enable debug logging for detailed extraction diagnostics
• Verify source files are syntactically valid
• Ensure all build dependencies are available

Logging and Debugging

Enable Debug Logging

To get more detailed diagnostic information:

GitHub Actions:

1. Re-run the workflow with debug logging enabled
2. In the workflow run, click "Re-run jobs" → "Enable debug logging"

CodeQL CLI:

codeql database create my-db \
  --language=javascript-typescript \
  --verbosity=progress++ \
  --logdir=codeql-logs

Verbosity levels: errors, warnings, progress, progress+, progress++, progress+++

Code Scanning Log Metrics

Workflow logs include summary metrics:

• Lines of code in codebase — baseline before extraction
• Lines of code in CodeQL database — extracted including external libraries
• Lines excluding auto-generated files — net analyzed code
• Extraction success/error/warning counts — per-file extraction results

Private Registry Diagnostics

For build-mode: none with private package registries:

• Check the "Setup proxy for registries" step in workflow logs
• Look for Credentials loaded for the following registries: message
• Verify organization-level private registry configuration
• Ensure internet access is available for dependency resolution

SARIF Upload Errors

SARIF File Too Large

Limit: 10 MB maximum (gzip-compressed).

Solutions:

• Focus on the most important query suites (use default instead of security-and-quality)
• Reduce the number of queries via configuration
• Split analysis into multiple jobs with separate SARIF uploads
• Remove --sarif-add-file-contents flag

SARIF Results Exceed Limits

GitHub enforces limits on SARIF data objects:

Solutions:

• Reduce query scope to focus on high-impact rules
• Split analysis across multiple SARIF uploads with different --sarif-category
• Disable noisy queries that produce many results

SARIF File Invalid

Solutions:

• Validate against the Microsoft SARIF validator
• Ensure version is "2.1.0" and $schema points to the correct schema
• Verify required properties (runs, tool.driver, results) are present

Upload Rejected: Default Setup Enabled

Cause: Cannot upload CodeQL-generated SARIF when default setup is active.

Solutions:

• Disable default setup before uploading via CLI/API
• Or switch to using default setup exclusively (no manual uploads)

Missing Authentication Token

Solutions:

• Set GITHUB_TOKEN environment variable with security-events: write scope
• Or use --github-auth-stdin to pipe the token
• For GitHub Actions: the token is automatically available via ${{ secrets.GITHUB_TOKEN }}