Sentry Issue Investigation

Overview

Fetch and debug a Sentry exception from a URL with a repeatable CLI workflow.

Core principle: Use sentry-cli for auth/org/project discovery first, then fetch issue + event details. If your sentry-cli version has no api subcommand, use curl with the same auth token.

When to Use

Use this skill when:

User gives a Sentry issue URL
You need stacktrace, request/job context, release, and tags
You need quick root-cause clues before changing code

Do not use this skill for generic app debugging without a Sentry issue reference.

URL Parsing

Given: https://buildrtech.sentry.io/issues/7261708580/?environment=demo&project=4510025524707328

Extract:

org slug: buildrtech
issue id: 7261708580
project id: 4510025524707328
environment: demo (if present)

Workflow

1) Verify CLI and auth

sentry-cli --version
sentry-cli info
sentry-cli organizations list
sentry-cli projects list --org <org_slug>

Capture whether sentry-cli has an api command:

sentry-cli --help

2) Get high-level issue metadata

If sentry-cli supports direct issue fetching in your version, use it. Otherwise use REST API with token from your Sentry CLI config.

Token discovery pattern:

TOKEN=$(rg '^token=' ~/.sentryclirc | head -n1 | cut -d'=' -f2-)

Issue metadata:

curl -sS -H "Authorization: Bearer $TOKEN" \
  "https://sentry.io/api/0/issues/<issue_id>/"

This gives title, culprit, level, firstSeen, lastSeen, count, release, and status.

3) Get latest event for stacktrace + request context

curl -sS -H "Authorization: Bearer $TOKEN" \
  "https://sentry.io/api/0/issues/<issue_id>/events/latest/?environment=<env>"

If env is unknown, omit the environment query.

4) List all events for pattern analysis

curl -sS -H "Authorization: Bearer $TOKEN" \
  "https://sentry.io/api/0/issues/<issue_id>/events/?environment=<env>"

Then inspect each event by ID:

curl -sS -H "Authorization: Bearer $TOKEN" \
  "https://sentry.io/api/0/issues/<issue_id>/events/<event_id>/?environment=<env>"

Use this to compare users, branches, params, releases, and frequency.

What to Extract

Always report:

Issue title/type/message
Culprit (controller/service/method)
First/last seen, count, status
Top in-app stack frames (file + line)
Request/job context (route, params, identifiers)
Environment, release, user info, request_id tags
Recurrence pattern (same path? same branch id? same commit type?)

Debugging Standard (Root Cause First)

Before proposing fixes:

Confirm exact throw site from in-app frame
Trace caller chain in local code
Match stacktrace behavior to request parameters
Identify whether failure is expected business condition vs true system fault
Propose fix at the boundary where error should be handled

Output Template

## Sentry Issue: <title>

- Issue ID: <id>
- Env: <env>
- Level: <level>
- Status: <status>
- First seen: <timestamp>
- Last seen: <timestamp>
- Occurrences: <count>

### Error
- Type: <exception class>
- Message: <message>
- Culprit: <culprit>

### In-app stacktrace highlights
- path/to/file.rb:123 in `method_name`
- ...

### Request/Job context
- Route/URL: <...>
- Key params: <...>
- User: <...>
- Release: <...>

### Root cause hypothesis
<why this fails based on evidence>

### Recommended fix
<where to handle and why>

Common Pitfalls

Assuming sentry-cli api exists in all versions (it may not)
Using issue list commands and expecting full stacktrace output
Ignoring environment filter and mixing unrelated events
Proposing fixes before confirming throw site and call chain
Treating expected domain errors as 500s instead of handling paths

Quick Reference

# Auth/context
sentry-cli info
sentry-cli organizations list
sentry-cli projects list --org <org>

# Token from CLI config
TOKEN=$(rg '^token=' ~/.sentryclirc | head -n1 | cut -d'=' -f2-)

# Issue
curl -sS -H "Authorization: Bearer $TOKEN" "https://sentry.io/api/0/issues/<issue_id>/"

# Latest event
curl -sS -H "Authorization: Bearer $TOKEN" "https://sentry.io/api/0/issues/<issue_id>/events/latest/?environment=<env>"

# Event list
curl -sS -H "Authorization: Bearer $TOKEN" "https://sentry.io/api/0/issues/<issue_id>/events/?environment=<env>"

sentry-issue