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todos update silently no-ops: PUT sent to wrong endpoint (missing /buckets/{project}/ segment) #724

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Description

@espen

Summary

basecamp todos update <id> --due <date> reports success (ok: true, "Updated todo #...") but no fields are actually changed. The CLI sends the PUT to /{account}/todos/{id} instead of the documented /{account}/buckets/{project}/todos/{id}.json. The API returns 200 for that path but ignores the body, so the failure is completely silent.

Steps to reproduce

basecamp todos update 111111 --due 2026-09-23 --in 222222 --json
# → ok: true, summary: "Updated todo #111111"

basecamp todos show 111111 --in 222222 --jq '.data.due_on'
# → "2026-09-15"  (unchanged)

Same result when passing the full app URL as the argument instead of a bare ID + --in.

Trace

-vv shows the request path (note: no /buckets/222222/):

[0.001s] Calling Todos.Update
[0.022s]   -> PUT https://3.basecampapi.com/999999/todos/111111
[0.249s]   <- 200 (226ms)

The 200 response even echoes the full todo (with the old due_on but a fresh updated_at), which the CLI treats as confirmation.

Expected

PUT https://3.basecampapi.com/999999/buckets/222222/todos/111111.json

Per the BC3 API docs, todos are updated at /buckets/{bucket}/todos/{id}.json.

Workaround

Raw API with the correct path works:

basecamp api put "buckets/222222/todos/111111.json" \
  -d '{"content":"<existing title>","due_on":"2026-09-23"}'
# → due_on updated correctly

Environment

  • basecamp CLI 0.7.2
  • macOS (Darwin 27.0.0), arm64
  • BC3 account, authenticated via OAuth

Notes

  • Impact is worse than a normal bug because the exit code is 0 and the envelope says ok: true — scripts and agents have no way to detect the failure without re-fetching the todo.
  • Possibly the resource path builder for Todos.Update drops the bucket scope; other verbs (todos show, done) resolve it correctly.

(IDs anonymised: 999999 = account, 222222 = project, 111111 = todo.)

Activity

  1. robzolkos commented on Oct 5, 2026

    @robzolkos
    Collaborator

    Thanks for the detailed trace. This was fixed in v0.8.0 (#543).

    The path without /buckets/{project}/ is valid; the CLI still uses it, and Basecamp supports it. The problem was that v0.7.2 sent only the changed field (due_on), and this endpoint expects the full to-do. That's also why your raw workaround worked: it included content. Since v0.8.0, todos update reads the current to-do and sends it all back with your changes, so a due-date-only change sticks.

    I checked this against the live API on current main: basecamp todos update <id> --due <date> changes due_on, both with an ID plus --in and with an app.basecamp.com URL. Upgrading should fix it for you. If it doesn't, reopen with -vv output from the new version.

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