---
title: Error: Extra arguments were provided
description: Symptoms: The elasticsearch-users command fails with the following message: ERROR: extra arguments [...] were provided.Resolution: This error occurs when...
url: https://www.elastic.co/elastic/docs-builder/docs/3016/troubleshoot/elasticsearch/security/security-trb-extraargs
products:
  - Elasticsearch
applies_to:
  - Self-managed Elastic deployments: Generally available
---

# Error: Extra arguments were provided
**Symptoms:**
- The `elasticsearch-users` command fails with the following message: `ERROR: extra arguments [...] were provided`.

**Resolution:**
This error occurs when the `elasticsearch-users` tool is parsing the input and finds unexpected arguments. This can happen when there are special characters used in some of the arguments. For example, on Windows systems the `,` character is considered a parameter separator; in other words `-r role1,role2` is translated to `-r role1 role2` and the `elasticsearch-users` tool only recognizes `role1` as an expected parameter. The solution here is to quote the parameter: `-r "role1,role2"`.
For more information about this command, see [`elasticsearch-users` command](https://docs-v3-preview.elastic.dev/elastic/docs-builder/docs/3016/reference/elasticsearch/command-line-tools/users-command).