AssemblyAI Debug Bundle

Overview

Collect all diagnostic information needed to resolve AssemblyAI issues — SDK version, transcript status, API connectivity, and configuration — packaged for support tickets.

Prerequisites

assemblyai package installed
Access to application logs
Failed transcript ID (if applicable)

Instructions

Step 1: Create Debug Bundle Script

#!/bin/bash
# assemblyai-debug-bundle.sh
set -euo pipefail

BUNDLE_DIR="assemblyai-debug-$(date +%Y%m%d-%H%M%S)"
mkdir -p "$BUNDLE_DIR"

echo "=== AssemblyAI Debug Bundle ===" > "$BUNDLE_DIR/summary.txt"
echo "Generated: $(date -u +%Y-%m-%dT%H:%M:%SZ)" >> "$BUNDLE_DIR/summary.txt"
echo "" >> "$BUNDLE_DIR/summary.txt"

# Environment
echo "--- Runtime ---" >> "$BUNDLE_DIR/summary.txt"
node --version >> "$BUNDLE_DIR/summary.txt" 2>&1 || echo "Node.js not found" >> "$BUNDLE_DIR/summary.txt"
echo "Platform: $(uname -s) $(uname -m)" >> "$BUNDLE_DIR/summary.txt"
echo "ASSEMBLYAI_API_KEY: ${ASSEMBLYAI_API_KEY:+[SET (${#ASSEMBLYAI_API_KEY} chars)]}" >> "$BUNDLE_DIR/summary.txt"
echo "" >> "$BUNDLE_DIR/summary.txt"

# SDK version
echo "--- SDK Version ---" >> "$BUNDLE_DIR/summary.txt"
npm list assemblyai 2>/dev/null >> "$BUNDLE_DIR/summary.txt" || echo "assemblyai not in node_modules" >> "$BUNDLE_DIR/summary.txt"
echo "" >> "$BUNDLE_DIR/summary.txt"

# API connectivity
echo "--- API Connectivity ---" >> "$BUNDLE_DIR/summary.txt"
HTTP_CODE=$(curl -s -o /dev/null -w "%{http_code}" \
  -H "Authorization: ${ASSEMBLYAI_API_KEY:-none}" \
  https://api.assemblyai.com/v2/transcript 2>/dev/null || echo "FAILED")
echo "GET /v2/transcript: HTTP $HTTP_CODE" >> "$BUNDLE_DIR/summary.txt"

STATUS_CODE=$(curl -s -o /dev/null -w "%{http_code}" \
  https://api.assemblyai.com/v2 2>/dev/null || echo "FAILED")
echo "GET /v2: HTTP $STATUS_CODE" >> "$BUNDLE_DIR/summary.txt"
echo "" >> "$BUNDLE_DIR/summary.txt"

# AssemblyAI service status
echo "--- Service Status ---" >> "$BUNDLE_DIR/summary.txt"
curl -s https://status.assemblyai.com/api/v2/status.json 2>/dev/null \
  | python3 -m json.tool 2>/dev/null >> "$BUNDLE_DIR/summary.txt" \
  || echo "Could not fetch status" >> "$BUNDLE_DIR/summary.txt"

# Package bundle
tar -czf "$BUNDLE_DIR.tar.gz" "$BUNDLE_DIR"
rm -rf "$BUNDLE_DIR"
echo ""
echo "Bundle created: $BUNDLE_DIR.tar.gz"
echo "Review for sensitive data before sharing with support."

Step 2: Programmatic Transcript Diagnostics

import { AssemblyAI } from 'assemblyai';

const client = new AssemblyAI({
  apiKey: process.env.ASSEMBLYAI_API_KEY!,
});

async function diagnoseTranscript(transcriptId: string) {
  const transcript = await client.transcripts.get(transcriptId);

  const report = {
    id: transcript.id,
    status: transcript.status,
    error: transcript.error ?? null,
    audio_url: transcript.audio_url,
    audio_duration: transcript.audio_duration,
    language_code: transcript.language_code,
    speech_model: transcript.speech_model,
    created: transcript.created,
    completed: transcript.completed,

    // Feature flags that were enabled
    features: {
      speaker_labels: !!transcript.utterances?.length,
      sentiment_analysis: !!transcript.sentiment_analysis_results?.length,
      entity_detection: !!transcript.entities?.length,
      auto_highlights: !!transcript.auto_highlights_result?.results?.length,
      content_safety: !!transcript.content_safety_labels?.results?.length,
      redact_pii: transcript.text?.includes('####') || transcript.text?.includes('['),
      summarization: !!transcript.summary,
    },

    // Word count / duration sanity check
    word_count: transcript.words?.length ?? 0,
    words_per_minute: transcript.audio_duration
      ? ((transcript.words?.length ?? 0) / (transcript.audio_duration / 60)).toFixed(1)
      : 'N/A',
  };

  console.log(JSON.stringify(report, null, 2));
  return report;
}

// Usage: diagnoseTranscript('your-transcript-id');

Step 3: Check Recent Failed Transcripts

async function findFailedTranscripts(limit = 50) {
  const page = await client.transcripts.list({ limit });
  const failed = page.transcripts.filter(t => t.status === 'error');

  console.log(`Found ${failed.length} failed transcripts out of ${page.transcripts.length}:`);
  for (const t of failed) {
    console.log(`  ${t.id} | ${t.created} | ${t.error}`);
  }

  return failed;
}

What to Include in a Support Ticket

Always include:

Transcript ID (e.g., 6wij2z3g66-...)
Error message (exact text)
SDK version (npm list assemblyai)
Node.js version
Timestamp of the failure (UTC)

Never include:

Your API key
Raw audio containing PII
Customer data

Helpful extras:

Audio file format and duration
Which features were enabled (speaker_labels, etc.)
Whether the issue is intermittent or consistent

Output

assemblyai-debug-YYYYMMDD-HHMMSS.tar.gz archive with:
- summary.txt — Runtime, SDK version, API connectivity, service status
Programmatic transcript diagnosis report
List of recently failed transcripts

Examples

For a single failed job, collect the opaque transcript ID, timestamp, SDK version, redacted status code, and selected feature flags into an access-restricted archive. Inspect and redact it before sharing with support, encrypt it in transit, then delete it according to the incident retention policy. Do not include audio URLs, raw transcript text, request headers, or API-key length metadata.

Error Handling

Item	Purpose	Check
SDK version	Version-specific bugs	`npm list assemblyai`
API connectivity	Network/firewall	`curl api.assemblyai.com`
Service status	Outage check	status.assemblyai.com
Transcript status	Job-specific error	`client.transcripts.get(id)`
Audio URL	Accessibility	`curl -I <audio_url>`

Resources

Next Steps

For rate limit issues, see assemblyai-rate-limits.