Budibase/budibase · error

unexpected response ${response.statusText}

Error message

unexpected response ${response.statusText}

What it means

This is the component-library/object-store download helper: it fetches a gzipped tarball via fetchWithBlacklist, checks response.ok, and throws with the HTTP statusText if the fetch was not OK. The response is then piped through unzip + tar extraction. Any non-2xx HTTP status surfaces as this error.

Source

Thrown at packages/backend-core/src/objectStore/objectStore.ts:746

    }
    return files
  })
}

export async function downloadTarballDirect(
  url: string,
  path: string,
  headers = {},
  { followRedirects = true }: { followRedirects?: boolean } = {}
) {
  path = sanitizeKey(path)
  const response = await fetchWithBlacklist(
    url,
    { headers },
    { followRedirects }
  )
  if (!response.ok) {
    throw new Error(`unexpected response ${response.statusText}`)
  }

  await pipeline(response.body, zlib.createUnzip(), tar.extract(path))
}

export async function downloadTarball(
  url: string,
  bucketName: string,
  path: string
) {
  bucketName = sanitizeBucket(bucketName)
  path = sanitizeKey(path)
  const response = await fetchWithBlacklist(url)
  if (!response.ok) {
    throw new Error(`unexpected response ${response.statusText}`)
  }

  const tmpPath = join(budibaseTempDir(), path)

View on GitHub (pinned to a81a902e9a)

Solutions

1. Check the exact statusText/HTTP code in the message: 404 means the tarball URL no longer exists — fix or update the URL
2. 403/401: add auth or make the tarball publicly downloadable; GitHub raw/release URLs must not be private
3. Verify network egress — the fetch goes through fetchWithBlacklist, so ensure the host is not blacklisted and no proxy/VPN blocks it
4. Retry the operation once network is restored if statusText indicates 502/503

const head = await fetch(url, { method: "HEAD" })
if (!head.ok) throw new Error(`Tarball URL invalid: ${head.status}`)

try {
  await download(url, path)
} catch (err) {
  if (err.message.startsWith("unexpected response")) {
    // inspect status, fix URL/auth, retry
  }
  throw err
}

When it happens

Trigger: Calling the internal download helper (used to fetch component libraries into the object store / local dir) when the remote URL returns 404, 403, 500 or any other non-2xx status.

Common situations: A component library URL pointing at a removed GitHub release or npm tarball version, a private repo returning 403, a corporate proxy/blacklist intercepting the request, or a mistyped URL in an app's component library config.

Related errors

• Unexpected response when fetching openid-configuration: ${re
• Unexpected response ${response.statusText}
• Failed to retrieve skeleton metadata
• Unable to retrieve docker-compose file - ${response.status}
• Error getting license: ${message}

AI-assisted analysis of Budibase/budibase@a81a902e9a (2026-08-29). Data as JSON: /api/errors/81691e2d32639791. Report an issue: GitHub.