GoogleContainerTools/skaffold · error

docker config: %w

Error message

docker config: %w

What it means

Wraps a failure from dockercli config.Load(configDir) when loading the user's Docker config file (~/.docker/config.json). loadDockerConfig backs GetAuthConfig and doGetAllAuthConfigs, so any registry-auth operation fails if the Docker config is unreadable or invalid.

Source

Thrown at pkg/skaffold/docker/auth.go:86

	if configDir == "" {
		configDir = filepath.Join(getHomeDir(), configFileDir)
	}
}

// AuthConfigHelper exists for testing purposes since GetAuthConfig shells out
// to native store helpers.
// Ideally this shouldn't be public, but the LocalBuilder needs to use it.
type AuthConfigHelper interface {
	GetAuthConfig(ctx context.Context, registry string) (types.AuthConfig, error)
	GetAllAuthConfigs(ctx context.Context) (map[string]types.AuthConfig, error)
}

type credsHelper struct{}

func loadDockerConfig() (*configfile.ConfigFile, error) {
	cf, err := config.Load(configDir)
	if err != nil {
		return nil, fmt.Errorf("docker config: %w", err)
	}

	gcp.AutoConfigureGCRCredentialHelper(cf)

	return cf, nil
}

func (h credsHelper) GetAuthConfig(ctx context.Context, registry string) (types.AuthConfig, error) {
	cf, err := loadDockerConfig()
	if err != nil {
		return types.AuthConfig{}, err
	}

	return h.loadCredentials(ctx, cf, registry)
}

func (h credsHelper) loadCredentials(ctx context.Context, cf *configfile.ConfigFile, registry string) (types.AuthConfig, error) {
	if helper := cf.CredentialHelpers[registry]; helper == "gcloud" {

View on GitHub (pinned to a1189de023)

Solutions

1. Validate/fix ~/.docker/config.json (run `docker login` to regenerate it)
2. Check DOCKER_CONFIG env var points to the right directory
3. Fix file permissions on the Docker config file
4. Test with `docker config` / any docker CLI pull to confirm the CLI can load the config

Example fix

// before
$ cat ~/.docker/config.json
{"auths": {  // truncated JSON
// after
$ docker login  # regenerates valid ~/.docker/config.json
{"auths": {}, "credsStore": "desktop"}

var cf configfile.ConfigFile
if err := json.Unmarshal(b, &cf); err != nil { return err }

func dockerConfigValid(path string) bool {
  b, err := os.ReadFile(path)
  return err == nil && json.Valid(b)
}

cf, err := loadDockerConfig()
if err != nil {
  return fmt.Errorf("registry auth unavailable; check ~/.docker/config.json: %w", err)
}

When it happens

Trigger: GetAuthConfig or doGetAllAuthConfigs invoke loadDockerConfig; config.Load fails because the config file is missing, malformed JSON, unreadable, or configDir is invalid.

Common situations: Hand-edited ~/.docker/config.json with invalid JSON; config file with wrong permissions; corrupted Docker Desktop install; DOCKER_CONFIG pointing to a bad directory.

Related errors

• parsing image name for registry: %w
• getting auth config: %w
• pulling image from repository: %w
• %s %q: %w
• %q running container image %q errored during run with status

AI-assisted analysis of GoogleContainerTools/skaffold@a1189de023 (2026-09-05). Data as JSON: /api/errors/27aa2f549b671ba9. Report an issue: GitHub.