GoogleContainerTools/skaffold · error

getting docker client: %w

Error message

getting docker client: %w

What it means

Fires in retrieveImage when a Docker API client cannot be created (NewAPIClient fails) while trying to inspect an image for dependency analysis. The configured docker endpoint is unreachable or invalid — daemon not running, bad DOCKER_HOST, or socket access denied.

Source

Thrown at pkg/skaffold/docker/parse.go:465

// unquote remove single quote/double quote pairs around a string value.
// It looks like FROM "scratch" and FROM 'scratch' and FROM """scratch"""...
// are valid forms of FROM scratch.
// Quotes are also accepted on tags, e.g. golang:"1.15".
func unquote(v string) string {
	unquoted := strings.ReplaceAll(v, "\"", "")
	if unquoted != v {
		return unquoted
	}

	unquoted = strings.ReplaceAll(v, "'", "")
	return unquoted
}

func retrieveImage(ctx context.Context, image string, cfg Config) (*v1.ConfigFile, error) {
	localDaemon, err := NewAPIClient(ctx, cfg)
	if err != nil {
		return nil, fmt.Errorf("getting docker client: %w", err)
	}

	return localDaemon.ConfigFile(context.Background(), image)
}

func hasMultiStageFlag(flags []string) bool {
	for _, f := range flags {
		if strings.HasPrefix(f, "--from=") {
			return true
		}
	}
	return false
}

// resolveDir determines the resulting directory as if a change-dir to targetDir was executed in cwd.
func resolveDir(cwd, targetDir string) string {
	if path.IsAbs(targetDir) {
		return path.Clean(targetDir)

View on GitHub (pinned to a1189de023)

Solutions

1. Ensure the Docker daemon is running (`docker ps`)
2. Check DOCKER_HOST and docker context settings point to a valid endpoint
3. Fix socket permissions/group membership if access is denied

When it happens

Trigger: Thrown at pkg/skaffold/docker/parse.go:465 when the library encounters an invalid state.

Common situations: See trigger scenarios.

AI-assisted analysis of GoogleContainerTools/skaffold@a1189de023 (2026-09-05). Data as JSON: /api/errors/853deb6ae9295946. Report an issue: GitHub.