apache/pulsar · error · IllegalArgumentException

Invalid time unit '${lastChar}'

Error message

Invalid time unit '${lastChar}'

What it means

Unit-switch default in RelativeTimeUtil.parseRelativeTimeInSeconds: the parsed duration's last character is not one of s/m/h/d/w/y, so the switch falls to the default branch and rejects the string; the trailing unit character of the relativeTime argument is the faulty input.

Source

Thrown at pulsar-cli-utils/src/main/java/org/apache/pulsar/cli/converters/RelativeTimeUtil.java:62

        long duration = Long.parseLong(relativeTime.substring(0, lastIndex));

        switch (timeUnit) {
        case 's':
            return duration;
        case 'm':
            return TimeUnit.MINUTES.toSeconds(duration);
        case 'h':
            return TimeUnit.HOURS.toSeconds(duration);
        case 'd':
            return TimeUnit.DAYS.toSeconds(duration);
        case 'w':
            return 7 * TimeUnit.DAYS.toSeconds(duration);
        // No unit for months
        case 'y':
            return 365 * TimeUnit.DAYS.toSeconds(duration);
        default:
            throw new IllegalArgumentException("Invalid time unit '" + lastChar + "'");
        }
    }

    /**
     * Convert nanoseconds to seconds and keep three decimal places.
     * @param ns
     * @return seconds
     */
    public static double nsToSeconds(long ns) {
        double seconds = (double) ns / 1_000_000_000;
        BigDecimal bd = new BigDecimal(seconds);
        return bd.setScale(3, RoundingMode.HALF_UP).doubleValue();
    }
}

View on GitHub (pinned to 820761864e)

Solutions

1. Use a supported unit suffix: s, m, h, d, w, or y (no months)

When it happens

Trigger: Thrown at pulsar-cli-utils/src/main/java/org/apache/pulsar/cli/converters/RelativeTimeUtil.java:62 when the library encounters an invalid state.

Common situations: See trigger scenarios.

AI-assisted analysis of apache/pulsar@820761864e (2026-09-06). Data as JSON: /api/errors/fcfbd2c155f73cfe. Report an issue: GitHub.