What causes "failed to submit SPIRE entries task for %q: %w" in cilium/cilium?

Inspect the wrapped cause (%w) to find the real failure (exec error, sink write error) and fix that first

failed to submit SPIRE entries task for %q: %w

Error message

failed to submit SPIRE entries task for %q: %w

What it means

This error wraps a failure returned while scheduling a worker-pool task in cilium-cli's sysdump collector that collects SPIRE server 'entries' output for a given pod. It is thrown by SubmitSpireEntriesSubtask when the submitted task function (which runs 'spire-server entry list'-style collection via WithFileSink and pod exec) returns an error. The %q is the pod name; the wrapped %w error is the underlying collection failure.

Source

Thrown at cilium-cli/sysdump/sysdump.go:2701

				return fmt.Errorf("failed to pick exec target: %w", err)
			}
			defer func() {
				err := cleanupFunc(ctx)
				if err != nil {
					c.logWarn("Failed to clean up exec target: %v", err)
				}
			}()

			command := []string{"/opt/spire/bin/spire-server", "entry", "show", "-output", "json"}
			if err := c.WithFileSink(fmt.Sprintf(ciliumSPIREServerEntriesFileName, p.Name), func(out io.Writer) error {
				return c.Client.ExecInPodWithWriters(ctx, nil, p.Namespace, p.Name, containerName, command, out, k8s.StderrAsError)
			}); err != nil {
				return fmt.Errorf("failed to collect 'spire-server' output for %q in namespace %q: %w", p.Name, p.Namespace, err)
			}

			return nil
		}); err != nil {
			return fmt.Errorf("failed to submit SPIRE entries task for %q: %w", p.Name, err)
		}
	}
	return nil
}

func extractGopsPID(output string) (string, error) {
	for entry := range strings.SplitSeq(output, "\n") {
		match := gopsRegexp.FindStringSubmatch(entry)
		if len(match) > 0 {
			result := make(map[string]string)
			for i, name := range gopsRegexp.SubexpNames() {
				if i != 0 && name != "" {
					result[name] = match[i]
				}
			}
			return result["pid"], nil
		}
	}

View on GitHub (pinned to ac7b90affa)

Solutions

Inspect the wrapped cause (%w) to find the real failure (exec error, sink write error) and fix that first
Verify the SPIRE server pod is Running and its container name matches what the sysdump expects
Re-run 'cilium-cli sysdump' with retries or after the cluster stabilizes
Ensure kubectl-style exec is permitted in the namespace (admission policies, RBAC pods/exec)

Example fix

// before: collection task fails inside submit
return fmt.Errorf("failed to submit SPIRE entries task for %q: %w", p.Name, err)
// after: guard pod readiness before submitting
if p.Status.Phase != corev1.PodRunning || p.DeletionTimestamp != nil {
    log.Printf("skipping SPIRE entries for non-running pod %s", p.Name)
    continue
}
if err := c.Pool.Submit(...); err != nil {
    return fmt.Errorf("failed to submit SPIRE entries task for %q: %w", p.Name, err)
}

Defensive patterns

Strategy: try-catch

Validate before calling

for _, p := range spirePods {
    if p.Status.Phase != corev1.PodRunning || p.DeletionTimestamp != nil {
        fmt.Printf("skipping SPIRE pod %s (phase=%s)\n", p.Name, p.Status.Phase)
    }
}

Type guard

func spireServerReady(p *corev1.Pod) bool {
    return p != nil && p.Status.Phase == corev1.PodRunning && p.DeletionTimestamp == nil
}

Try / catch

if err := collector.SubmitSpireEntriesSubtask(ctx, pods); err != nil {
    var wrapped interface{ Unwrap() error }
    if errors.As(err, &target) { log.Printf("root cause: %v", target) }
    // non-fatal: continue collecting the rest of the sysdump
}

Prevention

Check pod readiness before submitting collection tasks
Keep SPIRE pods stable (avoid rolling updates during sysdump)
Grant pods/exec RBAC to the cilium-cli identity
Read the wrapped cause with errors.As/Unwrap before guessing

When it happens

Trigger: Collector.SubmitSpireEntriesSubtask iterates SPIRE server pods and calls c.Pool.Submit for each; the inner task errors (e.g. ExecInPodWithWriters on the spire-server container fails) and the returned error is wrapped with the pod name.

Common situations: SPIRE server pod is terminating/restarting during sysdump; container name mismatch; exec denied by PodSecurity or missing tty support; cluster connectivity dropped mid-collection.

Related errors

AI-assisted analysis of cilium/cilium@ac7b90affa (2026-08-31). Data as JSON: /api/errors/b73a92ed0ac4e489. Report an issue: GitHub.