crowdsecurity/crowdsec · error

can't get absolute path of hub: %w

Error message

can't get absolute path of hub: %w

What it means

NewHubTest first converts hubPath to an absolute path with filepath.Abs. Abs essentially never fails on sane input (it only fails on pathological paths), so 'can't get absolute path of hub' indicates the OS rejected the path manipulation (e.g. working directory unreadable).

Source

Thrown at pkg/hubtest/hubtest.go:106

	f, err := os.Stat(resolved)
	switch {
	case errors.Is(err, fs.ErrNotExist):
		return "", err
	case err != nil:
		return "", err
	}

	if f.IsDir() {
		return "", fmt.Errorf("%q is a directory, not a file", resolved)
	}

	return resolved, nil
}

func NewHubTest(hubPath string, crowdsecPath string, cscliPath string, isAppsecTest bool) (HubTest, error) {
	hubPath, err := filepath.Abs(hubPath)
	if err != nil {
		return HubTest{}, fmt.Errorf("can't get absolute path of hub: %w", err)
	}

	sharedDataDir := filepath.Join(hubPath, ".cache", "data")
	if err = os.MkdirAll(sharedDataDir, 0o700); err != nil {
		return HubTest{}, fmt.Errorf("while creating data dir: %w", err)
	}

	// we can't use hubtest without the hub
	if _, err = os.Stat(hubPath); os.IsNotExist(err) {
		return HubTest{}, fmt.Errorf("path to hub '%s' doesn't exist, can't run", hubPath)
	}
	// we can't use hubtest without crowdsec binary
	if crowdsecPath, err = resolveBinaryPath(crowdsecPath); err != nil {
		return HubTest{}, fmt.Errorf("can't find crowdsec binary: %w", err)
	}

	// we can't use hubtest without cscli binary
	if cscliPath, err = resolveBinaryPath(cscliPath); err != nil {

View on GitHub (pinned to 909b515798)

Solutions

1. cd to a valid existing directory before running hubtest, or pass an absolute hubPath
2. Verify the current working directory exists (pwd) and recreate it if deleted
3. Pass an already-absolute hub path so Abs has no relative component to resolve against cwd

Example fix

// before
cd /tmp/deleted-dir && hubtest run ...
// after
cd /tmp && hubtest run ...

if !filepath.IsAbs(hubPath) {
    if _, err := os.Getwd(); err != nil { return err } // cwd must be valid
}
abs, err := filepath.Abs(hubPath); if err != nil { return err }

ht, err := hubtest.NewHubTest(hubPath, ...)
if err != nil {
    if strings.Contains(err.Error(), "absolute path of hub") { /* re-run from a valid cwd */ }
}

When it happens

Trigger: Calling NewHubTest(hubPath, ...) when filepath.Abs fails because the current working directory cannot be determined (deleted cwd, permission issues).

Common situations: Running hubtest from a directory that was deleted while the shell was inside it; running inside a container/sandbox where getwd fails.

Understand the failure class

Background: "Invalid URL" errors: why new URL(), URI.parse, and reqwest::Url reject your string — missing scheme, whitespace, and bad path format — this error's family across 39 libraries.

Related errors

• failed to get absolute path of %q: %w
• while find parser asserts: %w
• while reading %s: %w
• while find scenario asserts: %w
• %q is a directory, not a file

AI-assisted analysis of crowdsecurity/crowdsec@909b515798 (2026-09-06). Data as JSON: /api/errors/9fe5f7a81d8a9a59. Report an issue: GitHub.