dgraph-io/dgraph · error

Error while dropping depreciated preds/types.

Error message

Error while dropping depreciated preds/types.

What it means

This error wraps failures of dropDepreciated in fixCors, the final step of the 21.03 offline upgrade. dropDepreciated deletes deprecated predicates and types (old GraphQL-prefixed preds) from the restored badger DB. If those delete/iterate operations fail, the error is wrapped with this message.

Source

Thrown at upgrade/change_v21.03.0.go:382

	}
	for typ := range deprecatedTypes {
		prefixes = append(prefixes, x.TypeKey(x.AttrInRootNamespace(typ)))
	}
	return db.DropPrefix(prefixes...)
}

// fixCors removes the internal predicates from the restored backup. This also appends CORS from
// dgraph.cors to GraphQL schema.
func fixCors(db *badger.DB) error {
	glog.Infof("Fixing cors information in the restored backup.")
	cors, err := getCors(db)
	if err != nil {
		return errors.Wrapf(err, "Error while getting cors from db.")
	}
	if err := updateGQLSchemaOffline(db, cors); err != nil {
		return errors.Wrapf(err, "Error while updating GraphQL schema.")
	}
	return errors.Wrapf(dropDepreciated(db), "Error while dropping depreciated preds/types.")
}

// fixPersistedQuery, for the schema related to persisted query removes the deprecated field from
// the type and updates the index tokenizer for the predicate.
func fixPersistedQuery(db *badger.DB) error {
	glog.Infof("Fixing persisted query schema in restored backup.")
	update := func(entry *badger.Entry) error {
		txn := db.NewTransactionAt(math.MaxUint64, true)
		defer txn.Discard()
		if err := txn.SetEntry(entry); err != nil {
			return err
		}
		// Schema is written at version 1.
		return txn.CommitAt(1, nil)
	}

	// Update the tokenizer in the schema.
	su := pb.SchemaUpdate{

View on GitHub (pinned to 759e242be6)

Solutions

1. Read the wrapped inner error (%+v) to find the badger-level cause; fix it (disk space, permissions, I/O) and rerun the offline upgrade.
2. Re-restore the backup from the original backup file into a fresh p directory and rerun the upgrade.
3. Confirm the restored p directory is not open by another dgraph process; stop all processes and retry.
4. If specific deprecated entries are corrupt, use badger tools to inspect/repair, or manually drop the affected preds before rerunning.

Example fix

// before
dgraph upgrade offline -w v21.03.0 -d /var/lib/dgraph/p
// after (ensure exclusive access and healthy disk)
systemctl stop dgraph
dgraph debug --badgerdir /var/lib/dgraph/p  # verify integrity
dgraph upgrade offline -w v21.03.0 -d /var/lib/dgraph/p

// Check badger dir integrity and exclusive access before upgrade
flock := filepath.Join(pDir, "LOCK")
if _, err := os.Stat(pDir); err != nil { log.Fatalf("missing p dir: %v", err) }
_ = flock // ensure no live dgraph holds this dir

func isDropDepreciatedErr(err error) bool {
	return err != nil && strings.Contains(err.Error(), "Error while dropping depreciated preds/types.")
}

if err := upgrade.OfflineUpgradeFrom2011To2103(db); err != nil {
	log.Fatalf("drop depreciated step failed: %+v", err)
}

When it happens

Trigger: Running OfflineUpgradeFrom2011To2103 where dropDepreciated fails to delete deprecated predicate/type entries from the badger DB (e.g. badger transaction or iteration error, DB closed, disk failure).

Common situations: Migrating a 20.11 backup to 21.03; corrupted p directory; badger write errors due to full disk or I/O errors during the offline upgrade.

Related errors

• Error while updating GraphQL schema.
• while updating persisted query's type
• while upgrading persisted query
• while upgrading cors
• while updating persisted query's schema

AI-assisted analysis of dgraph-io/dgraph@759e242be6 (2026-09-01). Data as JSON: /api/errors/175e691bb6072d15. Report an issue: GitHub.