hashicorp/nomad · error

Error querying job summary: %s

Error message

Error querying job summary: %s

What it means

Raised by outputJobSummary (used by periodic, parameterized, and normal `nomad job status` output) when Jobs().Summary(jobID, q) fails to fetch the job's summary (queued/running/failed counts per task group). The client error is wrapped into this message and aborts the summary section. It is purely a read-side API failure.

Source

Thrown at command/job_status.go:735

				modTimePretty)
			if showDeadline {
				row += fmt.Sprintf("|%s", deadlines[i])
			}
			allocs[i+1] = row
		}
	}

	return formatList(allocs)
}

// outputJobSummary displays the given jobs summary and children job summary
// where appropriate
func (c *JobStatusCommand) outputJobSummary(client *api.Client, job *api.Job) error {
	// Query the summary
	q := &api.QueryOptions{Namespace: *job.Namespace}
	summary, _, err := client.Jobs().Summary(*job.ID, q)
	if err != nil {
		return fmt.Errorf("Error querying job summary: %s", err)
	}

	if summary == nil {
		return nil
	}

	periodic := job.IsPeriodic()
	parameterizedJob := job.IsParameterized()

	// Print the summary
	if !periodic && !parameterizedJob {
		c.Ui.Output(c.Colorize().Color("\n[bold]Summary[reset]"))
		summaries := make([]string, len(summary.Summary)+1)
		summaries[0] = "Task Group|Queued|Starting|Running|Failed|Complete|Lost|Unknown"
		taskGroups := make([]string, 0, len(summary.Summary))
		for taskGroup := range summary.Summary {
			taskGroups = append(taskGroups, taskGroup)
		}

View on GitHub (pinned to 482b49bf1a)

Solutions

1. Fix the wrapped cause: connectivity first (curl $NOMAD_ADDR/v1/agent/health), then server errors.
2. Set the correct namespace/region: nomad job status -namespace <ns> <job>.
3. Grant the ACL token job/summary read rights in the target namespace and retry.
4. Retry the command after transient conditions like no cluster leader.

Example fix

// before
nomad job status web    // Error querying job summary: permission denied
// after
nomad acl policy apply -job web-read -namespace default \
  'namespace "default" { capabilities = ["list-jobs", "read-job", "allocations"] }'
NOMAD_TOKEN=<web-read-token> nomad job status web

curl -sf -H "X-Nomad-Token: $NOMAD_TOKEN" \
  "$NOMAD_ADDR/v1/job/$JOB_ID/summary?namespace=$NOMAD_NAMESPACE" > /dev/null

summary, _, err := client.Jobs().Summary(id, q)
if err != nil {
    if isTransient(err) { // 5xx / connection reset
        return retry(3, backoff, func() error { ... })
    }
    return err
}

When it happens

Trigger: client.Jobs().Summary(*job.ID, q) returns an error: agent unreachable, ACL token without job-summary read permission in the namespace, wrong namespace/region in q, or server 5xx.

Common situations: Least-privilege ACL policies that permit job read but omit summary access; periodic/dispatched job inspected from the wrong namespace; network drop or agent restart while paging through status output; leadership failover mid-command.

Related errors

• Failed to retrieve allocation %q: %w
• Error querying job: %s
• Error querying job allocations: %s
• Error querying job evaluations: %s
• Error querying latest job deployment: %s

AI-assisted analysis of hashicorp/nomad@482b49bf1a (2026-09-04). Data as JSON: /api/errors/589e716c9b7a0b47. Report an issue: GitHub.