hashicorp/nomad · error

Failed to parse cron expression: %v

Error message

Failed to parse cron expression: %v

What it means

Fires in Job.Plan for an enabled periodic job: computing the next launch time failed because the job's cron expression (or timezone) could not be parsed by the periodic scheduler.

Source

Thrown at nomad/job_endpoint.go:1933

		}

		if err := scheduler.Annotate(jobDiff, annotations); err != nil {
			return fmt.Errorf("failed to annotate job diff: %v", err)
		}
		reply.Diff = jobDiff
	}

	// Grab the failures
	if len(planner.Evals) != 1 {
		return fmt.Errorf("scheduler resulted in an unexpected number of eval updates: %v", planner.Evals)
	}
	updatedEval := planner.Evals[0]

	// If it is a periodic job calculate the next launch
	if args.Job.IsPeriodic() && args.Job.Periodic.Enabled {
		reply.NextPeriodicLaunch, err = args.Job.Periodic.Next(time.Now().In(args.Job.Periodic.GetLocation()))
		if err != nil {
			return fmt.Errorf("Failed to parse cron expression: %v", err)
		}
	}

	reply.FailedTGAllocs = updatedEval.FailedTGAllocs
	reply.JobModifyIndex = index
	reply.Annotations = annotations
	reply.CreatedEvals = planner.CreateEvals
	reply.Index = index
	return nil
}

// validateJobUpdate ensures updates to a job are valid.
func validateJobUpdate(old, new *structs.Job) error {
	// Validate Dispatch not set on new Jobs
	if old == nil {
		if new.Dispatched {
			return fmt.Errorf("job can't be submitted with 'Dispatched' set")
		}

View on GitHub (pinned to 482b49bf1a)

Solutions

1. Validate the cron spec in the job's periodic block (e.g. with nomad job validate)
2. Fix the cron_expression or time_zone field and resubmit

When it happens

Trigger: Thrown at nomad/job_endpoint.go:1933 when the library encounters an invalid state.

Common situations: See trigger scenarios.

Understand the failure class

• Parsing and encoding errors: unexpected token, malformed input — why parsers reject input and how to find the real culprit.

AI-assisted analysis of hashicorp/nomad@482b49bf1a (2026-09-04). Data as JSON: /api/errors/1a8aef5a1f75f7a9. Report an issue: GitHub.