hashicorp/terraform · error

registry response includes invalid download URL

Error message

registry response includes invalid download URL: %s

What it means

Thrown when the registry's download_url field cannot be parsed as a URL. The download URL is later resolved against the request URL and required to be http/https.

Solutions

  1. Report the malformed download_url to the registry operator
  2. If self-hosting, ensure download_url is an absolute http(s) URL
  3. Check for a misbehaving mirror or proxy that rewrites the field
Defensive patterns

Strategy: validation

Validate before calling

// Pre-validate a URL string parses cleanly.
func parseableURL(s string) bool {
    _, err := url.Parse(s)
    return err == nil
}

Type guard

func IsParseableURL(s string) bool {
    _, err := url.Parse(s)
    return err == nil
}

Try / catch

if _, err := url.Parse(body.DownloadURL); err != nil {
    return fmt.Errorf("registry returned an unparseable download_url: %w", err)
}

Prevention

When it happens

Trigger: url.Parse(body.DownloadURL) returned a non-nil error (e.g. control characters, an unparseable scheme).

Common situations: Registry returns a download_url containing whitespace/control characters; a relative path with an unparseable form; corruption of the JSON field in transit.

Related errors

AI-assisted analysis of hashicorp/terraform@d32a084675 (2026-08-11). Data as JSON: /api/errors/e6eb055ce0a6d0b0. Report an issue: GitHub.

Appendix: source

Thrown at internal/getproviders/registry_client.go:285

		if !match {
			// If the protocol version is not supported, try to find the closest
			// matching version.
			closest, err := c.findClosestProtocolCompatibleVersion(ctx, provider, version)
			if err != nil {
				return PackageMeta{}, err
			}
			protoErr.Suggestion = closest
			return PackageMeta{}, protoErr
		}
	}

	if body.OS != target.OS || body.Arch != target.Arch {
		return PackageMeta{}, fmt.Errorf("registry response to request for %s archive has incorrect target %s", target, Platform{body.OS, body.Arch})
	}

	downloadURL, err := url.Parse(body.DownloadURL)
	if err != nil {
		return PackageMeta{}, fmt.Errorf("registry response includes invalid download URL: %s", err)
	}
	downloadURL = resp.Request.URL.ResolveReference(downloadURL)
	if downloadURL.Scheme != "http" && downloadURL.Scheme != "https" {
		return PackageMeta{}, fmt.Errorf("registry response includes invalid download URL: must use http or https scheme")
	}

	ret := PackageMeta{
		Provider:         provider,
		Version:          version,
		ProtocolVersions: protoVersions,
		TargetPlatform: Platform{
			OS:   body.OS,
			Arch: body.Arch,
		},
		Filename: body.Filename,
		Location: PackageHTTPURL(downloadURL.String()),
		// "Authentication" is populated below
	}

View on GitHub (pinned to d32a084675)