hyperledger/fabric · error

error deleting leveldb key [%#v]

Error message

error deleting leveldb key [%#v]

What it means

DB.Delete wraps goleveldb Delete failures with the key being removed and logs it. Deletion of e.g. a ledger ID failed at the storage layer. Note ErrNotFound is not special-cased here — goleveldb Delete of a missing key normally succeeds, so this error indicates a real storage failure.

Source

Thrown at common/ledger/util/leveldbhelper/leveldb_helper.go:154

	if err != nil {
		logger.Errorf("Error writing leveldb key [%#v]", key)
		return errors.Wrapf(err, "error writing leveldb key [%#v]", key)
	}
	return nil
}

// Delete deletes the given key
func (dbInst *DB) Delete(key []byte, sync bool) error {
	dbInst.mutex.RLock()
	defer dbInst.mutex.RUnlock()
	wo := dbInst.writeOptsNoSync
	if sync {
		wo = dbInst.writeOptsSync
	}
	err := dbInst.db.Delete(key, wo)
	if err != nil {
		logger.Errorf("Error deleting leveldb key [%#v]", key)
		return errors.Wrapf(err, "error deleting leveldb key [%#v]", key)
	}
	return nil
}

// GetIterator returns an iterator over key-value store. The iterator should be released after the use.
// The resultset contains all the keys that are present in the db between the startKey (inclusive) and the endKey (exclusive).
// A nil startKey represents the first available key and a nil endKey represent a logical key after the last available key
func (dbInst *DB) GetIterator(startKey []byte, endKey []byte) iterator.Iterator {
	dbInst.mutex.RLock()
	defer dbInst.mutex.RUnlock()
	return dbInst.db.NewIterator(&goleveldbutil.Range{Start: startKey, Limit: endKey}, dbInst.readOpts)
}

// WriteBatch writes a batch
func (dbInst *DB) WriteBatch(batch *leveldb.Batch, sync bool) error {
	dbInst.mutex.RLock()
	defer dbInst.mutex.RUnlock()
	wo := dbInst.writeOptsNoSync

View on GitHub (pinned to 2736b63f8f)

Solutions

1. Verify the DB is still open for the duration of the delete call.
2. Check disk space and filesystem permissions on the ledger path.
3. If the wrapped error indicates corruption, restore the DB from backup or re-provision.
4. Retry once for transient I/O errors before failing the higher-level operation.

Example fix

// before
if err := db.Delete(ledgerID, true); err != nil { return err }
// after
if err := db.Delete(ledgerID, true); err != nil {
  return fmt.Errorf("could not remove ledger id %q: %w", ledgerID, err)
}

func isDeleteErr(err error) bool {
  return err != nil && strings.Contains(err.Error(), "error deleting leveldb key")
}

if err := db.Delete(key, true); err != nil {
  return fmt.Errorf("leveldb delete of %#v failed: %w", key, err)
}

When it happens

Trigger: Deleting after the DB was closed; I/O failure writing the deletion record (disk full, permissions); corrupted memtable/manifest state.

Common situations: Ledger removal during peer shutdown racing with provider close; disk-full conditions; corrupted database files after a crash.

Related errors

• error while trying to see if the leveldb at path [%s] is emp
• error retrieving leveldb key [%#v]
• error writing leveldb key [%#v]
• error writing batch to leveldb
• Error creating dir if missing: %s

AI-assisted analysis of hyperledger/fabric@2736b63f8f (2026-09-04). Data as JSON: /api/errors/63cb8cce507d7242. Report an issue: GitHub.