hyperledger/fabric · error

Failed sending proposal, got %s

Error message

Failed sending proposal, got %s

What it means

Error in getChannels: the endorser client's ProcessProposal call for the peer's channels-list proposal returned a transport/gRPC error; %s is that error. It usually means the peer is unreachable, TLS misconfigured, or the endorser service rejected the connection.

Source

Thrown at internal/peer/channel/list.go:69

		},
	}

	var prop *pb.Proposal
	c, _ := cc.cf.Signer.Serialize()
	prop, _, err = protoutil.CreateProposalFromCIS(common2.HeaderType_ENDORSER_TRANSACTION, "", invocation, c)
	if err != nil {
		return nil, fmt.Errorf("Cannot create proposal, due to %s", err)
	}

	var signedProp *pb.SignedProposal
	signedProp, err = protoutil.GetSignedProposal(prop, cc.cf.Signer)
	if err != nil {
		return nil, fmt.Errorf("Cannot create signed proposal, due to %s", err)
	}

	proposalResp, err := cc.cf.EndorserClient.ProcessProposal(context.Background(), signedProp)
	if err != nil {
		return nil, fmt.Errorf("Failed sending proposal, got %s", err)
	}

	if proposalResp.Response == nil || proposalResp.Response.Status != http.StatusOK {
		return nil, fmt.Errorf("Received bad response, status %d: %s", proposalResp.Response.Status, proposalResp.Response.Message)
	}

	var channelQueryResponse pb.ChannelQueryResponse
	err = proto.Unmarshal(proposalResp.Response.Payload, &channelQueryResponse)
	if err != nil {
		return nil, fmt.Errorf("Cannot read channels list response, %s", err)
	}

	return channelQueryResponse.Channels, nil
}

func list(cf *ChannelCmdFactory) error {
	var err error
	if cf == nil {

View on GitHub (pinned to 2736b63f8f)

Solutions

1. Verify the peer is running and the address/port in --peerAddress is correct
2. Provide --tlsRootCertFile matching the peer's TLS CA when TLS is enabled
3. Test connectivity (nc/openssl s_client) to the endorser port from the client host
4. Check peer logs and gRPC keepalive/deadline settings if timeouts occur

Example fix

// before: wrong port -> connection refused
peer channel list --peerAddress peer0.example.com:7050
// after
peer channel list --peerAddress peer0.example.com:7051 --tlsRootCertFile tls/ca.crt

// pre-flight: TLS and reachability
conn, err := tls.DialWithDialer(&net.Dialer{Timeout: 3 * time.Second}, "tcp", host,
    &tls.Config{RootCAs: caPool})
if err != nil { return fmt.Errorf("cannot reach endorser over TLS: %w", err) }
conn.Close()

proposalResp, err := cc.cf.EndorserClient.ProcessProposal(context.Background(), signedProp)
if err != nil {
    // transient network errors: retry with backoff; TLS/cert errors: fix config, don't retry
    return nil, fmt.Errorf("Failed sending proposal, got %s", err)
}

When it happens

Trigger: EndorserClient.ProcessProposal returns an error — peer unreachable, connection refused, TLS handshake failure, gRPC deadline exceeded, or the peer closing the connection.

Common situations: Peer service down or wrong --peerAddress; missing --tlsRootCertFile for a TLS-enabled peer; network/firewall/DNS issues in containers; client cert not trusted under mutual TLS.

Understand the failure class

Background: ECONNREFUSED and "connection refused" / "could not connect to server" errors: what they mean and how to fix them — this error's family across 44 libraries.

Related errors

• failed sending proposal, due to %s
• orderer `%s` hung up without sending status
• received nil proposal response
• received nil proposal response
• received nil proposal response

AI-assisted analysis of hyperledger/fabric@2736b63f8f (2026-09-04). Data as JSON: /api/errors/98623582a8f7a4db. Report an issue: GitHub.