influxdata/influxdb · critical · Error

Internal error

Error message

Internal error: {0}

What it means

This Error variant maps a gRPC Status with code INTERNAL into a Rust error with the message "Internal error: {0}". The IOx server reported an unexpected internal failure while servicing the request; it is the server-side analogue of a 500 response. The From<Status> impl in core/influxdb_iox_client/src/client/error.rs produces it automatically for any internal status returned over the wire.

Solutions

  1. Inspect the IOx server logs around the request time for the panic or internal error details.
  2. Retry the request once in case of a transient internal condition, then stop — INTERNAL is usually not self-healing.
  3. Reduce or simplify the request (smaller batch, simpler query) to see whether a specific payload triggers a server bug.
  4. Report the issue with the ServerError message payload and server version if it reproduces.

Example fix

// before: retrying any error indiscriminately
if let Err(e) = client.write(lines).await { retry(); }
// after: only retry transient codes, fail fast on Internal
match client.write(lines).await {
    Err(Error::Internal(server_err)) => {
        log::error!("server internal error: {server_err} — not retrying");
        // check server logs, report bug
    }
    Err(e) if is_retryable(&e) => retry(),
    Err(e) => return Err(e.into()),
    Ok(resp) => /* ... */,
}
Defensive patterns

Strategy: try-catch

Type guard

fn is_internal(e: &client::Error) -> bool {
    matches!(e, client::Error::Internal(_))
}

Try / catch

match res {
    Err(Error::Internal(se)) => {
        log::error!("server internal error: {se}");
        alert_ops();
    }
    other => other.map_err(Into::into),
}

Prevention

When it happens

Trigger: Server panic or invariant violation while executing an RPC; internal storage/catalog failure reported as a tonic Status with code Internal; a server bug during query planning or write handling.

Common situations: Hitting a genuine IOx server bug under specific data shapes or query patterns; server misconfiguration (corrupt WAL, bad catalog state); resource exhaustion inside the server surfacing as INTERNAL instead of UNAVAILABLE.

Understand the failure class

Background: "This is a bug, please report it": internal invariant violations, unreachable panics, and SNH errors explained — this error's family across 47 libraries.

Related errors

AI-assisted analysis of influxdata/influxdb@06200ef96b (2026-09-19). Data as JSON: /api/errors/4c02585f8d86cb81. Report an issue: GitHub.

Appendix: source

Thrown at core/influxdb_iox_client/src/client/error.rs:102

    #[error("The caller does not have permission to execute the specified operation: {0}")]
    PermissionDenied(ServerError<()>),

    #[error("Some resource has been exhausted: {0}")]
    ResourceExhausted(ServerError<()>),

    #[error("The system is not in a state required for the operation's execution: {0}")]
    FailedPrecondition(Box<ServerError<PreconditionViolation>>),

    #[error("The operation was aborted: {0}")]
    Aborted(ServerError<()>),

    #[error("Operation was attempted past the valid range: {0}")]
    OutOfRange(ServerError<()>),

    #[error("Operation is not implemented or supported: {0}")]
    Unimplemented(ServerError<()>),

    #[error("Internal error: {0}")]
    Internal(ServerError<()>),

    #[error("The service is currently unavailable: {0}")]
    Unavailable(ServerError<()>),

    #[error("Unrecoverable data loss or corruption: {0}")]
    DataLoss(ServerError<()>),

    #[error("The request does not have valid authentication credentials: {0}")]
    Unauthenticated(ServerError<()>),

    #[error("Received an invalid response from the server: {0}")]
    InvalidResponse(#[from] FieldViolation),

    #[error("An unexpected error occurred in the client library: {0}")]
    Client(StdError),
}

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