What causes "'true' is not a valid priority" in ipfs/kubo?

Replace the unquoted boolean true with the quoted string "true" (meaning default priority/enabled).

'true' is not a valid priority

Error message

'true' is not a valid priority

What it means

config/types.go's Priority type implements json.UnmarshalJSON and accepts "true" only as the literal string meaning enabled-with-default-priority, a bare JSON boolean true, or an integer. The bare JSON literal `true` (unquoted boolean) is explicitly rejected because a priority must be either disabled (false) or carry a positive numeric value; there is no defined default numeric priority for the bare true literal.

Source

Thrown at config/types.go:200

	// <= 0 == special
	switch p {
	case DefaultPriority:
		return json.Marshal(nil)
	case Disabled:
		return json.Marshal(false)
	default:
		return nil, fmt.Errorf("invalid priority value: %d", p)
	}
}

func (p *Priority) UnmarshalJSON(input []byte) error {
	switch string(input) {
	case "null", "undefined":
		*p = DefaultPriority
	case "false":
		*p = Disabled
	case "true":
		return fmt.Errorf("'true' is not a valid priority")
	default:
		var priority int64
		err := json.Unmarshal(input, &priority)
		if err != nil {
			return err
		}
		if priority <= 0 {
			return fmt.Errorf("priority must be positive: %d <= 0", priority)
		}
		*p = Priority(priority)
	}
	return nil
}

func (p Priority) String() string {
	if p > 0 {
		return fmt.Sprintf("%d", p)
	}

View on GitHub (pinned to 329838acdf)

Solutions

Replace the unquoted boolean true with the quoted string "true" (meaning default priority/enabled).
Or set an explicit positive integer, e.g. "priority": 5.
Use `ipfs config --json <key> "true"` so the shell/JSON quoting is correct.

Example fix

// before
{"Reprovider.Strategy": {"Priority": true}}
// after
{"Reprovider.Strategy": {"Priority": "true"}}
// or
{"Reprovider.Strategy": {"Priority": 5}}

Defensive patterns

Strategy: validation

Validate before calling

// reject bare boolean true before handing config to kubo
func validPriority(v any) error {
    if b, ok := v.(bool); ok && b {
        return fmt.Errorf("Priority cannot be bare true; use \"true\" or a positive integer")
    }
    return nil
}

Type guard

func isQuotedTrue(v any) bool { s, ok := v.(string); return ok && s == "true" }

Try / catch

if err := json.Unmarshal(data, &cfg); err != nil {
    if strings.Contains(err.Error(), "'true' is not a valid priority") {
        // fix quoting in the JSON and retry
    }
}

Prevention

Use `ipfs config --json <key> <value>` instead of editing config.json raw
Remember Priority is quoted "true"/"false" or a positive int, never a JSON boolean true
Validate config.json with `ipfs config show` after manual edits

When it happens

Trigger: Unmarshaling JSON config such as {"priority": true} (unquoted boolean true) into a Priority field via json.Unmarshal or `ipfs config --json`.

Common situations: Users editing config.json by hand write true expecting 'enabled', not realizing the field expects a quoted "true" string or a positive integer; migration scripts copying boolean flags into priority fields.

Understand the failure class

Background: "Invalid value" and "allowed values are" config errors: what your library rejected and how to fix it — this error's family across 41 libraries.

Related errors

AI-assisted analysis of ipfs/kubo@329838acdf (2026-09-03). Data as JSON: /api/errors/94dd9dbf12590c05. Report an issue: GitHub.