What causes "creating client for Scaleway NodeIdentifier: %w" in kubernetes/kops?

Verify Scaleway credentials: SCW_ACCESS_KEY, SCW_SECRET_KEY and SCW_DEFAULT_PROJECT_ID are set and well-formed

creating client for Scaleway NodeIdentifier: %w

Error message

creating client for Scaleway NodeIdentifier: %w

What it means

New() for the Scaleway nodeidentifier creates a Scaleway API client (scw.NewClient) using a profile derived from environment/config, plus the kOps user agent. This error wraps any failure instantiating that client, such as malformed configuration or an invalid credential profile.

Source

Thrown at pkg/nodeidentity/scaleway/identify.go:61

// nodeIdentifier identifies a node from Scaleway
type nodeIdentifier struct {
	client       *scw.Client
	cache        expirationcache.Store
	cacheEnabled bool
}

// New creates and returns a nodeidentity.Identifier for Nodes running on Scaleway
func New(cacheNodeidentityInfo bool) (nodeidentity.Identifier, error) {
	profile, err := scalewaymetadata.CreateValidScalewayProfile()
	if err != nil {
		return nil, err
	}
	scwClient, err := scw.NewClient(
		scw.WithProfile(profile),
		scw.WithUserAgent(scaleway.KopsUserAgentPrefix+kopsv.Version),
	)
	if err != nil {
		return nil, fmt.Errorf("creating client for Scaleway NodeIdentifier: %w", err)
	}

	return &nodeIdentifier{
		client:       scwClient,
		cache:        expirationcache.NewTTLStore(stringKeyFunc, cacheTTL),
		cacheEnabled: cacheNodeidentityInfo,
	}, nil
}

// IdentifyNode queries Scaleway for the node identify information
func (i *nodeIdentifier) IdentifyNode(ctx context.Context, node *corev1.Node) (*nodeidentity.Info, error) {
	providerID := node.Spec.ProviderID
	if providerID == "" {
		return nil, fmt.Errorf("providerID not set for node %s", node.Name)
	}
	if !strings.HasPrefix(providerID, "scaleway://") {
		return nil, fmt.Errorf("providerID %q not recognized for node %s", providerID, node.Name)
	}

View on GitHub (pinned to 4c8573c808)

Solutions

Verify Scaleway credentials: SCW_ACCESS_KEY, SCW_SECRET_KEY and SCW_DEFAULT_PROJECT_ID are set and well-formed
Check/repair the Scaleway CLI config ('scw init' or 'scw config dump') that feeds the profile
Ensure credentials are valid and have the right IAM permissions by testing with the Scaleway CLI/API

Example fix

// before
export SCW_ACCESS_KEY="not-a-uuid"
// after
export SCW_ACCESS_KEY="SCWXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX"
export SCW_SECRET_KEY="<valid-secret>"
export SCW_DEFAULT_PROJECT_ID="<project-uuid>"

Defensive patterns

Strategy: try-catch

Validate before calling

// Preflight scaleway env/config before New()
for _, k := range []string{"SCW_ACCESS_KEY", "SCW_SECRET_KEY"} {
    if os.Getenv(k) == "" {
        return fmt.Errorf("%s must be set before creating the scaleway nodeidentifier", k)
    }
}

Try / catch

id, err := scaleway.New()
if err != nil && strings.Contains(err.Error(), "creating client for Scaleway NodeIdentifier") {
    return fmt.Errorf("scaleway client init failed; check SCW_* credentials/config: %w", err)
}

Prevention

Run 'scw config dump' / 'scw init' to validate credentials and profile before startup
Set SCW_ACCESS_KEY, SCW_SECRET_KEY and SCW_DEFAULT_PROJECT_ID in the pod/deployment env
Keep the scaleway-sdk-go dependency updated to match credential format expectations

When it happens

Trigger: scw.NewClient fails while building the client from the Scaleway profile — invalid SCW_* environment variables, malformed config file, bad credentials format, or conflicting options (e.g. both access key and deprecated fields set incorrectly).

Common situations: Missing or malformed SCW_ACCESS_KEY / SCW_SECRET_KEY / SCW_DEFAULT_PROJECT_ID, a corrupted ~/.config/scaleway/config.yaml, or an incompatible scaleway-sdk-go profile setup.

Related errors

AI-assisted analysis of kubernetes/kops@4c8573c808 (2026-09-05). Data as JSON: /api/errors/ffd3e43e935e1b5b. Report an issue: GitHub.