kubernetes/kops · error

--name is required

Error message

--name is required

What it means

The create instancegroup command's argument validator found no cluster name: rootCommand.ClusterName(true) returned empty because neither a positional/flag cluster name nor a configured default exists. The command cannot proceed without knowing which cluster to add the IG to.

Source

Thrown at cmd/kops/create_instancegroup.go:100

// NewCmdCreateInstanceGroup create a new cobra command object for creating a instancegroup.
func NewCmdCreateInstanceGroup(f *util.Factory, out io.Writer) *cobra.Command {
	options := &CreateInstanceGroupOptions{
		Role: kopsapi.InstanceGroupRoleNode.ToLowerString(),
		Edit: true,
	}

	cmd := &cobra.Command{
		Use:     "instancegroup INSTANCE_GROUP",
		Aliases: []string{"instancegroups", "ig"},
		Short:   createInstanceGroupShort,
		Long:    createInstanceGroupLong,
		Example: createInstanceGroupExample,
		Args: func(cmd *cobra.Command, args []string) error {
			options.ClusterName = rootCommand.ClusterName(true)

			if options.ClusterName == "" {
				return fmt.Errorf("--name is required")
			}

			if len(args) == 0 {
				return fmt.Errorf("must specify name of instance group to create")
			}

			options.InstanceGroupName = args[0]

			if len(args) != 1 {
				return fmt.Errorf("can only create one instance group at a time")
			}

			return nil
		},
		ValidArgsFunction: func(cmd *cobra.Command, args []string, toComplete string) ([]string, cobra.ShellCompDirective) {
			commandutils.ConfigureKlogForCompletion()
			if len(args) == 1 && rootCommand.ClusterName(false) == "" {
				return []string{"--name"}, cobra.ShellCompDirectiveNoFileComp

View on GitHub (pinned to 4c8573c808)

Solutions

1. Pass the cluster name via --name or the parent command configuration
2. Set the cluster name in the kops configuration used by the CLI

When it happens

Trigger: Thrown at cmd/kops/create_instancegroup.go:100 when the library encounters an invalid state.

Common situations: See trigger scenarios.

AI-assisted analysis of kubernetes/kops@4c8573c808 (2026-09-05). Data as JSON: /api/errors/51ebb5b2583d18c7. Report an issue: GitHub.