kubernetes/kops · error

unable to fetch droplet id: %w

Error message

unable to fetch droplet id: %w

What it means

Wraps GetDropletID failure in the DO bootstrap authenticator: the node could not read its own droplet ID from the DigitalOcean metadata service (169.254.169.254), so the node identity token cannot be created.

Source

Thrown at upup/pkg/fi/cloudup/do/dometadata/authenticator.go:44

	"k8s.io/kops/pkg/bootstrap"
)

const DOAuthenticationTokenPrefix = "x-digitalocean-droplet-id "

type doAuthenticator struct {
}

var _ bootstrap.Authenticator = (*doAuthenticator)(nil)

func NewAuthenticator() (bootstrap.Authenticator, error) {
	return &doAuthenticator{}, nil
}

func (o *doAuthenticator) CreateToken(body []byte) (string, error) {
	dropletID, err := GetDropletID()
	if err != nil {
		return "", fmt.Errorf("unable to fetch droplet id: %w", err)
	}
	return DOAuthenticationTokenPrefix + dropletID, nil
}

const (
	dropletIDMetadataURL = "http://169.254.169.254/metadata/v1/id"
)

// GetDropletID returns the droplet ID from the metadata service.
func GetDropletID() (string, error) {
	return getMetadata(dropletIDMetadataURL)
}

func getMetadata(url string) (string, error) {
	resp, err := http.Get(url)
	if err != nil {
		return "", fmt.Errorf("error querying droplet metadata: %w", err)
	}

View on GitHub (pinned to 4c8573c808)

Solutions

1. Verify the droplet metadata service is reachable from the node
2. Check the wrapped error: network failure vs non-200 response
3. Ensure nodeup/kops-controller runs on an actual DigitalOcean droplet

When it happens

Trigger: Thrown at upup/pkg/fi/cloudup/do/dometadata/authenticator.go:44 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/f9bed78269079b02. Report an issue: GitHub.