Invalid object storage credentials with Terraform Enterprise

Problem

When starting, a Terraform Enterprise instance may fail with an error related to object storage credentials. This can occur if the Google Cloud Storage (GCS) credentials file is expired, invalid, or malformed.

Prerequisites

• A self-hosted Terraform Enterprise instance configured to use Google Cloud Storage (GCS) for object storage.
• Administrative access to the Terraform Enterprise instance to run replicatedctl commands.

Cause

The instance fails to start and logs the following error message, indicating a problem parsing the GCS credentials file.

failed to start server { err="failed parsing credentials: invalid character '\\n' in string literal" }

This error typically occurs when the GCS credential JSON file contains unexpected characters, such as a newline (\n), often due to incorrect formatting when the value was set.

Solution

To resolve this issue, you must provide a correctly formatted GCS credential file to the Terraform Enterprise configuration.

1. Download a new, valid service account key file in JSON format from the Google Cloud IAM & Admin console. Save this file as GCP-key.json on the Terraform Enterprise instance.

2. Update the gcs_credentials configuration setting by passing the contents of the new key file. Ensure you use standard double quotes.

   $ replicatedctl app-config set gcs_credentials --value "$(cat GCP-key.json)"

Outcome

After you update the credentials and restart the Terraform Enterprise application, the parsing error is resolved, and the instance should start successfully.