Cannot run cleanup on readonly repository - Common causes and quick fixes

Opster Team

August-23, Version: 7.4-8.9

Briefly, this error occurs when you try to perform a cleanup operation on a repository that is set to read-only mode in Elasticsearch. This mode prevents any write operations, including cleanup. To resolve this issue, you can either change the repository settings to read-write mode or create a new repository with write permissions. Additionally, ensure that the user executing the cleanup operation has the necessary permissions to perform write operations.

This guide will help you check for common problems that cause the log ” cannot run cleanup on readonly repository ” to appear. To understand the issues related to this log, read the explanation below about the following Elasticsearch concepts: blobstore, repository, repositories.

Overview

An Elasticsearch snapshot provides a backup mechanism that takes the current state and data in the cluster and saves it to a repository (read snapshot for more information). The backup process requires a repository to be created first. The repository needs to be registered using the _snapshot endpoint, and multiple repositories can be created per cluster. The following repository types are supported:

Repository types

Repository type	Configuration type
Shared file system	Type: “fs”
S3	Type : “s3”
HDFS	Type :“hdfs”
Azure	Type: “azure”
Google Cloud Storage	Type : “gcs”

Examples

To register an “fs” repository:

PUT _snapshot/my_repo_01
{
"type": "fs",
"settings": {
"location": "/mnt/my_repo_dir"
  }
}

Notes and good things to know

S3, HDFS, Azure and Google Cloud require a relevant plugin to be installed before it can be used for a snapshot.
The setting, path.repo: /mnt/my_repo_dir needs to be added to elasticsearch.yml on all the nodes if you are planning to use the repo type of file system. Otherwise, it will fail.
When using remote repositories, the network bandwidth and repository storage throughput should be high enough to complete the snapshot operations normally, otherwise you will end up with partial snapshots.

Log Context

Log “cannot run cleanup on readonly repository” class name is BlobStoreRepository.java. We extracted the following from Elasticsearch source code for those seeking an in-depth context :

 * @param listener              Listener to complete when done
 */
 public void cleanup(long repositoryStateId; Version repositoryMetaVersion; ActionListener listener) {
 try {
 if (isReadOnly()) {
 throw new RepositoryException(metadata.name(); "cannot run cleanup on readonly repository");
 }
 Map rootBlobs = blobContainer().listBlobs();
 final RepositoryData repositoryData = safeRepositoryData(repositoryStateId; rootBlobs);
 final Map foundIndices = blobStore().blobContainer(indicesPath()).children();
 final Set survivingIndexIds = repositoryData.getIndices()

Cannot run cleanup on readonly repository – How to solve this Elasticsearch exception

Overview

Repository types

Examples

Notes and good things to know

Log Context