Missing secret_key_base for 'production' environment,

Question

I simply cant get past the message

Missing secret_key_base for 'production' environment, set this string with rails credentials:edit (ArgumentError)

I have here rails 5.2.0. Ran EDITOR=vim rails credentials:edit and inside:

production:
   secret_key_base: xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Save and, in terminal: RAILS_ENV=production rails c

Am I missing something? Ive restarted server and same issue. No issue in development mode.

Answer 1

Keep default the secrets.yml file

# config/secrets.yml
production:
  secret_key_base: <%= ENV["SECRET_KEY_BASE"] %>

RAILS_ENV=production SECRET_KEY_BASE=production_test_key rails c

Answer 2

Rails 5.2.0 requires an extra stage for the production environment:

config.require_master_key = true    # in config/environments/production.rb

Without it, Rails still falls back to the legacy secret.yml mechanism (for now).

Engine Yard's Christopher Rigor has written a concise post on it. The relevant piece:

Reading the Credentials

If you want to use the credentials in the production environment, add the following to config/environments/production.rb

config.require_master_key = true

A good read to also see up and down sides.

Note: As @TomDogg found out, Rails 5.2.1 seems again different, so this answer may only apply to 5.2.0.

Answer 3

There are no production: development: and test: environment tags in the credentials file. Further information in this DHH's post: https://github.com/rails/rails/pull/30067

So write directly

secret_key_base: xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Please don't confuse master key with the secret key base. The master key is used to open the credentials encrypted file.

Switching back to the previous secrets system should not be the solution, nor the accepted answer.

Answer 4

config/credentials.yml.enc:

development:
  some_username: XXXXXXXXX
  some_password: YYYYYYYYY

test:
  some_username: XXXXXXXXX
  some_password: YYYYYYYYY

production:
  some_username: XXXXXXXXX
  some_password: YYYYYYYYY

secret_key_base: ZZZZZZZZZ
# `secret_key_base:` must NOT be indented !
# It must be put at the very start of a new line.
# There is also no need for it in development or test environment,
#   since there are no attacks to be expected.

Also make sure that you respect all YAML indention rules (i.e. 2 spaces only) as failing to do so my make loading of this file fail silently.