[SOLVED] Cannot install Docker Compose v2: "Invalid Plugin, exec format error"

Cannot install Docker Compose v2: "Invalid Plugin, exec format error"

I installed the new docker compose CLI according to the instructions on docs.docker.com (Ubuntu 20.04) and cannot use the plugin.

The command docker compose help shows:

$ docker compose help
docker: 'compose' is not a docker command.
See 'docker --help'

When running docker help, I get:

$ docker help

Usage:  docker [OPTIONS] COMMAND

[[ OMMITTED NORMAL OUTPUT ]]

Invalid Plugins:
  compose     failed to fetch metadata: fork/exec /home/myname/.docker/cli-plugins/docker-compose: exec format error

Run 'docker COMMAND --help' for more information on a command.

To get more help with docker, check out our guides at https://docs.docker.com/go/guides/

Same when installing under /usr/local/lib/docker/cli-plugins and running the command as root.

I currently use docker version 20.10.7 and docker-compose version 1.28.0.

What am I doing wrong? How to get the new compose to work?

Solution

The problem is solved with version 2.0.1 instead of 2.0.0

Until the docs get updated, just change the cURL command to download the newer version:

curl -SL https://github.com/docker/compose/releases/download/v2.0.1/docker-compose-linux-x86_64 -o ~/.docker/cli-plugins/docker-compose

The cause is a missing asset in the Github Release.

Works like a charm:

$ docker compose version
Docker Compose version v2.0.1

EDIT: as of October 26th 2021, the documentation has been updated to link to the correct download-artifact. This answer remains valid for the case when artifacts are missing, which may happen with future versions or other plugins.