[BUG]

[Yashwant00CR7]

Checklist

• The error occurs when using our provided Docker image.
• I can consistently reproduce the bug across multiple trials or random seeds. (Marked as yes assuming this happens every time you run the command)
• If the error causes experiment abortion, I've verified that this error is the root cause, not a secondary error caused by peer workers.

Detailed Information

Describe the bug

When running the aenv init command to scaffold a new project, the process fails with a NewConnectionError and Max retries exceeded exception. The CLI appears to be attempting to connect to a local registry/server at https://localhost:8080/env/my-env/1.0.0/exists.

The tool retries the connection 3 times before crashing with an unhandled exception stack trace. This suggests the CLI expects a local backend service to be running on port 8080 but does not handle the "Connection Refused" state gracefully or explain to the user that a prerequisite service is missing.

Expected behavior

1. If the local server is required: The CLI should check for the server's presence and output a user-friendly error message (e.g., "Cannot connect to AEnv registry at localhost:8080. Please ensure the server is running before initializing.") rather than a raw Python stack trace.
2. If the local server is NOT required: The CLI should not default to localhost:8080 and should instead point to the correct remote registry or configuration.

Full logs

(test) D:\Downloads\Projects\My College Projects\Legacy Project Maintainer\Aenvironment>aenv init my-env
╭───────────────────── AEnv Scaffolding ──────────────────────╮
│ 🚀 Initializing AEnv Project: my-env                        │
╰───────────────────── Environment Setup ─────────────────────╯
⠋ Checking environment registry...2025-12-19 19:45:11,154 - urllib3.connectionpool - WARNING - Retrying (Retry(total=2, connect=None, read=None, redirect=None, status=None)) after connection broken by 'NewConnectionError("HTTPSConnection(host='localhost', port=8080): Failed to establish a new connection: [WinError 10061] No connection could be made because the target machine actively refused it")': /env/my-env/1.0.0/exists
⠦ Checking environment registry...2025-12-19 19:45:17,235 - urllib3.connectionpool - WARNING - Retrying (Retry(total=1, connect=None, read=None, redirect=None, status=None)) after connection broken by 'NewConnectionError("HTTPSConnection(host='localhost', port=8080): Failed to establish a new connection: [WinError 10061] No connection could be made because the target machine actively refused it")': /env/my-env/1.0.0/exists
⠦ Checking environment registry...2025-12-19 19:45:25,335 - urllib3.connectionpool - WARNING - Retrying (Retry(total=0, connect=None, read=None, redirect=None, status=None)) after connection broken by 'NewConnectionError("HTTPSConnection(host='localhost', port=8080): Failed to establish a new connection: [WinError 10061] No connection could be made because the target machine actively refused it")': /env/my-env/1.0.0/exists
❌ Error: Unexpected error: Connection error: HTTPSConnectionPool(host='localhost', port=8080): Max retries exceeded with url: /env/my-env/1.0.0/exists (Caused by NewConnectionError("HTTPSConnection(host='localhost', port=8080): Failed to establish a new connection: [WinError 10061] No connection could be made because the target machine actively refused it"))

Environment

• OS: Windows (deduced from WinError 10061 and file paths)
• Python Virtual Environment: Active (indicated by (test) prompt)
• Tool: Aenvironment (Legacy Project Maintainer)
• Hardware: [Please insert CPU/RAM specs if relevant, otherwise leave blank]

Script

# Run inside the Aenvironment project root
aenv init my-env

[shenxiangzhuang]

You can use export DUMMY_INSTANCE_IP=http://localhost:8081 to fix the error.

Check the doc here: https://inclusionai.github.io/AEnvironment/getting_started/quickstart.html#environment-configuration