This article provides a workaround to correct the issue where the SSR node fails to connect to the Conductor due to a Salt minion public key mismatch.

The salt-minion.service stays in an activating state and fails to start because the minion's public key is rejected by the Salt Master.

Error snippet: 

# systemctl status salt-minion.service

Jun 18 03:09:54 sn2046220246 systemd[1]: Started The Salt Minion.
Jun 18 03:09:58 sn2046220246 salt-minion[15377]: [CRITICAL] The Salt Master has rejected this minion's public key!
Jun 18 03:09:58 sn2046220246 salt-minion[15377]: To repair this issue, delete the public key for this minion on the Salt Master and restart this minion.
Jun 18 03:09:58 sn2046220246 salt-minion[15377]: Or restart the Salt Master in open mode to clean out the keys. The Salt Minion will now exit.
Jun 18 03:10:10 sn2046220246 systemd[1]: salt-minion.service: main process exited, code=exited, status=77/n/a
Jun 18 03:10:10 sn2046220246 systemd[1]: Unit salt-minion.service entered failed state.
Jun 18 03:10:10 sn2046220246 systemd[1]: salt-minion.service failed.

Salt test from Conductor:

# sudo t128-salt "*" test.ping
Minion did not return. [No response]

Workaround

Step 1: Reset the asset ID

Remove/reset the asset ID of the problematic node (node0) and perform a commit.
A new asset ID will be automatically regenerated.

Step 2: Update the minion ID and restart Salt

1. Copy the newly generated asset ID.
2. Add it to the minion_id file.
3. Restart the Salt minion service.

Commands:

cd /etc/salt
cat minion_id
systemctl restart salt-minion.service

After salt-minion service restart, SSR node should reconnect successfully to the Conductor.

If you face any further issues, please contact JUNIPER JTAC Support for assistance.