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Troubleshooting

gitlab-runner issues

gitlab-runner error "Job failed (system failure): prepare environment"

Most gitlab-runner executors rely on a local shell. Certain settings and operations in shell startup or logout scripts can interfere with the successful operation of \texttt{gitlab-runner} jobs and cause the following error message in the log output:

ERROR: Job failed (system failure): prepare environment: exit status 1. Check
https://docs.gitlab.com/runner/shells/index.html#shell-profile-loading for more
information

This is often caused by commands in the file ~/.bash_logout which try to clear the terminal, e.g. by executing clear_console. On most systems it is safe to simply remove ~/.bash_logout. See https://docs.gitlab.com/runner/shells/index.html#shell-profile-loading for more details.

Info

On ForHLR II and bwUniCluster 2.0 the file ~/.bash_logout will be created at the first login. But the file is empty except for some comments, so by default the problem should not occur.

Last update: November 30, 2022