trac-admin: Failed to create environment

[Derrick Karpo <dkarpo@…>]

Hello.

When creating a new Trac 0.11 environment, the Initenv will fail if the parent directory does not already exist. See below for an example where '/var/local/lib' does not exist. This appears to also affect the latest Trac 0.13 dev.

# trac-admin /var/local/lib/mytracinstall initenv
Creating a new Trac environment at /var/local/lib/mytracinstall
<snip>
<snip>
<snip>
Creating and Initializing Project
Initenv for '/var/local/lib/mytracinstall' failed. 
 Failed to create environment.
[Errno 2] No such file or directory: '/var/local/lib/mytracinstall'
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "/usr/lib/python2.6/dist-packages/trac/admin/console.py", line 583, in do_initenv
    options=options)
  File "/usr/lib/python2.6/dist-packages/trac/env.py", line 207, in __init__
    self.create(options)
  File "/usr/lib/python2.6/dist-packages/trac/env.py", line 316, in create
    os.mkdir(self.path)
OSError: [Errno 2] No such file or directory: '/var/local/lib/mytracinstall'

This is due to 'env.py' using os.mkdir() when os.makedirs() would be a better fit. The attached patch to 'env.py' will allow Trac to create all the intermediate directories if they don't exist.

[Remy Blank]

I don't think this is a good idea. When you create a new file e.g. in a word processor, it doesn't create all necessary subdirectories. So I would find it surprising if Trac did that.

Suggesting "wontfix".

[Derrick Karpo <dkarpo@…>]

I understand where you are coming from but the difference between the word processor analogy and this one is that with a new file in a word processor, there is no context to start with. You create the file, then save it where ever you want. In this case, you are initializing a brand new Trac environment with context (ie. put the Trac env here). You are telling Trac that you want to create this new Trac environment in location X so IMO, if you are telling Trac that you want the environment in location X, you shouldn't have to pre-create location X first. This should happen automatically as you've told it that's where you want it. Perhaps a simple "Destination doesn't exist. Would you like to create this directory?" prompt would suffice.

The 'Creating a Project Environment' section of the Trac install documentation makes no reference to having to pre-create the dirname() of the Trac environment. If the os.makedirs() patch is not accepted then you may want to consider updating the installation documentation so that it is clear that the destination location needs to be created.

• ​http://trac.edgewall.org/wiki/TracInstall#CreatingaProjectEnvironment

[Remy Blank]

Replying to Derrick Karpo <dkarpo@…>:

You are telling Trac that you want to create this new Trac environment in location X so IMO, if you are telling Trac that you want the environment in location X, you shouldn't have to pre-create location X first. This should happen automatically as you've told it that's where you want it.

I disagree with that. Try the following (where subdir doesn't exist):

$ touch testfile
$ cp testfile subdir/testfile
cp: cannot create regular file `subdir/testfile': No such file or directory

The cp command reports an error, and certainly doesn't create the subdir directory for you. Why should Trac? If you want the base directory to be created, simply precede your call to trac-admin with mkdir -p /var/local/lib.

Definitely a "wontfix".

[Derrick Karpo <dkarpo@…>]

Yes, I understand this. With respect to administrators who may be little out of their element when installing Trac I think the application should do its best to be nice. If you feel that Trac shouldn't make assumptions that the user knows what their are doing (which I get), then it should error out nicely during the environment initialization like it does when the "Directory exists and is not empty".

Would you be opposed to changes in do_initenv() in console.py that would check if dirname() doesn't exist and catch that error providing the user with a nicer prompt?

[Remy Blank]

Replying to Derrick Karpo <dkarpo@…>:

Would you be opposed to changes in do_initenv() in console.py that would check if dirname() doesn't exist and catch that error providing the user with a nicer prompt?

No, that would be a nice addition. Currently, the error happens at the end of the creation process, after asking the few required questions, which is not too nice. A check (and abort) before asking the questions would be welcome.

Let's reopen this ticket for that, then.

[Remy Blank]

If you do provide a patch, please make it for 0.12-stable or trunk, as the 0.11.x branch is unsupported.

[dkarpo@…]

Hello.

Here is a patch (attachment:trac.initenv.os.path.exists.patch​) against trac-0.12.2 which should resolve this ticket. Please consider merging it. Trac will now check first if the base directory for the Trac environment initialization exists, if it doesn't, it fails immediately with a nice user prompt. This has been tested on Linux only.

With the patch:

$ trac-admin  /home/dk/tmp/dir1/dir2/trac initenv
Initenv for '/home/dk/tmp/dir1/dir2/trac' failed. 
Base directory '/home/dk/tmp/dir1/dir2' does not exist.  Please create manually and retry.

Let's create the directory and retry:

$ mkdir -p /home/dk/tmp/dir1/dir2
$ trac-admin  /home/dk/tmp/dir1/dir2/trac initenv
Creating a new Trac environment at /home/dk/tmp/dir1/dir2/trac

Trac will first ask a few questions about your environment 
in order to initialize and prepare the project database.

 Please enter the name of your project.
<snip>

[Remy Blank]

Thanks for the patch.

[Remy Blank]

Patch applied in [10807]. Thanks!