Test Kitchen issues on EC2 using RHEL platform?

[gstankovski]

Hi,

I'm setting up Test Kitchen for the first time on one of my cookbooks.

I'm trying to test my cookbook on RHEL 6.5 AMI in EC2 using Test Kitchen.

kitchen create works ok and EC2 instance is created (RHEL 6.5).

When I run kitchen converge, I get the following error:

kitchen converge default-redhat-65
-----> Starting Kitchen (v1.4.0)
-----> Converging ...
Preparing files for transfer

------Exception-------
Class: Kitchen::ActionFailed

Message: Failed to complete #converge action: [undefined method `merge' for #String:0x007f9173ed2748]

Please see .kitchen/logs/kitchen.log for more details
Also try running kitchen diagnose --all for configuration

Stack trace below:

I, [2015-07-27T10:02:27.628246 #27566] INFO -- default-redhat-65: -----> Converging ...
I, [2015-07-27T10:02:27.628656 #27566] INFO -- default-redhat-65: Preparing files for transfer
E, [2015-07-27T10:02:27.628851 #27566] ERROR -- default-redhat-65: Converge failed on instance .
E, [2015-07-27T10:02:27.628939 #27566] ERROR -- default-redhat-65: ------Exception-------
E, [2015-07-27T10:02:27.628953 #27566] ERROR -- default-redhat-65: Class: NoMethodError
E, [2015-07-27T10:02:27.628963 #27566] ERROR -- default-redhat-65: Message: undefined method merge' for #<String:0x007fcdb25766b0> E, [2015-07-27T10:02:27.628991 #27566] ERROR -- default-redhat-65: ------Backtrace------- E, [2015-07-27T10:02:27.629001 #27566] ERROR -- default-redhat-65: /opt/chefdk/embedded/apps/test-kitchen/lib/kitchen/provisioner/chef/common_sandbox.rb:271:inprepare_json'
E, [2015-07-27T10:02:27.629009 #27566] ERROR -- default-redhat-65: /opt/chefdk/embedded/apps/test-kitchen/lib/kitchen/provisioner/chef/common_sandbox.rb:48:in populate' E, [2015-07-27T10:02:27.629018 #27566] ERROR -- default-redhat-65: /opt/chefdk/embedded/apps/test-kitchen/lib/kitchen/provisioner/chef_base.rb:99:increate_sandbox'
E, [2015-07-27T10:02:27.629029 #27566] ERROR -- default-redhat-65: /opt/chefdk/embedded/apps/test-kitchen/lib/kitchen/provisioner/chef_zero.rb:52:in create_sandbox' E, [2015-07-27T10:02:27.629038 #27566] ERROR -- default-redhat-65: /opt/chefdk/embedded/apps/test-kitchen/lib/kitchen/provisioner/base.rb:61:incall'
E, [2015-07-27T10:02:27.629046 #27566] ERROR -- default-redhat-65: /opt/chefdk/embedded/apps/test-kitchen/lib/kitchen/instance.rb:366:in block in converge_action' E, [2015-07-27T10:02:27.629055 #27566] ERROR -- default-redhat-65: /opt/chefdk/embedded/apps/test-kitchen/lib/kitchen/instance.rb:488:incall'
E, [2015-07-27T10:02:27.629063 #27566] ERROR -- default-redhat-65: /opt/chefdk/embedded/apps/test-kitchen/lib/kitchen/instance.rb:488:in synchronize_or_call' E, [2015-07-27T10:02:27.629071 #27566] ERROR -- default-redhat-65: /opt/chefdk/embedded/apps/test-kitchen/lib/kitchen/instance.rb:453:inblock in action'
E, [2015-07-27T10:02:27.629080 #27566] ERROR -- default-redhat-65: /opt/chefdk/embedded/lib/ruby/2.1.0/benchmark.rb:279:in measure' E, [2015-07-27T10:02:27.629088 #27566] ERROR -- default-redhat-65: /opt/chefdk/embedded/apps/test-kitchen/lib/kitchen/instance.rb:452:inaction'
E, [2015-07-27T10:02:27.629098 #27566] ERROR -- default-redhat-65: /opt/chefdk/embedded/apps/test-kitchen/lib/kitchen/instance.rb:362:in converge_action' E, [2015-07-27T10:02:27.629107 #27566] ERROR -- default-redhat-65: /opt/chefdk/embedded/apps/test-kitchen/lib/kitchen/instance.rb:341:inblock in transition_to'

Any ideas?

[zl4bv]

Have you defined attributes anywhere in your .kitchen.yml? It looks like it's having trouble parsing them.

[gstankovski]

Yes! That was it.

I had an attribute defined in single quotes. I changed this to double quotes and it now converges.

For my learning, how did you derive this from the stack trace?

Now its failing due to dependent cookbooks not existing during kitchen converge, so am looking at Berkshelf now to hopefully resolve these.

[zl4bv]

For my learning, how did you derive this from the stack trace?

The first line of the stack trace refers to test-kitchen/lib/kitchen/provisioner/chef/common_sandbox.rb:271, which gets attributes from the config and tries to merge a hash into it. The error message undefined method 'merge' for #<String:0x007fcdb25766b0> suggests it was given a string but it expected a hash, so I figured the attributes in your .kitchen.yml file were defined in some mysterious way.

[gstankovski]

Thanks for the clarification. Much appreciated.