Azure-pipelines-agent: Error while saving the cache : [error]Failed to start the required dependency 'tar'. Please verify the correct version is installed and available on the path.

Created on 26 Mar 2020 · 18Comments · Source: microsoft/azure-pipelines-agent

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Agent Version and Platform

Version of your agent? 2.144.0/2.144.1/...

OS of the machine running the agent? OSX/Windows/Linux/...

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bug question

Source

nithyusha23

👍2

All 18 comments

@fadnavistanmay - Can you take a look at this?

jtpetty on 27 Mar 2020

👍1

Having the same problem when using NPM cache. Post build task fails with:

[error]Failed to start the required dependency 'tar'. Please verify the correct version is installed and available on the path.

Running a windows agent.

vikpck on 24 Apr 2020

👍1

Here same error too. Trying to use npm cache in order to increase a deployment speed but post cache task is showing the follow error:

[error]Failed to start the required dependency 'tar'. Please verify the correct version is installed and available on the path.

txitxo0 on 24 Apr 2020

Which version of tar have you installed?
Has the path variable been updated to include the directory where tar is installed?

TMHLS-Ultron on 28 Apr 2020

I also have this issue.

Agent version: 2.169.1
Tar GNU 32 installed and path updated. "tar" via cmd works
OS: Windows Server 2012 R2

matthoulb on 11 Jun 2020

I also have this issue.

Agent version: 2.169.1
Tar GNU 32 installed and path updated. "tar" via cmd works
OS: Windows Server 2012 R2

Did you get it to work?

shivanaru on 29 Aug 2020

Also having this issue, i've installed GNU32 and updated the path. Still no luck

Plus3IT-Azure on 15 Sep 2020

Fixed the issue in my environment. Once I installed GNU32 AND added it to the $PATH the error resolved itself. Be sure to attempt to call the tar.exe command (I used Powershell) from any directory you're currently in; if you receive an error stating that it doesn't exist that it's not where it needs to be. This test will confirm that the executable is indeed in $PATH.

Plus3IT-Azure on 15 Sep 2020

Fixed the issue in my environment. Once I installed GNU32 AND added it to the $PATH the error resolved itself. Be sure to attempt to call the tar.exe command (I used Powershell) from any directory you're currently in; if you receive an error stating that it doesn't exist that it's not where it needs to be. This test will confirm that the executable is indeed in $PATH.

I did that, tar executes under windows cmd but the azure pipeline fails with the same error anyway

jlabaj on 7 Oct 2020

Fixed the issue in my environment. Once I installed GNU32 AND added it to the $PATH the error resolved itself. Be sure to attempt to call the tar.exe command (I used Powershell) from any directory you're currently in; if you receive an error stating that it doesn't exist that it's not where it needs to be. This test will confirm that the executable is indeed in $PATH.

I did that, tar executes under windows cmd but the azure pipeline fails with the same error anyway

Which server are you using? Didn't work for me on Win 2012r2. Win 2019 server comes with tar. So tar is fine. Haven't had luck with caching yet though.

shivanaru on 7 Oct 2020

Fixed the issue in my environment. Once I installed GNU32 AND added it to the $PATH the error resolved itself. Be sure to attempt to call the tar.exe command (I used Powershell) from any directory you're currently in; if you receive an error stating that it doesn't exist that it's not where it needs to be. This test will confirm that the executable is indeed in $PATH.

I did that, tar executes under windows cmd but the azure pipeline fails with the same error anyway

Which server are you using? Didn't work for me on Win 2012r2. Win 2019 server comes with tar. So tar is fine. Haven't had luck with caching yet though.

Windows Server 2016, I am giving up the npm caching, doesnt help much anyway, cant cache the node_modules anyway

jlabaj on 8 Oct 2020

I'm having the same issue. I installed tar, and added it to path:

C:\Users\admin>tar --version
tar (GNU tar) 1.13

Copyright (C) 1988, 92,93,94,95,96,97,98, 1999 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
This is free software; see the source for copying conditions.  There is NO
warranty; not even for MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.

Written by John Gilmore and Jay Fenlason.

I still get the Failed to start the required dependency 'tar'. Please verify the correct version is installed and available on the path.. I tried restarting the agent's service, didn't help.

ghost on 23 Oct 2020

@JH-Tools4ERP have you tried adding a custom user capability like tar=<path to your tar.exe> into your self hosted agent ? I had similar issues with curl for windows with azure pipelines and I followed the above approach to resolve it in addition to adding it to the path of course.
I have the similar set up for tar after encountering the initial error of tar not found on windows but it is working now for me.

bbarman4u on 29 Oct 2020

Although on a side note, I must say the whole caching concept does not make sense if the cache gets uploaded to the pipeline through the API and is restored again during the next run making the pipeline run more slower.

bbarman4u on 29 Oct 2020

@nithyusha23 @jlabaj @matthoulb you can specify path that the tar either in Path environment variable or by specifying 'VSTS_TAR_EXECUTABLE' environment variable also - could you please try second approach?

anatolybolshakov on 27 Dec 2020

👍1

Setting 'VSTS_TAR_EXECUTABLE' does work

ankur198 on 4 Jan 2021

@ankur198 ok thanks! Looks like there's missed path to the tar in Path environment variable - let me close this at the moment since it doesn't seem to be an issue. Please feel free to ask any further questions.

anatolybolshakov on 6 Jan 2021

Having the same issue, tried using the path variable and the VSTS_TAR_EXECUTABLE also. On Windows Server 2012 R2 and 2016