CI failing with "cannot import name 'AnsibleCollectionLoader'"

[geerlingguy]

SUMMARY

CI testing has started failing today with the error message down below.

See failed build: https://github.com/ansible-collections/community.kubernetes/runs/785830751?check_suite_focus=true#step:8:21

ISSUE TYPE

• Bug Report

COMPONENT NAME

CI / Molecule

ANSIBLE VERSION

TODO.

CONFIGURATION

TODO.

OS / ENVIRONMENT

GitHub Actions

STEPS TO REPRODUCE

Run GitHub Actions workflow, molecule test:

molecule test

EXPECTED RESULTS

Tests pass.

ACTUAL RESULTS

Molecule tests fail:

--> Action: 'syntax'
ERROR! Unexpected Exception, this is probably a bug: cannot import name 'AnsibleCollectionLoader' from 'ansible.utils.collection_loader' (/opt/hostedtoolcache/Python/3.7.7/x64/lib/python3.7/site-packages/ansible/utils/collection_loader/__init__.py)
    the full traceback was:
    
    Traceback (most recent call last):
      File "/opt/hostedtoolcache/Python/3.7.7/x64/bin/ansible-playbook", line 92, in <module>
        mycli = getattr(__import__("ansible.cli.%s" % sub, fromlist=[myclass]), myclass)
      File "/opt/hostedtoolcache/Python/3.7.7/x64/lib/python3.7/site-packages/ansible/cli/__init__.py", line 22, in <module>
        from ansible.inventory.manager import InventoryManager
      File "/opt/hostedtoolcache/Python/3.7.7/x64/lib/python3.7/site-packages/ansible/inventory/manager.py", line 38, in <module>
        from ansible.plugins.loader import inventory_loader
      File "/opt/hostedtoolcache/Python/3.7.7/x64/lib/python3.7/site-packages/ansible/plugins/loader.py", line 26, in <module>
        from ansible.utils.collection_loader import AnsibleCollectionLoader, AnsibleFlatMapLoader, AnsibleCollectionRef
    ImportError: cannot import name 'AnsibleCollectionLoader' from 'ansible.utils.collection_loader' (/opt/hostedtoolcache/Python/3.7.7/x64/lib/python3.7/site-packages/ansible/utils/collection_loader/__init__.py)
ERROR: 
An error occurred during the test sequence action: 'syntax'. Cleaning up.

[geerlingguy]

Testing locally with Ansible 2.9.9 there's no issue.

[geerlingguy]

I also tested with 2.11.0.dev0 and didn't have an issue:

$ ansible --version
[WARNING]: You are running the development version of Ansible. You should only run Ansible from "devel" if you are
modifying the Ansible engine, or trying out features under development. This is a rapidly changing source of code and
can become unstable at any point.
ansible 2.11.0.dev0

[geerlingguy]

Tried with 2.9.10 and the current 2.10.0 devel too, no problems locally. ???

[geerlingguy]

And... now I can't get the problem to reproduce on GitHub Actions, so I guess it was some weird transient issue.

Closing this.

[jamesmarshall24]

@geerlingguy I ran into the same today randomly and had to uninstall Ansible and delete the ansible directory under site-packages. After reinstalling Ansible, I could no longer replicate the error.

[NicoWde]

@jamesmarshall24 @geerlingguy I recently ran into it..

think the problem is somehow somewhere between the package-names 'ansible' and 'ansible-base' (in my case: installed via pip)

[geerlingguy]

Grr, I just ran into this again locally, after I was installing Ansible 2.9.10, then 2.10 pre, then ansible-base, then Ansible 2.9.10 again.

The fix was as @jamesmarshall24 and @NicoWde stated:

1. pip3 uninstall ansible
2. rm -rf /usr/local/lib/python3.7/site-packages/ansible (things that weren't automatically removed)
3. pip3 install ansible

[distributorofpain]

Grr, I just ran into this again locally, after I was installing Ansible 2.9.10, then 2.10 pre, then ansible-base, then Ansible 2.9.10 again.

The fix was as @jamesmarshall24 and @NicoWde stated:

1. pip3 uninstall ansible
2. rm -rf /usr/local/lib/python3.7/site-packages/ansible (things that weren't automatically removed)
3. pip3 install ansible

Note, on CentOS 8, i had to change the python path to 3.6 to remove the right directory. But it fixed my issue.

[tzvifriedman]

Just a note on the above, aside from also changing the python version, in Ubuntu 18.04, it's dist-packages and not site-packages. Took me some time to figure that one out.

[strarsis]

Yes, had to uninstall ansible-base package, too, not just the ansible package: pip3 uninstall ansible-base.
pip3 list can help finding extraneous packages.
Also note that root user and normal user can easily have different pip packages and therefore ansible versions.
ansible-base was installed on normal user and on root user, adding extra confusion and errors when trying to use ansible.

sudo apt autoremove ansible
sudo pip3 uninstall ansible
sudo pip3 uninstall ansible-base
pip3 uninstall ansible
pip3 uninstall ansible-base

[SturmB]

I just now learned about GitHub Actions and decided to give it a try. My first action is using ansible-lint. And I now get this error message every time I push. However, ansible-lint runs fine locally and I've already corrected all issues it brought up.

Is there something I need to do to correct this, or is it something that's buggy with GitHub's Actions?

[shinebayar-g]

Grr, I just ran into this again locally, after I was installing Ansible 2.9.10, then 2.10 pre, then ansible-base, then Ansible 2.9.10 again.

The fix was as @jamesmarshall24 and @NicoWde stated:

1. pip3 uninstall ansible
2. rm -rf /usr/local/lib/python3.7/site-packages/ansible (things that weren't automatically removed)
3. pip3 install ansible

This really helped. Thank you!
I guess pip uninstall ansible doesn't really clean everything.

[ader1990]

Yes, had to uninstall ansible-base package, too, not just the ansible package: pip3 uninstall ansible-base.
pip3 list can help finding extraneous packages.
Also note that root user and normal user can easily have different pip packages and therefore ansible versions.
ansible-base was installed on normal user and on root user, adding extra confusion and errors when trying to use ansible.

sudo apt autoremove ansible
sudo pip3 uninstall ansible
sudo pip3 uninstall ansible-base
pip3 uninstall ansible
pip3 uninstall ansible-base

this is the correct solution.

[wolfwolker]

same problem here in ubuntu 20.04, reinstalling with pip3 worked for me :)
thanks a lot

[iamgini]

Grr, I just ran into this again locally, after I was installing Ansible 2.9.10, then 2.10 pre, then ansible-base, then Ansible 2.9.10 again.

The fix was as @jamesmarshall24 and @NicoWde stated:

1. pip3 uninstall ansible
2. rm -rf /usr/local/lib/python3.7/site-packages/ansible (things that weren't automatically removed)
3. pip3 install ansible

Perfect. It worked.

lucky, I was using it inside venv !

thank you @geerlingguy

[sanzenwin]

Grr, I just ran into this again locally, after I was installing Ansible 2.9.10, then 2.10 pre, then ansible-base, then Ansible 2.9.10 again.

The fix was as @jamesmarshall24 and @NicoWde stated:

1. pip3 uninstall ansible
2. rm -rf /usr/local/lib/python3.7/site-packages/ansible (things that weren't automatically removed)
3. pip3 install ansible

Good job !