file: force_unlink and manage_link_source don't work

[jaymzh]

Description

setup the test:

echo 'foo' > /tmp/foo
ln -s /tmp/foo /tmp/link

Sample recipe:

$ cat /tmp/test.rb
file '/tmp/link' do
  force_unlink true
  content 'fuckidy'
end

Try it:

[phild@dev8344 tmp]$ chef-apply /tmp/test.rb
Recipe: (chef-apply cookbook)::(chef-apply recipe)
  * file[/tmp/link] action create[2016-06-03T06:27:18-07:00] WARN: File /tmp/link managed by file[/tmp/link] is really a symlink. Managing the source file instead.
[2016-06-03T06:27:18-07:00] WARN: Disable this warning by setting `manage_symlink_source true` on the resource
[2016-06-03T06:27:18-07:00] WARN: In a future Chef release, 'manage_symlink_source' will not be enabled by default

    - update content in file /tmp/link from b5bb9d to 2f7925
    --- /tmp/link   2016-06-03 06:26:47.705361719 -0700
    +++ /tmp/.link20160603-2039507-1qjlpa5  2016-06-03 06:27:18.526023383 -0700
    @@ -1,2 +1,2 @@
    -foo
    +fuckidy
    - restore selinux security context

What did it do?

$ ls -l /tmp/link
lrwxrwxrwx. 1 phild users 8 Jun  3 06:25 /tmp/link -> /tmp/foo

Nope still a link. OK, so what about if we tell it to manage symlink sources while we're at it?

$ cat /tmp/test.rb 
file '/tmp/link' do
  force_unlink true
  manage_symlink_source true
  content 'fuckidy'
end
$ chef-apply /tmp/test.rb
Recipe: (chef-apply cookbook)::(chef-apply recipe)
  * file[/tmp/link] action create
    - update content in file /tmp/link from b5bb9d to 2f7925
    --- /tmp/link   2016-06-03 06:29:10.992437914 -0700
    +++ /tmp/.link20160603-2044816-v4dg9o   2016-06-03 06:29:17.541578521 -0700
    @@ -1,2 +1,2 @@
    -foo
    +fuckidy
    - restore selinux security context

did that do it?

[phild@dev8344 tmp]$ ls -l /tmp/link
lrwxrwxrwx. 1 phild users 8 Jun  3 06:25 /tmp/link -> /tmp/foo

Nope.

Chef Version

12.6.0

Platform Version

CentOS 6 and 7

Replication Case

see above

Client Output

See above.

[jakauppila]

I was running into this as well but found that if I configure both force_unlink true and manage_symlink_source false it would actually unlink the target file.

With only force_unlink true it was modifying the source file itself.

[jakauppila]

Just wanted to leave a note that I am still running into this on 16.9.17

[liaden]

I once uninstalled ruby from all our VMs by accident with this bug, and the only reason it didn't cause an outage was because we hadn't attempted to restart any processes yet.

I tried to have it unlink a symlink and then create a file in its place to do some magic. It didn't unlink, and then it overwrote the linked file.

[jaymzh]

@johnmccrae - are you sure this is fixed?