ramdisk throws "no such file or directory, symlink ..." if webpack `output.path` is specified

[agilgur5]

Not sure if this is an upstream issue in webpack-plugin-ramdisk or an issue here.

• Webpack Version: 4.9.1
• Operating System (or Browser): macOS High Sierra 10.13.6
• Node Version: 10.16.0
• webpack-plugin-serve Version: 0.12.0

How Do We Reproduce?

Literally just setting ramdisk: true

Expected Behavior

Builds and serves content same as when ramdisk isn't set, but faster (and not output to disk).

Actual Behavior

⬡ wps: Ramdisk enabled
⬡ webpack-plugin-ramdisk: Build being written to /Volumes/wps/49d4ada5043fbb2f01d098d183664fc2/build
...

Error: ENOENT: no such file or directory, symlink '/Volumes/wps/49d4ada5043fbb2f01d098d183664fc2/build' -> '/path-to-my-project-dir/build/'
    at symlinkSync (fs.js:909:3)
    at WebpackPluginServe.init (/path-to-my-project-dir/node_modules/webpack-plugin-serve/lib/plugins/ramdisk.js:83:5)
    ...

It does delete the build directory before it errors out.
ls /Volumes/wps/ shows nothing, ls -a shows a .fseventsd directory.

[shellscape]

Thanks for the issue 🍺

(Your webpack versions is super out of date. Would highly recommend updating if you're able, there have been a lot of performance improvements)

Well this one is damn peculiar. Would you have the time to clone webpack-plugin-ramdisk, npm install && npm run test? That might reveal the root cause here. If the tests all pass on the ramdisk plugin then we'll know the problem exists with WPS here.

[agilgur5]

Thanks for the quick response @shellscape!

(Oh, I didn't even realize that, I've been waiting for v5 but didn't update minors ha. Been going through and doing major upgrades of all my devDeps (including webpack-serve -> webpack-plugin-serve), but didn't think to update webpack minors)

Sure, did that, tests all seem to pass, here's the output:

> webpack-plugin-ramdisk@0.1.3 pretest /Users/.../webpack-plugin-ramdisk
> del test/fixtures/multi/output test/fixtures/simple/output


> webpack-plugin-ramdisk@0.1.3 test /Users/.../webpack-plugin-ramdisk
> ava


⠦ ⬡ webpack-plugin-ramdisk: Initializing RAMdisk. You may be prompted for credentials
⠋ ⬡ webpack-plugin-ramdisk: Initializing RAMdisk. You may be prompted for credentials
⠧ multi › multi config
⠏ multi › multi config

  5 tests passed

Let me know if there's something else I should try.

[agilgur5]

I updated webpack to latest in particular because webpack-plugin-serve has a peerDep of webpack@^4.20.2 (and webpack-plugin-ramdisk of webpack@^4.20.0), but I'm still getting the same error, so it's not related to the older webpack@4 version.

[shellscape]

That's interesting. Thanks for going the extra mile there. I'll need to take a good look at the code to see if anything stands out that could be causing this problem. I might ask you to try a diagnostic branch or make some code edits on your end to get to the bottom of this. Stay tuned...

[shellscape]

@agilgur5 I can't find anything obvious that would be causing this to think it succeeded but actually fail. I'll add some more logging in a branch that you'll have to run. that might shed some light.

[shellscape]

@agilgur5 my apologies that it's taken me so long to get back to you on this. Life has a habit of throwing curveballs.

I've created a logging branch for you. To use it you'll have to do the following:

1. Update your webpack-plugin-serve dependency to point at the branch: "webpack-plugin-serve": "shellscape/webpack-plugin-serve#log/ramdisk",
2. Add the following to your WPS options: log: { level: 'debug' },

When you run your app, you should see log output similar to this:

⬡ wps: ramdisk → hasPlugin: false
⬡ wps: ramdisk → output path: /code/webpack/webpack-plugin-serve/test/fixtures/simple/output
⬡ wps: ramdisk → lastSegment: output
⬡ wps: ramdisk → newPath: a8b75d9b8487e31bfb91f9ee6e3ec66d/output
⬡ wps: ramdisk → compiler.options.output.path: a8b75d9b8487e31bfb91f9ee6e3ec66d/output
⬡ wps: Ramdisk enabled
⬡ webpack-plugin-ramdisk: Initializing RAMdisk. You may be prompted for credentials
⬡ webpack-plugin-ramdisk: Build being written to /Volumes/wps/a8b75d9b8487e31bfb91f9ee6e3ec66d/output
⬡ wps: ramdisk → symlink: /Volumes/wps/a8b75d9b8487e31bfb91f9ee6e3ec66d/output to /code/webpack/webpack-plugin-serve/test/fixtures/simple/output

Hopefully that will shed some light onto what's ailing your setup there.

[agilgur5]

Ok, I switched to the logging branch and added the debug level logging config. Got the same error, log below:

⬡ wps: ramdisk → hasPlugin: false
⬡ wps: ramdisk → output path: /path-to-my-project-dir/build/
⬡ wps: ramdisk → lastSegment: build
⬡ wps: ramdisk → newPath: 49d4ada5043fbb2f01d098d183664fc2/build
⬡ wps: ramdisk → compiler.options.output.path: 49d4ada5043fbb2f01d098d183664fc2/build
⬡ wps: Ramdisk enabled
⬡ webpack-plugin-ramdisk: Initializing RAMdisk. You may be prompted for credentials
⬡ webpack-plugin-ramdisk: Build being written to /Volumes/wps/49d4ada5043fbb2f01d098d183664fc2/build
⬡ wps: ramdisk → symlink: /Volumes/wps/49d4ada5043fbb2f01d098d183664fc2/build to /path-to-my-project-dir/build/
/path-to-my-project-dir/node_modules/webpack-cli/bin/cli.js:281
                                throw err;
                                ^

Error: ENOENT: no such file or directory, symlink '/Volumes/wps/49d4ada5043fbb2f01d098d183664fc2/build' -> '/path-to-my-project-dir/build/'
    at symlinkSync (fs.js:909:3)
    at WebpackPluginServe.init (/path-to-my-project-dir/node_modules/webpack-plugin-serve/lib/plugins/ramdisk.js:94:5)
    at WebpackPluginServe.hook (/path-to-my-project-dir/node_modules/webpack-plugin-serve/lib/index.js:177:25)
    at WebpackPluginServe.apply (/path-to-my-project-dir/node_modules/webpack-plugin-serve/lib/index.js:128:10)
    at webpack (/path-to-my-project-dir/node_modules/webpack/lib/webpack.js:51:13)
   ....

Also, I added a repro branch for this at https://github.com/agilgur5/front-end-base/tree/ramdisk-issues

my apologies that it's taken me so long to get back to you on this. Life has a habit of throwing curveballs.

Sure, sure, didn't expect an immediate response, I maintain some libraries too. Was more concerned that the comments I raised in #151 (comment) and the commit didn't get a response 😅

[shellscape]

Hrm, with that log output I really have no idea why that's not working on your side. The logs show that everything is aligned.

[agilgur5]

Hrm, with that log output I really have no idea why that's not working on your side. The logs show that everything is aligned.

Yea, I even tried clearing cache and fresh installing all node_modules but it still errors out the same way.

Any chance you can try the repro branch I linked above? npm install -> npm run build:hmr. maybe some issue with transitive deps or something?

[shellscape]

For sure, I totally missed that. I'll do that today.

[shellscape]

OK I went through your branch there. What I found was:

• wps+ramdisk is actually creating the RAMDisk at /Volumes/wps successfully
• It's not cleaning up after the first run because webpack exists with nonzero. So sudo umount /Volumes/wps should get rid of the volume
• It looks like webpack (not the cli, I tried nano to confirm) is having some kind of trouble creating the output directory, and I have no idea why.

I think you might have some kind of config that just doesn't mesh well with this. Unfortunately I don't have the time right now that I'd need in order to slowly reduce the branch's config to something more simple in order to identify the problem. You'll either have to start tearing away bits (I'd start with plugins) bit by bit to see what the issue is, or go in reverse and start with a basic, bare bones build (e.g. one js file) and slowly start adding complexity, to try and figure out what is causing the problem. From there we can source dive the offender and try to figure a workaround.

Edge cases are no fun.