Azure DevOps: .NET build fails on macOS 15.3 but succeeds on macOS 15.2 – what's changed?

[tmontagnoni]

We have Azure DevOps pipelines compiling a .NET 8 application for iOS and Android. Since the last macOS update (15.3), our pipelines are failing inconsistently—sometimes during the restore step and sometimes during the build step. Azure agents are on version 3.238.0

Here’s an example of the error we get when installing the iOS workload:

/xxxx/sds-azure-agent/agent/_work/_tool/dotnet/dotnet workload install ios
dotnet(55273,0x1edec4840) malloc: Unrecognized value for MallocDebugReport (1) - using 'stderr'
dotnet(55273) MallocStackLogging: could not tag MSL-related memory as no_footprint, so those pages will be included in process footprint - (null)
dotnet(55273) MallocStackLogging: stack logs being written to /private/tmp/stack-logs.55273.105074000.dotnet.8X77wI.index
dotnet(55273) MallocStackLogging: recording malloc and VM allocation stacks to disk using standard recorder
dotnet(55273,0x16b4db000) malloc: *** error for object 0x600003c0a0e0: pointer being freed was not allocated
dotnet(55273,0x16b4db000) malloc: *** set a breakpoint in malloc_error_break to debug
[1] 55273 abort /xxx/sds-azure-agent/agent/_work/_tool/dotnet/dotnet

We use the following task to install dotnet-sdk:

    - task: UseDotNet@2
      displayName: 'Configuration - Dotnet'
      inputs:
        version: '8.0.405'

This task works on both macOS versions, but we noticed that the workload version differs, which might be causing the issue.

On Macos 15.2 we have:

    .NET SDK:
     Version:           8.0.405
     Commit:            fb1830d421
     Workload version:  8.0.400-manifests.56b5f3fe
     MSBuild version:   17.11.9+a69bbaaf5

On Macos 15.3 we have:

    .NET SDK:
     Version:           8.0.405
     Commit:            fb1830d421
     Workload version:  8.0.400-manifests.c7afa696
     MSBuild version:   17.11.9+a69bbaaf5

An this is what we do during restore task for iOS apps:

    - task: CmdLine@2
      displayName: Project - Install workload
      inputs:
         script: |
            ulimit -n 65536
            dotnet workload uninstall ios
            dotnet workload install ios --from-rollback-file $(Build.SourcesDirectory)/workload-manifest.json 

For Android apps:

    - task: CmdLine@2
      displayName: Project - Install workload
      inputs:
         script: |
            ulimit -n 65536
            dotnet workload uninstall android
            dotnet workload install android --from-rollback-file $(Build.SourcesDirectory)/workload-manifest.json 

And our workload-manifest:

    {
      "microsoft.net.sdk.android": "34.0.145/8.0.100",
      "microsoft.net.sdk.ios": "18.0.8319/8.0.100"
    }

Does anyone have an idea what might be causing this issue? Could it be related to the workload version differences or a change in macOS 15.3?

Thank you! 🙏

[marcpopMSFT]

Since the error is coming from malloc, we assume this is coming from native code and so the host as we don't have native code in this code path in the SDK.

[elinor-fung]

Since the error is coming from malloc, we assume this is coming from native code and so the host as we don't have native code in this code path in the SDK.

It is more 'anywhere in the runtime or native libraries' than specifically the host. Unfortunately, the error message is not much to go on - somewhere in native code, a pointer is being incorrectly freed.

@tmontagnoni would it be possible to make the commands you are running in the pipeline enable core dumps and upload it if dotnet workload install ios crashes? Or some way to get at the stack log file mentioned in the output you shared?

[agocke]

Closing as stale. We can re-open with more info.