protractor hangs indefinitely on "[launcher] Running 1 instances of WebDriver" - when running with xvfb

[borisdiakur]

At first glance this issue seems to be related with #1764 but I don't see how a network issue can cause the hanging here (directConnect is set to true). So here is the setup:

protractor-config.js

'use strict';

/* globals jasmine, browser */
exports.config = {
    allScriptsTimeout: 300000, // 5 min

    // Spec patterns are relative to this directory.
    specs: [
        'protractor/*.js'
    ],

    capabilities: {
        'browserName': 'chrome',
        version: '',
        platform: 'ANY'
    },

    directConnect: true,

    baseUrl: 'http://localhost:3000/', // gets overwritten

    troubleshoot: true,

    framework: 'jasmine',
    onPrepare: function beforeProtractorRuns() {
        browser.driver.manage().window().setSize(1280, 1024);

        // Disable animations so e2e tests run more quickly
        var disableNgAnimate = function () {
            angular.module('disableNgAnimate', []).run([
                '$animate',
                function ($animate) {
                    $animate.enabled(false);
                }
            ]);
        };
        browser.addMockModule('disableNgAnimate', disableNgAnimate);

        // see: https://github.com/angular/protractor/issues/60
        require('jasmine-reporters');
        var capsPromise = browser.getCapabilities();
        capsPromise.then(function setOutputDir(caps) {
            var browserName = caps.caps_.browserName.toUpperCase();
            var browserVersion = caps.caps_.version;
            var filePrefix = browserName + '-' + browserVersion + '-';
            jasmine.getEnv().addReporter(
                new jasmine.JUnitXmlReporter(
                    'build/reports/testresults',
                    true, //consolidate: save nested describes within the same file as their parent
                    true, //useDotNotation: separate suite names with dots rather than spaces (ie "Class.init" not "Class init")
                    filePrefix
                )
            );
        });
    },

    jasmineNodeOpts: {
        isVerbose: true,
        showColors: true,
        includeStackTrace: true,
        defaultTimeoutInterval: 300000, // 5 min
    }
};

Here is an extract of the essential parts of the Jenkins Job console log:

⋮
13:28:22 DEBUG - Running with --troubleshoot
13:28:22 DEBUG - Protractor version: 2.1.0
13:28:22 DEBUG - Your base url for tests is http://localhost:57505/
13:28:22 Using ChromeDriver directly...
13:28:22 [launcher] Running 1 instances of WebDriver
13:28:22 DEBUG - WebDriver session successfully started with capabilities { caps_: 
13:28:22    { acceptSslCerts: true,
13:28:22      applicationCacheEnabled: false,
13:28:22      browserConnectionEnabled: false,
13:28:22      browserName: 'chrome',
13:28:22      chrome: { userDataDir: '/tmp/.com.google.Chrome.AuA2qr' },
13:28:22      cssSelectorsEnabled: true,
13:28:22      databaseEnabled: false,
13:28:22      handlesAlerts: true,
13:28:22      javascriptEnabled: true,
13:28:22      locationContextEnabled: true,
13:28:22      mobileEmulationEnabled: false,
13:28:22      nativeEvents: true,
13:28:22      platform: 'Linux',
13:28:22      rotatable: false,
13:28:22      takesHeapSnapshot: true,
13:28:22      takesScreenshot: true,
13:28:22      version: '44.0.2403.125',
13:28:22      webStorageEnabled: true } }
13:28:30 Testing foobar
13:28:30   Setup
13:28:30     should display foobar - pass
⋮                                                   <--- more describe-s and it-s
13:28:35 Finished in 12.616 seconds
13:28:35 2 tests, 9 assertions, 0 failures
13:28:35 
13:28:35 [launcher] 0 instance(s) of WebDriver still running
13:28:35 [launcher] chrome #1 passed
⋮                                                   <--- other tests scenarios also run successfully
13:28:47 DEBUG - Running with --troubleshoot
13:28:47 DEBUG - Protractor version: 2.1.0
13:28:47 DEBUG - Your base url for tests is http://localhost:34976/
13:28:47 Using ChromeDriver directly...
13:28:47 [launcher] Running 1 instances of WebDriver <--- hanging from here,
                                                          can't figure out why,
                                                          wish I had logs : [
15:05:23 Xvfb stopping                               <--- canceled build manually,
                                                          see time difference, no timeouts triggered,
                                                          neither from Protractor nor from WebDriver : [
15:05:23 Build has been canceled

Note that it is not always the same tests scenario which leads to the hanging.
Same problems with node 0.10.33 as with 0.12.7.
Using Ubuntu 12.04.5 LTS (GNU/Linux 3.13.0-37-generic x86_64).

$ file /opt/google/chrome/chrome
/opt/google/chrome/chrome: ELF 64-bit LSB shared object, x86-64, version 1 (SYSV), dynamically linked (uses shared libs), for GNU/Linux 2.6.26, BuildID[sha1]=0xe4fc0257b42110fc269782274f1e774718135349, stripped

[dseravalli]

I opened that other issue. In my case, I was running protractor inside of Vagrant and had port 4444 forwarded in my Vagrantfile. protractor silently failed/hung in this scenario

[caninemwenja]

I had the same issue but it got fixed when I ran webdriver-manager start in the foreground ie

webdriver-manager start &
protractor conf.js #hangs

but

webdriver-manager start
protractor conf.js #works

[caninemwenja]

Oddly both styles seem to work now. I'm not sure but I think the nature of the tests may also determine whether protractor hangs or not. I had a test that was infinitely trying to reach a nonexistent location because I hadn't set the baseUrl. Protractor showed the same symptoms.

[PaddyMann]

I'm getting hanging behaviour, running tests with sharding on Codeship CI.

I run the same tests with Firefox and Chrome - I've split these into 2 separate config files but other than the browser setting they're the same.

The process sometimes hangs at the end of the Chrome file, and sometimes at the end of the Firefox one (and, if I'm very lucky, sometimes doesn't hang :))

Consistently seems to be "1 instances" left running (rather than 2 or more).

It's run as a foreground process so no help from @caninemwenja 's comment...

[Callmenorm]

I've got a similar issue, where it hangs at

Using ChromeDirver directly...
[launcher] Running 1 instances of WebDriver

about 50% of the time. It will hang there indefinitely. However, even if it hangs you can start other instances which may or may not succeed in the same manner.

[PaddyMann]

I've experienced the issue both with and without directConnect so that's not part of the issue

[Callmenorm]

Yeah, I've just confirmed that the same things happens with directConnect and standalone selenium.

[jrust]

Also seeing the problem, but only on our Ubuntu build servers. Haven't seen the issue yet on the Windows servers. Using Google Chrome 44.0.2403.130 and ChromeDriver 2.15.322448.

[Callmenorm]

I don't know how significant it is, but its also our Ubuntu build servers which are affected. We have fedora, ubuntu, and OSX systems, but its only the Ubuntu servers which hang at the ChromeDriver start up.

[caninemwenja]

Ubuntu for me too. Using Chromium 43.0.2357.130 and ChromeDriver 2.16. It works now though (with no apparent change).

[PaddyMann]

We're on Ubuntu too (- using Codeship and their servers are based on Ubuntu Trusty)

[borisdiakur]

We're on Ubuntu as well (updated issue description with system information "Ubuntu 12.04.5 LTS (GNU/Linux 3.13.0-37-generic x86_64)").

[Callmenorm]

The ubuntu servers also use Xvfb (X Virtual Frame Buffer) to use the browser without a window manager.

[NickTomlin]

Interesting; i've experienced some weird hang ups on Debian (wheezy) when using Xvfb. They seemed to be due to the browser not being able to attach to the headless display. Is everyone here attempting to run things via Xvfb?