Cannot install Rails gem on vagrant virtual CentOS Machine using Chef-Solo

Question

I am trying to setup Rails environment on CentOS 6.3 64bit using Vagrant and Chef-Solo.

Rails cannot be installed when using chef, with error message,

Mixlib::ShellOut::CommandTimeout: rbenv_gem[rails] (main::default line 21) had an error: Mixlib::Shell
Out::CommandTimeout: command timed out:

How do I solve this?

env

• OS : Mac OS X 10.8.2
• Virtual Box : 4.2.12
• vagrant : 1.1.5
• chef : 11.4.0
• knife solo : 0.3.0

my steps

1.create vagrant VM

$ vagrant box add centos https://dl.dropbox.com/u/7225008/Vagrant/CentOS-6.3-x86_64-minimal.box`
$ vagrant init centos
$ vagrant up

2.create chef repository and install chef to VM

$ knife solo init chefrepo
$ knife solo prepare [email protected] # vagrant VMs IP

3.import public cookbook from OpsCode

$ knife cookbook site vendor rbenv 

this imports rbenv cookbook to chefrepo/cookbooks/rbenv

4.create my cookbook and modify default.rb

$ knife cookbook create main -o site-cookbooks
$ vi site-cookbooks/main/recipes/default.rb


include_recipe 'rbenv::default'
include_recipe 'rbenv::ruby_build'

rbenv_ruby "2.0.0-p0" do
  global true
end

rbenv_gem "rails" do
  ruby_version "2.0.0-p0"
end

5.cook

$ knife solo cook [email protected]

then gets error as follows.

# Declared in /home/vagrant/chef-solo/site-cookbooks/main/recipes/default.rb:21:in `from_file'

rbenv_gem("rails") do
  provider Chef::Provider::Package::RbenvRubygems
  action :install
  retries 0
  retry_delay 2
  cookbook_name :main
  recipe_name "default"
  ruby_version "2.0.0-p0"
  package_name "rails"
  gem_binary "/opt/rbenv/shims/gem"
  version "3.2.13"
end


[2013-04-17T12:00:13+02:00] ERROR: Running exception handlers
[2013-04-17T12:00:13+02:00] ERROR: Exception handlers complete
Chef Client failed. 0 resources updated
[2013-04-17T12:00:13+02:00] FATAL: Stacktrace dumped to /var/chef/cache/chef-stacktrace.out
[2013-04-17T12:00:13+02:00] FATAL: Mixlib::ShellOut::CommandTimeout: rbenv_gem[rails] (main::default line 21) had an error: Mixlib::Shell
Out::CommandTimeout: command timed out:
---- Begin output of /opt/rbenv/versions/2.0.0-p0/bin/gem install rails -q --no-rdoc --no-ri -v "3.2.13" ----
STDOUT: 
STDERR: 
---- End output of /opt/rbenv/versions/2.0.0-p0/bin/gem install rails -q --no-rdoc --no-ri -v "3.2.13" ----

ERROR: RuntimeError: chef-solo failed. See output above.

manual install

Rails can be installed by $ sudo gem install rails on VM. This takes about 20mins or more.

Answer 1

I'm not sure what your environment restrictions are, but one potential solution is to use a different operating system. I had a very similar problem with CentOS 6.3 and Vagrant a few weeks ago and spent literally days on it. Once I switched to Ubuntu it was like cutting hot butter.