Jenkins does not start on macOS 10.12 (Sierra)

Question

After upgrading my macOS to Sierra, when I start Jenkins using launchctl load I cannot connect to localhost:8080. If I call launchctl load again, I see response "service already loaded". There is no log file at the default location /var/log/jenkins/ (as set in jenkins-ci.plist). I also tried to create jenkins.log there and chown to jenkins user, but still nothing is printed there.

If I try to start Jenkins using java -jar jenkins.war, I can connect to localhost, but Jenkins runs as a new installation.

I have the latest JRE 1.8.0_102 installed.

How to diagnose the problem?

Answer 1

Seems that Sierra changed the permission of Jenkis folder. So the best solution is:
1. Add execute permissions to org.jenkins-ci.plist:
sudo chmod +x /Library/LaunchDaemons/org.jenkins-ci.plist
2. Set jenkins as the owner of /var/log/jenkins:
sudo chown jenkins /var/log/jenkins
3. Start Jenkins:
sudo launchctl load /Library/LaunchDaemons/org.jenkins-ci.plist

Answer 2

This happened to me when I upgraded to Sierra and I managed to solve it with the answer from @mac.slusarek . But it happened again recently. This time I had allowed a minor update of the OS and I had also been playing around with SDK Man to switch JDK's. Not sure which one broke my Jenkins but this time around it was not a permissions issue.

I noticed from the logs Jenkins was trying to run on Java 9-ea, which is apparently not supported yet. I had installed Jenkins using the Jenkins installer for Mac, so tried uninstalling:

/Library/Application\ Support/Jenkins/Uninstall.command

and installing again but the issue didn't go away.

Then I found this article suggesting to instead install it using Homebrew. It was as easy as running:

$brew install jenkins

Since I only run it locally for development I don't need to start it as a daemon, so now I just run it by typing

$jenkins

Problem solved. I hope this helps others.

Answer 3

I fixed it by setting the appropriate JAVA_HOME variable. The way I diagnosed it was to look at the errors that were thrown as Jenkins was trying to run:

tail -f /var/log/jenkins/jenkins.log

Then I tried to run it:

sudo launchctl load -w /Library/LaunchDaemons/org.jenkins-ci.plist

If it says it's already loaded, unload it first:

sudo launchctl unload /Library/LaunchDaemons/org.jenkins-ci.plist

Then run it:

sudo launchctl load -w /Library/LaunchDaemons/org.jenkins-ci.plist

The error I saw was that Jenkins needed Java 8, not Java 10. So I unloaded:

sudo launchctl unload /Library/LaunchDaemons/org.jenkins-ci.plist

and then installed Java 8. Then I edited the plist file:

sudo nano /Library/LaunchDaemons/org.jenkins-ci.plist

and added the appropriate JAVA_HOME environment variable:

<dict>
   <key>JENKINS_HOME</key>
   <string>/Users/Shared/Jenkins/Home</string>
   <key>JAVA_HOME</key>
   <string>/Library/Java/JavaVirtualMachines/jdk1.8.0_161.jdk/Contents/Home</string>
</dict>

Finally, I tried the launchctl command again:

sudo launchctl load -w /Library/LaunchDaemons/org.jenkins-ci.plist

and voilà!