Install of PhantomJS fails on CI quite often lately

[diraulo]

Lately, we've experienced lots of build failure as a result of PhantomJS failing to install.

Semaphore already supports PhantomJS. We just need to specify which version to use.
https://semaphoreci.com/docs/phantomjs.html

I understand that in order to simplify install process for new devs on the project, we added the phantomjs gem which then downloads and install PhantomJS on the system. How about removing that and updating docs with instructions to install PhantomJS manually? It's not convenient to have to restart the build on CI every time because of that.

[diraulo]

Phantomjs does not appear to be installed in /home/runner/.phantomjs/2.1.1/x86_64-linux/bin/phantomjs, installing!
  % Total    % Received % Xferd  Average Speed   Time    Time     Time  Current
                                 Dload  Upload   Total   Spent    Left  Speed

  0     0    0     0    0     0      0      0 --:--:-- --:--:-- --:--:--     0
  0     0    0     0    0     0      0      0 --:--:-- --:--:-- --:--:--     0
  0     0    0     0    0     0      0      0 --:--:-- --:--:-- --:--:--     0

  0     0    0   333    0     0    440      0 --:--:-- --:--:-- --:--:--   440
bunzip2: phantomjs-2.1.1-linux-x86_64.tar.bz2 is not a bzip2 file.
tar: phantomjs-2.1.1-linux-x86_64.tar: Cannot open: No such file or directory
tar: Error is not recoverable: exiting now
rake aborted!
Bundler::GemRequireError: There was an error while trying to load the gem 'phantomjs/poltergeist'.
/home/runner/WebsiteOne/config/application.rb:7:in `<top (required)>'
/home/runner/WebsiteOne/Rakefile:4:in `require'
/home/runner/WebsiteOne/Rakefile:4:in `<top (required)>'
TypeError: no implicit conversion of nil into String
/home/runner/WebsiteOne/vendor/bundle/ruby/2.3.0/gems/phantomjs-2.1.1.0/lib/phantomjs/platform.rb:72:in `block in install!'
/home/runner/WebsiteOne/vendor/bundle/ruby/2.3.0/gems/phantomjs-2.1.1.0/lib/phantomjs/platform.rb:53:in `chdir'
/home/runner/WebsiteOne/vendor/bundle/ruby/2.3.0/gems/phantomjs-2.1.1.0/lib/phantomjs/platform.rb:53:in `install!'
/home/runner/WebsiteOne/vendor/bundle/ruby/2.3.0/gems/phantomjs-2.1.1.0/lib/phantomjs/platform.rb:86:in `ensure_installed!'
/home/runner/WebsiteOne/vendor/bundle/ruby/2.3.0/gems/phantomjs-2.1.1.0/lib/phantomjs.rb:30:in `platform'
/home/runner/WebsiteOne/vendor/bundle/ruby/2.3.0/gems/phantomjs-2.1.1.0/lib/phantomjs.rb:25:in `path'
/home/runner/WebsiteOne/vendor/bundle/ruby/2.3.0/gems/phantomjs-2.1.1.0/lib/phantomjs/poltergeist.rb:10:in `<top (required)>'
/home/runner/WebsiteOne/config/application.rb:7:in `<top (required)>'
/home/runner/WebsiteOne/Rakefile:4:in `require'
/home/runner/WebsiteOne/Rakefile:4:in `<top (required)>'
(See full trace by running task with --trace)

[tansaku]

this is a real pain - would be good to have a comprehensive solution

[tansaku]

let's try removing the gem and see what happens ...

[tansaku]

@diraulo rather than immediately pulling out the gem I've investigated if others have encountered the issue, and it seems they have - I've also open a support ticket with Semaphore:

we're having occasional trouble with what seems like a faulty download? #1103

it all works fine on a second or third try - I'm guessing that maybe the download of phantomjs-2.1.1-linux-x86_64.tar.bz2 is failing - we're looking at alternatives to the gem that requires this download, but is there anything about sempahore we could change to help?

[tansaku]

they just replied:

Thanks for getting in touch!

As Semaphore platform has PhantomJS 2.1.1 included, I would like to suggest adding the following command to the setup thread
change-phantomjs-version 2.1.1
because the default PhantomJS version is 1.9.8.
Afterwards, please expire project's dependency cache by visiting the Admin tab in the Project Settings [Expire Dependency Cache].

Let me know how things go!

[tansaku]

I just changed like so:

[tansaku]

just moved that to first in the setup and ran a test build on develop, which worked - will re-run a few times to see if this addresses the issue

[tansaku]

@diraulo so this might be fixed then?