install package error: npm-3.5.2 install of alarmFeed in alarm package gives ENOTDIR error

[hugy718]

Environment details:

local deployment on self-built kubernetes cluster
Kubernetes version: 1.23.3
ubuntu version: 20.04.4 LTS (kernel: Linux 5.13.0-51-generic)

Steps to reproduce the issue:

1. use the openwhisk-deploy-kube project provided helm charts to install openwhisk
2. all other pods are ok, but the owdev-install-packages keeps failing

I had labeled my node as invoker.

Provide the expected results and outputs:

owdev-install-packages pod has status Completed

Provide the actual results and outputs:

owdev-install-packages pod has status Completed

Additional information you deem important:

This happened last week when re-deploy openwhisk.
After doing some investigation, I found the problem is the npm package install for alarm package. I inspected the log of the failing pods and successfully reproduced issue by interactively launching the container. The owdev-install-package pod uses container image by openwhisk/tols/ow-utils/Dockerfile. The npm installed by apt has the version:

{ npm: '3.5.2',
  ares: '1.14.0',
  cldr: '32.0.1',
  http_parser: '2.7.1',
  icu: '60.2',
  modules: '57',
  nghttp2: '1.30.0',
  node: '8.10.0',
  openssl: '1.0.2n',
  tz: '2017c',
  unicode: '10.0',
  uv: '1.18.0',
  v8: '6.2.414.50',
  zlib: '1.2.11' }

Install fails for the openwhisk-deploy-kube/helm/openwhisk/configMapFiles/installPackages/myTask.sh at L104

#####
# Install the catalog for the Alarm provider
#####

if [ "$OW_INSTALL_ALARM_PROVIDER" == "yes" ]; then
    cd /
    git clone https://github.com/apache/openwhisk-package-alarms.git

    pushd /openwhisk-package-alarms
        git checkout $OW_GIT_TAG_OPENWHISK_PACKAGE_ALARMS
        ./installCatalog.sh $WHISK_AUTH $WHISK_API_HOST_URL $WHISK_API_HOST_URL worker0 $PROVIDER_DB_URL $ALARM_DB_PREFIX || exit 1
    popd
fi

Looking at the log of failed pod, problem is the npm install command at L95 in openwhisk-package-alarms/installCatalog.sh

cp -f alarmFeed_package.json package.json
npm install

The output:

alarmFeed@1.0.0 /openwhisk-package-alarms/action
├── @types/caseless@0.12.2  extraneous
├── @types/tough-cookie@4.0.2  extraneous
├── cloudant-follow@0.18.2  extraneous
├── errs@0.3.2  extraneous
├── form-data@2.5.1  extraneous
└─┬ needle@2.3.2 
  ├─┬ debug@3.2.7 
  │ └── ms@2.1.2 
  ├─┬ iconv-lite@0.4.24 
  │ └── safer-buffer@2.1.2 
  └── sax@1.2.4 

npm WARN alarmFeed@1.0.0 No description
npm WARN alarmFeed@1.0.0 No repository field.
npm WARN alarmFeed@1.0.0 No license field.
npm ERR! Linux 5.13.0-51-generic
npm ERR! argv "/usr/bin/node" "/usr/bin/npm" "install"
npm ERR! node v8.10.0
npm ERR! npm  v3.5.2
npm ERR! path /openwhisk-package-alarms/action/node_modules/.staging/@types/node-7154234c/package.json
npm ERR! code ENOTDIR
npm ERR! errno -20
npm ERR! syscall open

npm ERR! ENOTDIR: not a directory, open '/openwhisk-package-alarms/action/node_modules/.staging/@types/node-7154234c/package.json'
npm ERR! 
npm ERR! If you need help, you may report this error at:
npm ERR!     <https://github.com/npm/npm/issues>

npm ERR! Please include the following file with any support request:
npm ERR!     /openwhisk-package-alarms/action/npm-debug.log

That seems to be an issue of using old version of npm. A recent issue under npm/cli here also report their application suddenly broke last week.

[hugy718]

It can be fixed by using a newer version of npm in the docker image of ow-utils. Configuring the helm charts in openwhisk-deploy-kube to use the updated image, I have successfully deployed it as before.

[style95]

Thank you for reporting this.
Why don't you contribute the change to fix the issue as you already clearly analyzed the culprit?

[hugy718]

Thank you for reporting this. Why don't you contribute the change to fix the issue as you already clearly analyzed the culprit?

Sure. I'd love to :). Opened a PR here #5261. As for the contribution guideline, I have submitted signed Apache CLA, waiting for the reply.

[hugy718]

Update of image tags at openwhisk-deploy-kube helm charts has been merged.

[style95]

@hugy718 Nice! Thank you for your contribution.