[DRE-maint] Bug#973741: gitlab: Yarn hasn't been able to find a cache folder it can use

[Pirate Praveen]

Control: reassign -1 node-yarnpkg
Control: affects -1 gitlab

On Wed, 4 Nov 2020 12:22:30 +0200 Dragos Jarca 
<dragos.jarca at dynamicpuzzle.ro> wrote:
 > Dear Maintainer,
 >
 > Upgrade to 13.3.8.1 failed:
 >
 > Installing node modules...
 > + runuser -u gitlab -- sh -c install -d /var/lib/gitlab/.node_modules
 > + runuser -u gitlab -- sh -c install -d /var/lib/gitlab/.cache
 > + runuser -u gitlab -- sh -c yarnpkg install
 > yarn install v1.22.4
 > warning Skipping preferred cache folder "/var/lib/gitlab/.cache/yarn"
 > because it is not writable.
 > warning Skipping preferred cache folder "/tmp/.yarn-cache-131" 
because
 > it is not writable.
 > warning Skipping preferred cache folder "/tmp/.yarn-cache" because 
it is
 > not writable.
 > error Yarn hasn't been able to find a cache folder it can use. Please
 > use the explicit --cache-folder option to tell it what location to 
use,
 > or make one of the preferred locations writable.
 > info Visit https://yarnpkg.com/en/docs/cli/install for documentation
 > about this command.
 > dpkg: error processing package gitlab (--configure):
 >   installed gitlab package post-installation script subprocess 
returned
 > error exit status 1
 > Processing triggers for man-db (2.9.3-2) ...
 > Errors were encountered while processing:
 >   gitlab
 > E: Sub-process /usr/bin/dpkg returned an error code (1)
 >
 > The problem is related to
 > https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=972952 - yarnpkg 
isn't
 > compatible with recent node-mkdirp and
 > https://github.com/yarnpkg/yarn/issues/8417 - mkdirp module is 
obsolete
 > #8417.
 >
 > Please help to find a solution.

As you already found out, the problem is in node-yarnpkg. The fix is a 
bit hard though as node-yarnpkg currently ftbfs due to babel 7 
transition.

A work around could be to install yarnpkg via npm. npm install -g yarn 
and replace the yarnpkg command.