ReleaseEngineering/TryServer

Try Server

The try server is an easy way to test a patch without actually checking the patch into the core repository. Your code will go through the same tests as a mozilla-central push, and you'll be able to download builds if you wish.

Getting access to the Try Server

To use the try server, you'll need Level 1 Commit Access. You can learn more about Mozilla's commit access policies and start the process of signing up for an account here: Becoming a Mozilla Contributor

After you have level 1 commit access, you'll need to do a bit of setup before you'll be able to push. See this guide for instructions. Assuming you only have level 1 access, you won't be able to push to mozilla-central, but you can replace 'hg.mozilla.org/mozilla-central' with 'hg.mozilla.org/try'.

Configuration

Before using try, there is some recommended configuration you should set up. This can be accomplished by running:

$ ./mach mercurial-setup

Be sure to at least enable the firefoxtree extension and the push-to-try extension. The push-to-try extension is required if you wish to use the |mach try| command (see below). Firefoxtree will give you a handy 'try' alias you can use for pushing, and prevent you from accidentally pushing multiple heads. If for some reason you prefer not to use firefoxtree, you can set the same alias up manually in your hgrc:

[paths]
try = ssh://hg.mozilla.org/try

Note: Never pull from try. You'll end up with hundreds of heads containing everyone's half baked and broken pushes.

For more information, see mercurial for mozillians.

How to push to try

There are two ways to schedule jobs on try. You can either push like normal, and select which jobs you want using treeherder, or you can specify a try syntax in your commit message to schedule jobs automatically.

Scheduling jobs with Treeherder

Note: This method won't work if the pushes are more than a week old. If this is a problem, please file a bug under Treeherder.

Note: The "Add New Jobs" feature doesn't show TaskCluster jobs for non-try pushes. See bug 1286813

With this method, just push to try like you would to inbound (don't create any try syntax):

$ hg push -r . try

You should see a warning about no jobs being scheduled automatically, followed by a link to your push in treeherder. Open the link, select the drop-down arrow at the top right, and choose "Add new Jobs". It might take upto 6 seconds for the jobs to load (bug 1288028) :

Click the job symbols you wish to schedule. If you select a test job, the required build will automatically be scheduled:

Finally, click "Trigger New Jobs" near the top right of your push.

NOTE: The outcome of your request will show up as a 'Sch' job ("Scheduling" request) or as an 'A' ("Action Task") job depending if you requested Buildbot (old CI) or TaskCluster (new CI) jobs. Blog post. In the logs you can see the outcome of your request. If there are any issues you will be able to file it with that information. A failed 'Sch' or 'A' job would mean "Add New Jobs" has failed.

Scheduling jobs with Try Syntax

If you know exactly what you want to run, you can use Build:TryChooser to select which jobs run directly in your commit message. Make sure the commit message containing try syntax is placed in your topmost commit. The TryChooser web page can help you build a commit message for custom requests. It will generate both a syntax string as well as a mach command you can simply paste into your terminal.

Using mach

The recommended way to push with a try syntax, is to use |mach try|. It works with both mercurial and git, and you can use the TryChooser web page to generate the command. For example:

$ mach try -b o -p linux -u mochitest-1 -t none

The |mach try| command also has some advanced features. It can actually change how the job gets run within automation. For example, to run only mochitests under 'dom/indexedDB':

$ mach try -b o -p linux -u mochitests --and dom/indexedDB

For more information see:

$ mach try --help

Note: This method doesn't work well with mq.

Using the Trychooser Extension

You can also use the mercurial trychooser extension from sfink. It has some neat features, like a curses ui that lets you graphically choose a try syntax. Though bug 1197868 tracks implementing this feature in |mach try|. Eventually trychooser will be deprecated in favor of |mach try|.

Using mq

The aforementioned tools may not play all that nicely with mercurial queues. If you use mq, you can still push to try manually. First build your try syntax with the TryChooser web page. Then run:

$ hg qref --message "try: <your-computed-syntax-here>"
$ hg push -f try

Viewing the results

You can see the results of your tryserver build in a number of ways:

• You'll get an email on a successful push with a link to treeherder for your revision as well as optional emails on any non-successful build/test/talos results (this setting can be adjusted using Build:TryChooser args for email notification)
• You can have the results of your try run posted to bug(s) automatically at the completion of the run using the --post-to-bugzilla flag in your try syntax (see: Build:TryChooser for examples)
• The link to treeherder will be printed on the command line.
• Look for your changeset on Treeherder. You can add &author=YOUR.EMAIL to only see your pushes.
• Download your completed builds from firefox/tryserver-builds on ftp.m.o.

Using a custom mozconfig

The mozconfigs for recent mozilla-central clones are located in the browser/config/mozconfigs directory. Edit those as you please.

If you want to apply the same mozconfig changes to multiple platforms, you can edit build/mozconfig.common.override instead. This file is included at the end of each of the in-tree mozconfig files.

Android mozconfigs are in mobile/android/config/mozconfigs.

Note:

• TryServer purpose is to tell what will happen on Tinderbox, not to check every possible build option/configuration.
  • Any non-standard feature is implicitly unsupported. You may try them, but don't complain if they break.

Getting debug symbols

By default native debug symbols are not uploaded for Try server builds because of their size. If you want to debug your builds locally you must add MOZ_CRASHREPORTER_UPLOAD_FULL_SYMBOLS=1 to the in-tree mozconfigs. You can do this for all platforms by importing this patch into your mq and pushing it along with your changes to Try. This will cause a ...crashreporter-symbols-full.zip package to be uploaded to the builds directory for each platform built.

Adding new jobs

It's possible to create new jobs (or modify existing ones) directly *in* your try push, provided you use taskcluster. Just edit the relevant configuration in testing/taskcluster. For more information on creating jobs, see the taskcluster docs.

Desktop l10n jobs

You can use the steps in Scheduling jobs with Treeherder to add localized desktop builds to your try push, regardless of whether you used try syntax at first. Filtering with 'l10n' helps to find the jobs amongst the many possibilities.

The jobs can be customized by modifying files prior to pushing:

• reducing the number of locales by limiting browser/locales/all-locales (eg top-locales like de fr ja ja-JP-mac ru zh-TW). Leaving a full list of locales is likely to hit a timeout on Mac and Windows
• use a different en-US build by modifying en_us_binary_url, but note that the building en-US and then l10n in one push is not a tested scenario
• use the Aurora l10n repos by modifying hg_l10n_base

The resulting builds are uploaded to the same sub-directory as en-US builds, eg try-linux/ for 32bit linux.

Server Status

• Pending builds by revision are at https://secure.pub.build.mozilla.org/buildapi/pending
• In-progress builds by revision are are https://secure.pub.build.mozilla.org/buildapi/running

Other Notes

• Finished builds will live in http://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/mozilla.org/firefox/try-builds/<your_ldap_email>-<revision> for 14 days before deletion
• Treeherder data is purged after 4 months.
• If you have any problems please file a bug

• Suggestions for the future can be made here or file a blocking bug against bug try_enhancements

Other Mozilla Try Servers

• Thunderbird Try Server for the comm-central repository

Problem Diagnosis

Can not access try server

Test your account & configuration

• ssh hg.mozilla.org, response: "No Interactive shells allowed here!"
• ssh hg.mozilla.org clone invalid_sandbox, response: menu display and interactive prompting.

Pushes to try take a very long time

Note: if a fellow developer cancelled their try push, they have saddled you with the cost of rebuilding the cache. (See caching details.)

If you're experiencing excessive wait times (> 45min) pushing to try, please file a bug asking IT to reset the try repository using this template (please include specifics of your experience). They will coordinate with sheriffs and release engineering as needed.

Waiting for Lock

If you get a message similar to:

   remote: waiting for lock on repository /repo/hg/mozilla/try/ held by 'hgssh1.dmz.scl3.mozilla.com:23974'
   remote: abort: repository /repo/hg/mozilla/try/: timed out waiting for lock held by hgssh1.dmz.scl3.mozilla.com:30549

It means several developers are trying to push to try at the same time. In the case above, nothing appears to be wrong, as the PID changes between the messages.

Waiting for Lock multiple times with the same pid

Similar to the above case, but with the same pid when you retry over and over again.

Please retry your push. If you see messages indicating the same process has been pushing for more than 15 minutes, treat as above.

Buildduty issues

How do I trigger additional talos/test runs for a given try build?

If your trychooser syntax included the tests you'd like more of, then select the job you want on Treeherder and use the + button. For test suites you didn't request originally you can use the "Add New Jobs" interface in Treeherder.

How do I cancel existing jobs?

For individual jobs, select the relevant one on Treeherder and use the cancel button. To cancel all jobs, use the menu arrow shown on the header row for each push, and then the "Cancel all" option.

TryChooser

See the TryChooser wiki page.

See Also

• https://developer.mozilla.org/en/Creating_Mercurial_User_Repositories
• http://trychooser.pub.build.mozilla.org/
• https://wiki.mozilla.org/Sheriffing/How:To:Recommended_Try_Practices
• https://wiki.mozilla.org/Build:TryChooser
• https://wiki.mozilla.org/ReleaseEngineering:Autoland
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