Nightmare is simply not starting

[aaronik]

Similar to #1515, except their fix is not working for me.

I also tried npm cache clean --force, still to no avail.

uname -a
Linux hyperion 5.3.0-24-generic #26-Ubuntu SMP Thu Nov 14 01:33:18 UTC 2019 x86_64 x86_64 x86_64 GNU/Linux

node --version
v12.13.1

npm --version
6.13.2

The code I'm running is straight from the example:

const Nightmare = require('nightmare')
const nightmare = Nightmare({ show: true })

nightmare
  .goto('https://duckduckgo.com')
  .type('#search_form_input_homepage', 'github nightmare')
  .click('#search_button_homepage')
  .wait('#r1-0 a.result__a')
  .evaluate(() => document.querySelector('#r1-0 a.result__a').href)
  .end()
  .then(console.log)
  .catch(error => {
    console.error('Search failed:', error)
  })

My package.json:

{
...
  "dependencies": {
    "nightmare": "^3.0.2"
  }
}

I'd copy the output of what I've run but there simply is none. The command node index.js instantly finishes with no output and no error code. (echo $? returns 0)

[aaronik]

Aha, I discovered the debug flag, now the output is:

DEBUG=nightmare node index.js 
  nightmare queuing process start +0ms
  nightmare queueing action "goto" for https://duckduckgo.com +1ms
  nightmare queueing action "type" +0ms
  nightmare queueing action "click" +0ms
  nightmare queueing action "wait" +0ms
  nightmare queueing action "evaluate" +0ms
  nightmare running +0ms
  nightmare electron child process exited with code 127: command not found - you may not have electron installed correctly +7ms
  nightmare electron child process not started yet, skipping kill. +1ms

which is pretty clearly saying that electron is not installed. However I do have nightmare installed, as the docs suggested, so I thought electron was supposed to come with it. The process really should at least return an error code, if not a helpful message, when this happens.

I'm still stuck though, because I don't know how to get electron installed correctly. Can you help? Thanks!

[ethanfrey]

I had the same issue (on ubuntu 18.04). I think I got a step closer...

Running yarn run electron got me:

electron: error while loading shared libraries: libgconf-2.so.4: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory
error Command failed with exit code 127.

I then tried:

sudo apt -y install libgconf2-4

and now electron starts up fine, and I can run some scripts. Running tests (copied from the homepage) still hangs for me somehow (but at least it hangs after "run", without an electron error).

Hope this helps.

[ethanfrey]

Ahh... also found the selector is off in the sample test. Try:

.click('#search_form_homepage_top .js-search-button')

Then everything worked

[aaronik]

Seems like there are many hidden steps required to even get this running. I've decided to go with nightwatch.js for my testing needs since this library seems pretty rickety.