Operations center fails to load plugins or start after upgrade with 'Failed Loading plugin', due to plugin dependency on unsupported plugin

2 minute readKnowledge base

Issue

After upgrading your Operations center, it fails to load plugins, or fails to startup, and you see an error in the logs mentioning Failed Loading plugin ... Update required: Pipeline: Job.

One example of this kind of error is:

SEVERE  jenkins.InitReactorRunner$1#onTaskFailed: Failed Loading plugin Operations Center Context v2.222.0.3 (operations-center-context)
java.io.IOException: Failed to load: Operations Center Context (2.222.0.3)
 - Update required: Pipeline: Job (2.33) to be updated to 2.36 or higher
    at hudson.PluginWrapper.resolvePluginDependencies(PluginWrapper.java:933)
    at hudson.PluginManager$2$1$1.run(PluginManager.java:546)
    at org.jvnet.hudson.reactor.TaskGraphBuilder$TaskImpl.run(TaskGraphBuilder.java:169)
    at org.jvnet.hudson.reactor.Reactor.runTask(Reactor.java:296)
    at jenkins.model.Jenkins$5.runTask(Jenkins.java:1133)
    at org.jvnet.hudson.reactor.Reactor$2.run(Reactor.java:214)
    at org.jvnet.hudson.reactor.Reactor$Node.run(Reactor.java:117)
    at jenkins.security.ImpersonatingExecutorService$1.run(ImpersonatingExecutorService.java:59)
    at java.util.concurrent.ThreadPoolExecutor.runWorker(ThreadPoolExecutor.java:1149)
    at java.util.concurrent.ThreadPoolExecutor$Worker.run(ThreadPoolExecutor.java:624)
    at java.lang.Thread.run(Thread.java:748)

Resolution

This is caused by installing a plugin on the operations center that is not supported there, there is no updated version of that plugin bundled in the war file of the new product version, yet plugins from the war have optional dependencies on that plugin, which causes bundled plugin upgrade failures. Plugins that are known to causes this kind of issue are the Pipeline: Job (workflow-job) and Pipeline: Groovy (workflow-cps).

If you have Pipeline: Job (workflow-job) installed on your operations center, and think you may have Pipeline jobs you want to review and delete before you uninstall the plugin, you can run the following script under Manage Jenkins -> Script Console to list them:

import org.jenkinsci.plugins.workflow.job.*
Jenkins.getInstance().getAllItems(WorkflowJob.class).each() {println (it.getFullName())}

Next, remove the plugin (workflow-job is an example, you will need to review the error message you are encountering to determine which plugin is causing the issue) by either:

  1. If your operations center is still running, go to Manage Jenkins -> Manage Plugins -> Installed and uninstall Pipeline: Job

  2. If your operations center is failing to startup due to this issue, run the following command:

cd JENKINS_HOME/plugins
rm -rf workflow-job.jpi workflow-job.hpi workflow-job/

Then restart your operations center.

Tested product/plugin versions

CloudBees CI on modern cloud platforms - Operations Center upgrade from 2.222.2.1 to 2.289.2.3 (but upgrade problems can happen on other versions)