Synopsis

Here are some recommendations for debugging the workflows and individual stages compiled and run with dxCompiler on the DNAnexus platform.

Debugging workflow stages

General approach follows a similar strategy as the debugging of any job on the platform. Consult the official DNAnexus documentation on the matter. Below is a step-by-step guide:

Use case: debug a stage (job)

1. Find the job which failed. Use platform UI (View Failure Cause button) or write a program to parse the execution tree.
2. Run the stage by cloning the failed job:

dx run --clone job-xxxx --priority=high -y --debug-on All --ssh

A new job-yyyy will start and with an attempt to login to the worker. If an attempt fails, ssh directly to the job-yyyy

dx ssh job-yyyy

3. Inside the running job, if you expect the job to succeed, but still want to debug it:

sudo touch /.dx-hold

However, if the job successfully finished, it gets to the terminated state without an option to get access to the worker.

4. To restart whatever processing was done in the container if it already finished, first switch to the root user while preserving job environment:

sudo -E bash

5. The job script (from the command section of the workflow task/process) is located in /home/dnanexus/meta/commandScript for debugging. Add a delay to this script (e.g. sleep 3600) if the containerized execution inside this script finishes too quickly to debug. Then invoke the job script:

/home/dnanexus/meta/containerRunScript

6. If Docker is used as an execution environment in your task, you can debug inside the Docker container while it's running, by using GNU screens:
   • create a new screen by pressing Ctrl a followed by c
   • in the new screen:

   sudo -E bash
   docker exec -it $(docker ps -q | head -n1) /bin/bash