Starting a session fails due to user data directory

[JonathanWoollett-Light]

Describe the bug

A simple program attempting to connect to chromedriver fails to create a session.

This is following up from jonhoo/fantoccini#301 since it doesn't appear related to this library but rather a lower level issue.

To reproduce

I have a simple Rust project which creates this behaviour.

Download chrome and chromedriver with:

# Install prerequisites
sudo apt install unzip

# Install chrome headerless (normal chrome also works but is slower)
wget https://storage.googleapis.com/chrome-for-testing-public/139.0.7258.154/linux64/chrome-headless-shell-linux64.zip
unzip chrome-headless-shell-linux64.zip
sudo mv chrome-headless-shell-linux64/chrome-headless-shell /usr/local/bin/chrome
sudo chmod +x /usr/local/bin/chrome

# Install ChromeDriver
wget https://storage.googleapis.com/chrome-for-testing-public/139.0.7258.154/linux64/chromedriver-linux64.zip
unzip chromedriver-linux64.zip
sudo mv chromedriver-linux64/chromedriver /usr/local/bin/chromedriver
sudo chmod +x /usr/local/bin/chromedriver

Then make sure you have Rust installed.

Run cargo new --name hello-fantoccini to create a new project.

Update the below files to match the contents below.

main.rs:

use reqwest::Url;
use std::{
    net::{Ipv4Addr, SocketAddr, SocketAddrV4},
    time::Duration,
};

struct ChromeDriver(std::process::Child);
impl Drop for ChromeDriver {
    fn drop(&mut self) {
        self.0.kill().unwrap();
        self.0.wait().unwrap();
    }
}

#[tokio::main]
async fn main() {
    let status = std::process::Command::new("chrome")
        .arg("--version")
        .output()
        .unwrap();
    assert!(
        status.status.success(),
        "Missing chrome installation `chrome --version`: {status:?}"
    );
    println!(
        "chrome installed:\n\t{:?}\n\t{:?}",
        std::str::from_utf8(&status.stdout),
        std::str::from_utf8(&status.stderr)
    );

    let status = std::process::Command::new("chromedriver")
        .arg("--version")
        .output()
        .unwrap();
    assert!(
        status.status.success(),
        "Missing chromedriver installation `chromedriver --version`: {status:?}"
    );
    println!(
        "chromedriver installed:\n\t{:?}\n\t{:?}",
        std::str::from_utf8(&status.stdout),
        std::str::from_utf8(&status.stderr)
    );

    let chromedriver_port = 4470;
    let chromedriver = ChromeDriver(
        std::process::Command::new("chromedriver")
            .arg(format!("--port={chromedriver_port}"))
            .spawn()
            .unwrap(),
    );
    println!("chromedriver started");

    const TIMEOUT: Duration = Duration::from_secs(30);
    const SLEEP: Duration = Duration::from_millis(100);
    let timeout = std::time::Instant::now();
    let client = reqwest::Client::new();
    let url = Url::parse(&format!(
        "http://{}",
        SocketAddr::V4(SocketAddrV4::new(Ipv4Addr::LOCALHOST, chromedriver_port))
    ))
    .unwrap();
    loop {
        assert!(timeout.elapsed() <= TIMEOUT, "timeout");
        let response = client.get(url.join("/status").unwrap()).send().await;
        match response {
            Ok(res) if res.status().is_success() => break,
            _ => {}
        }
        tokio::time::sleep(SLEEP).await;
    }
    println!("chromedriver running");

    let user_data_dir = tempfile::tempdir().unwrap();
    let user_data_arg = format!("--user-data-dir={}", user_data_dir.path().to_string_lossy());

    let json = serde_json::json!({
        "capabilities": {
            "alwaysMatch": {
                "browserName": "chrome",
                "goog:chromeOptions": {
                    "binary": "/usr/local/bin/chrome",
                    "args": [
                        user_data_arg,
                        "--headless=new",
                        "--no-sandbox",
                        "--disable-dev-shm-usage"
                    ]
                }
            },
            "firstMatch": [{}]
        }
    });
    let res = client
        .post(url.join("/session").unwrap())
        .json(&json)
        .send()
        .await
        .unwrap();
    println!("create session: {res:?}");
    println!("create session: {:?}", res.text().await.unwrap());

    drop(chromedriver);
    drop(user_data_dir);
}

cargo.toml:

[package]
name = "hello-fantoccini"
version = "0.1.0"
edition = "2024"

[dependencies]
reqwest = { version = "0.12.7", features = ["cookies", "json", "stream", "multipart", "native-tls-vendored"] }
tokio = { version = "1.42.0", features = ["full"] }
serde_json = "1.0.143"
tempfile = "3.15.0"

Run with cargo run.

Which should produce an output like

chrome installed:
        Ok("Google Chrome for Testing 139.0.7258.154\n")
        Ok("")
chromedriver installed:
        Ok("ChromeDriver 139.0.7258.154 (9e0d6b2b47ffb17007b713429c9a302f9e43847f-refs/branch-heads/7258@{#2926})\n")
        Ok("")
chromedriver started
Starting ChromeDriver 139.0.7258.154 (9e0d6b2b47ffb17007b713429c9a302f9e43847f-refs/branch-heads/7258@{#2926}) on port 4470
Only local connections are allowed.
Please see https://chromedriver.chromium.org/security-considerations for suggestions on keeping ChromeDriver safe.
ChromeDriver was started successfully on port 4470.
chromedriver running
create session: Response { url: "http://127.0.0.1:4470/session", status: 500, headers: {"content-length": "882", "content-type": "application/json; charset=utf-8", "cache-control": "no-cache"} }
create session: "{\"value\":{\"error\":\"session not created\",\"message\":\"session not created: probably user data directory is already in use, please specify a unique value for --user-data-dir argument, or don't use --user-data-dir\",\"stacktrace\":\"#0 0x55ef0dce808a \\u003Cunknown>\\n#1 0x55ef0d787a70 \\u003Cunknown>\\n#2 0x55ef0d7c2e07 \\u003Cunknown>\\n#3 0x55ef0d7bd5a7 \\u003Cunknown>\\n#4 0x55ef0d80d93e \\u003Cunknown>\\n#5 0x55ef0d80cf06 \\u003Cunknown>\\n#6 0x55ef0d7ff1b3 \\u003Cunknown>\\n#7 0x55ef0d7cb59b \\u003Cunknown>\\n#8 0x55ef0d7cc971 \\u003Cunknown>\\n#9 0x55ef0dcad25b \\u003Cunknown>\\n#10 0x55ef0dcb0fa9 \\u003Cunknown>\\n#11 0x55ef0dc94339 \\u003Cunknown>\\n#12 0x55ef0dcb1b58 \\u003Cunknown>\\n#13 0x55ef0dc78c1f \\u003Cunknown>\\n#14 0x55ef0dcd5118 \\u003Cunknown>\\n#15 0x55ef0dcd52f6 \\u003Cunknown>\\n#16 0x55ef0dce7066 \\u003Cunknown>\\n#17 0x70813489caa4 \\u003Cunknown>\\n#18 0x708134929c3c \\u003Cunknown>\\n\"}}"

Removing "goog:chromeOptions" and re-running produce the same outcome.

uname -a outputs:

Linux DESKTOP-UTVQJHQ 6.6.87.2-microsoft-standard-WSL2 #1 SMP PREEMPT_DYNAMIC Thu Jun  5 18:30:46 UTC 2025 x86_64 x86_64 x86_64 GNU/Linux

Expected behavior
It should successfully create a new session.