make is intermittently unavailable on macos 14

[lengau]

Description

(I've only marked the x86 runner images, but I'm guessing it happens on both x86 and arm64, and maybe other versions of macos.)

On the latest macos-14 runner image, the make command sometimes fails with:

 sh: line 1:  3678 Bus error: 10           /Applications/Xcode_15.4.app/Contents/Developer/usr/bin/xcodebuild -sdk '' -find make 2> /dev/null
make: error: sh -c '/Applications/Xcode_15.4.app/Contents/Developer/usr/bin/xcodebuild -sdk '' -find make 2> /dev/null' failed with exit code 35328: (null) (errno=No such file or directory)
xcode-select: Failed to locate 'make', requesting installation of command line developer tools.

This is inconsistent though, as it both worked and broke on different jobs in the same workflow.

Platforms affected

• Azure DevOps
• GitHub Actions - Standard Runners
• GitHub Actions - Larger Runners

Runner images affected

• Ubuntu 20.04
• Ubuntu 22.04
• Ubuntu 24.04
• macOS 12
• macOS 13
• macOS 13 Arm64
• macOS 14
• macOS 14 Arm64
• macOS 15
• macOS 15 Arm64
• Windows Server 2019
• Windows Server 2022
• Windows Server 2025

Image version and build link

Version: 20250106.587

https://github.com/canonical/charmcraft/actions/runs/12755016605/job/35550123637?pr=2073

Note that the "Fast tests" job uns on the same version but doesn't have this issue (despite running the same make command)

Is it regression?

unknown

Expected behavior

make commands work

Actual behavior

Running make returns an xcode error:

Run make setup-tests
  make setup-tests
  shell: /bin/bash -e {0}
  env:
    PYTEST_ADDOPTS: --no-header -v -rN -m 'slow'
    HOMEBREW_NO_INSTALL_FROM_API: 
    HOMEBREW_GITHUB_API_TOKEN: ***
    UV_CACHE_DIR: /Users/runner/work/_temp/setup-uv-cache
sh: line 1:  3678 Bus error: 10           /Applications/Xcode_15.4.app/Contents/Developer/usr/bin/xcodebuild -sdk '' -find make 2> /dev/null
make: error: sh -c '/Applications/Xcode_15.4.app/Contents/Developer/usr/bin/xcodebuild -sdk '' -find make 2> /dev/null' failed with exit code 35328: (null) (errno=No such file or directory)
xcode-select: Failed to locate 'make', requesting installation of command line developer tools.
Error: Process completed with exit code 72.

Repro steps

1. Create a workflow that uses macos-14-large and runs make
2. Run it many times until you get this error.

[susmitamane]

Hi @lengau

We will investigate the issue and keep you posted on further updates.

Thank you.