ansible-lint's version check makes incorrect assumptions

[gotmax23]

Summary

ansible-lint's version check breaks completely or gives incorrect instructions in certain cases.

Issue Type

• Bug Report

OS / ENVIRONMENT

Fedora Rawhide container running ansible-lint 6.16.2

With pipx:

$ pipx install ansible-lint==6.16.2
$ ansible-lint --version
WARNING: PATH altered to include /home/ME/.local/pipx/venvs/ansible-lint/bin :: This is usually a sign of broken local setup, which can cause unexpected behaviors.
ansible-lint 6.16.2 using ansible-core:2.15.0 ruamel-yaml:0.17.31 ruamel-yaml-clib:0.2.7
A new release of ansible-lint is available: 6.16.2 → 6.17.0 Upgrade by running: pip install --upgrade ansible-lint

With RPM:

# dnf install ansible-lint
$ /usr/bin/ansible-lint --version
ansible-lint 6.16.2 using ansible-core:2.15.0 ruamel-yaml:0.17.24 ruamel-yaml-clib:0.2.7
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "/usr/bin/ansible-lint", line 8, in <module>
    sys.exit(_run_cli_entrypoint())
             ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
  File "/usr/lib/python3.11/site-packages/ansiblelint/__main__.py", line 310, in _run_cli_entrypoint
    sys.exit(main(sys.argv))
             ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
  File "/usr/lib/python3.11/site-packages/ansiblelint/__main__.py", line 223, in main
    msg = get_version_warning()
          ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
  File "/usr/lib/python3.11/site-packages/ansiblelint/config.py", line 302, in get_version_warning
    pip = guess_install_method()
          ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
  File "/usr/lib/python3.11/site-packages/ansiblelint/config.py", line 229, in guess_install_method
    for _ in uninstallation_paths(dist):
  File "/usr/lib/python3.11/site-packages/pip/_internal/req/req_uninstall.py", line 45, in unique
    for item in fn(*args, **kw):
  File "/usr/lib/python3.11/site-packages/pip/_internal/req/req_uninstall.py", line 83, in uninstallation_paths
    raise UninstallationError(msg)
pip._internal.exceptions.UninstallationError: Cannot uninstall ansible-lint 6.16.2, RECORD file not found. Hint: The package was installed by rpm.

• ansible installation method: one of n/a
• ansible-lint installation method: pipx/rpm

STEPS TO REPRODUCE

1. Install ansible-lint and run ansible-lint --version as shown in the steps above.

Desired Behavior

pipx:

ansible-lint --version should not suggest running pip install -U ansible-lint when it's installed in a pipx environment. It should not warn about WARNING: PATH altered to include /home/ME/.local/pipx/venvs/ansible-lint/bin :: This is usually a sign of broken local setup, which can cause unexpected behaviors. either.

I would argue that it shouldn't suggest running pip install -U in any case, as there's many environmental variations and this will be wrong in many cases, but pipx is a supported installation method and running pip install -U ansible-lint is definitely wrong when ansible-lint is installed with pipx.

RPM:

ansible-lint --version should not error out and should not suggest running pip install -U ansible-lint when it's installed via RPM.

ansible-lint is calling pip._internal.req.req_uninstall.uninstallation_paths() which does not work on RPM-installed Python packages. In dist-info directories, we purposely remove RECORD file (see https://peps.python.org/pep-0627/#optional-record-file) and set the contents of INSTALLER to rpm so users do not break their systems by trying to uninstall RPM-installed Python packages with pip uninstall.

There's a couple potential ways ansible-lint can handle this case:

1. Suppress pip._internal.exceptions.UninstallationError and move on like the code already does with AttributeError.
2. Check if importlib.metadata.distribution('ansible_lint').read_text('INSTALLER').strip() == "pip" and skip this code if it does not. This would need proper error handling for FileNotFoundErrors.

Actual Behavior

See ansible-lint --version output above.