"ERROR: Theme file compilation failed" when running quarto preview

[Tiddy-Fje]

Description

I am new to quarto. I'm trying to replicate this tutorial. I use the newest version of VScode & quarto and a conda environement which I selected using the "Python: select interpreter" command. I also enabled the quarto extension for VScode.
When click on the preview button (or manually run quarto preview c:/path/to/folder/my-demo.qmd --no-browser --no-watch-inputs) I get the following error message :

Done

Executing 'my-demo.ipynb'
  Cell 1/1...Done

ERROR: Theme file compilation failed:



Error: Theme file compilation failed:


    at dartCommand (file:///C:/Users/User/AppData/Local/Programs/Quarto/bin/quarto.js:59894:15)
    at async dartCompile (file:///C:/Users/UserAppData/Local/Programs/Quarto/bin/quarto.js:59856:5)
    at async compileWithCache (file:///C:/Users/UserAppData/Local/Programs/Quarto/bin/quarto.js:60084:17)
    at async compileSass (file:///C:/Users/User/AppData/Local/Programs/Quarto/bin/quarto.js:59946:12)
    at async resolveSassBundles (file:///C:/Users/UserAppData/Local/Programs/Quarto/bin/quarto.js:76333:27)
    at async resolveExtras (file:///C:/Users/User/AppData/Local/Programs/Quarto/bin/quarto.js:80428:18)
    at async runPandoc (file:///C:/Users/User/AppData/Local/Programs/Quarto/bin/quarto.js:79983:24)
    at async renderPandoc (file:///C:/Users/User/AppData/Local/Programs/Quarto/bin/quarto.js:81044:26)
    at async Object.onRender (file:///C:/Users/User/AppData/Local/Programs/Quarto/bin/quarto.js:86673:36)
    at async renderFiles (file:///C:/Users/User/AppData/Local/Programs/Quarto/bin/quarto.js:86636:25)

Can anyone spot where I went wrong ?
Thank you for your time !

[mcanouil]

Hard to tell without knowing your environment:

• What's your operating system?
• What's the Quarto version you are using?
• What's the output of quarto check (to be run in a terminal)?

[Tiddy-Fje]

Oh, sorry for the confusion. I meant I have tried both of these and none of them works.

[cderv]

none of them works.

no error ? Nothing printed in console ?

They should both print a version - if they are not this means something on your environment is preventing that to happen. I don't know what... 🤔

[Tiddy-Fje]

I get the following

(base) PS C:\Users\User> C:\Users\User\AppData\Local\Programs\Quarto\bin\tools\dart-sass\sass.bat --version
(base) PS C:\Users\User> C:\Users\User\AppData\Local\Programs\Quarto\bin\tools\dart-sass\src\dart.exe --version
Dart SDK version: 2.18.1 (stable) (Tue Sep 13 11:42:55 2022 +0200) on "windows_x64"

so if I understand correctly, dart.exe works but sass.bat doesn't ?
(I don't know why the second command seems to work now)

[cderv]

so if I understand correctly, dart.exe works but sass.bat doesn't ?

Yes exactly. This means this is what we think from the start i.e

Do you have anti-virus software that prevents the execution of .bat files? That's a common cause of this issue.

It seems something is preventing BAT file to execute correctly. We plan to make some improvement to bypass sass.bat - follow this

• Quarto check fails and render to HTML fails in secured enterprise environment #6651

but .bat file are often use in software, so finding the reason why you can't run it could be interesting for you.

[Tiddy-Fje]

Thank you very much !
Sorry for taking so much of your time.

[LCPallares]

I have the same error:
quarto\1.6.39\bin\tools\x86_64\dart-sass\sass.bat --version
1.70.0
quarto\1.6.39\bin\tools\x86_64\dart-sass\src\dart.exe --version
Dart SDK version: 3.2.5 (stable) (Tue Jan 16 15:02:13 2024 +0000) on "windows_x64"

[LCPallares]

I fixed it, the problem was with sass.bat, I used some test .scss to convert to .css and it returned error
“sass.bat test.scss output.css”.
so I installed another sass from scoop “scoop install sass”, copied the folder to quarto sass and it worked.
C:\Users\Aunak\scoop\apps\sass\current
both the scoop quarto and the official page is:
---scoop quarto:
[>] Checking versions of quarto binary dependencies...
Pandoc version 3.4.0: OK
Dart Sass version 1.70.0: OK
Deno version 1.46.3: OK
Typst version 0.11.0: OK
---quarto from official site:
[>] Checking versions of quarto binary dependencies...
Pandoc version 3.4.0: OK
Dart Sass version 1.70.0: OK
Deno version 1.46.3: OK
Typst version 0.11.0: OK
---the sass I copied manually:
[>] Checking versions of quarto binary dependencies...
Pandoc version 3.4.0: OK
Dart Sass version 1.83.1: OK
Deno version 1.46.3: OK
Typst version 0.11.0: OK

[cderv]

Thanks for sharing the workaround, I will look into it.

copied the folder to quarto sass

If you want to override, you need to set QUARTO_DART_SASS environment variable. Modifying directly the installation folder is risky, and it won't last when you update.

[mcanouil]

Would it be possible to install the same version (Dart Sass version 1.70.0) with Scoop? Like is it an issue with the binary, the version, etc.?

[cderv]

Yes this is part of the solution maybe. Questions and investigations for #6651.

[mcanouil]

I mean the example here makes quite a substantial bump of versions.