Unable to deploy Model - [Errno 13] Permission denied: '/.cache'

Issue

When deploying a model as a Model API, the build completes successfully but the model fails to start, with the following error:

Jan 05 2023 14:21:05 -0500 There was a problem when trying to write in your cache folder (/.cache/huggingface/hub). You should set the environment variable TRANSFORMERS_CACHE to a writable directory.
Jan 05 2023 14:21:05 -0500 PermissionError: [Errno 13] Permission denied: '/.cache'

The model’s Python code uses the Transformers package. By default, Transformers sets its cache directory to /.cache, which may not be writable in the Model API environment.

Solution

Override the default cache path by setting TRANSFORMERS_CACHE to a writable directory. Python:

import os
os.environ['TRANSFORMERS_CACHE'] = '/path/to/writable/cache/'

Bash:

export TRANSFORMERS_CACHE=/path/to/writable/cache/

Replace /path/to/writable/cache/ with a directory your model environment can write to, such as a path under your project or home directory.

Set HF_HOME for broader cache coverage

The TRANSFORMERS_CACHE variable controls only the Transformers cache. The Hugging Face (HF) HF_HOME variable controls a broader set of caches, including the datasets cache. Set HF_HOME to cover both:

export HF_HOME=/path/to/writable/cache/

To also protect against cases where the environment variable isn’t set, create a symlink from the default cache location to your writable directory:

ln -s /path/to/writable/cache/ ~/.cache/huggingface

How the default cache directory is determined

The Transformers documentation describes cache setup and the order of priority for environment variables:

Pretrained models are downloaded and locally cached at: ~/.cache/huggingface/transformers/. This is the default directory given by the shell environment variable TRANSFORMERS_CACHE. On Windows, the default directory is given by C:\Users\username\.cache\huggingface\transformers. You can change the shell environment variables shown below — in order of priority — to specify a different cache directory:

Shell environment variable (default): TRANSFORMERS_CACHE

Shell environment variable: HF_HOME + transformers/

Shell environment variable: XDG_CACHE_HOME + /huggingface/transformers

HF_HOME defaults to $XDG_CACHE_HOME/huggingface. If XDG_CACHE_HOME is not set, it defaults to $HOME/.cache, making the usual default $HOME/.cache/huggingface.

​Issue

​Solution

​Set HF_HOME for broader cache coverage

​How the default cache directory is determined

Issue

Solution

Set HF_HOME for broader cache coverage

How the default cache directory is determined