anchor init Error

[jackieismpc]

On mac,I use anchor init --test-template rust my-program to create a new project,however,Error: No such file or directory (os error 2) .
in my workspace ,the anchor project generated ,but without tests folders.

(base) ➜ rustprogram anchor init --test-template rust my-program
Error: No such file or directory (os error 2)

Now, I plan to spend some time fixing this bug.

[jackieismpc]

add: i use anchor-cli 0.32.1

[rz1989s]

Hey! I ran into something similar and dug into this a bit. I think I found what's causing the error.

TL;DR

The --test-template rust option needs cargo in your PATH, but it looks like cargo might not be available in your shell environment.

What's Happening

When you run anchor init --test-template rust, Anchor tries to create the Rust test package by running:

cargo new --lib tests

If cargo isn't in your PATH, you get "No such file or directory (os error 2)" - which is basically the system saying "I can't find the cargo command".

Quick Test

Can you try running:

which cargo
cargo --version

If either of these fails, that's the issue!

Fix

Add cargo to your PATH:

# Add this to your ~/.zshrc (or ~/.bashrc if you use bash)
export PATH="$HOME/.cargo/bin:$PATH"

# Then reload your shell
source ~/.zshrc

After that, anchor init --test-template rust my-program should work.

How I Found This

I looked at the Anchor CLI source code (cli/src/rust_template.rs:697-709) and found it runs cargo new via std::process::Command. When cargo isn't in PATH, Rust returns OS error 2.

I was able to reproduce your exact error by temporarily removing cargo from my PATH and running the same command.

Note for Maintainers

The error message is a bit cryptic. Maybe it would help to check for ErrorKind::NotFound and show something like:

Error: 'cargo' command not found. The Rust test template requires cargo to be installed and in your PATH.
Please install Rust from https://rustup.rs

Just a thought! The current error message doesn't make it obvious that cargo is the missing piece.

---

Hope this helps! Let me know if adding cargo to your PATH fixes it.

[jackieismpc]

No,it can't work.
I just tested two commands and checked the environment variables. The environment variables are normal, and in the same terminal, executing cargo new --lib tests works fine, but executing anchor init --test-template rust my-program fails.