[BUG]: VSBuild@1 fails to build appx WITHOUT the task updating

[Skintkingle]

What happened?

Last week, we were using VSBuild@1 (version 1.245.0), last used Friday 13th September at 8pm UTC to successfully build and package an APPX.
On sunday (and today) we are using the same version (1.245.0), and the build is now failing with the following error:

fatal error CMF1106: failed to open input PDB file for reading (PDB error code = 13)

I have raised this here INSTEAD of azure-pipelines-tasks because the task hasn't changed between the successful execution and the failure, so I don't beleive it's the task that has changed to make this fail, rather the hosting environment/agent

The task is configured as such (and has been like this for many months):

- task: VSBuild@1
  displayName: Build Our Product
  inputs:
    platform: 'x64' 
    solution: 'Our Solution.sln'
    msbuildArgs: '/p:AppxBundlePlatforms="x64" /p:AppxBundle=Always /p:UapAppxPackageBuildMode=SideLoadOnly /p:AppxPackageSigningEnabled=false'

Critically - we can run this on the same commit that previously passed, and it now fails.

This is preventing us from releasing any changes and as such, for us, is critical to get a fix or workaround

Versions

Azure Hosted Agent, windows-latest

Environment type (Please select at least one enviroment where you face this issue)

• Self-Hosted
• Microsoft Hosted
• VMSS Pool
• Container

Azure DevOps Server type

dev.azure.com (formerly visualstudio.com)

Azure DevOps Server Version (if applicable)

No response

Operation system

No response

Version controll system

No response

Relevant log output

_GenerateAppxSymbolPackage:
  C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio\2022\Enterprise\MSBuild\Microsoft\VisualStudio\v17.0\AppxPackage\\x64\mspdbcmf.exe /check "D:\a\1\s\Our App\bin\x64\Debug\net8.0-windows10.0.19041.0\win-x64\msixpublish\Our App.pdb" 
  Microsoft (R) FastLink To Full PDB Converter Version 14.41.33923.0
  Copyright (C) Microsoft Corporation.  All rights reserved.
  
  D:\a\1\s\Our App\bin\x64\Debug\net8.0-windows10.0.19041.0\win-x64\msixpublish\Our App.pdb : fatal error CMF1106: failed to open input PDB file for reading (PDB error code = 13)
##[error]C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio\2022\Enterprise\MSBuild\Microsoft\VisualStudio\v17.0\AppxPackage\Microsoft.AppXPackage.Targets(3715,5): Error MSB6006: "mspdbcmf.exe" exited with code 1106.
##[debug]Processed: ##vso[task.logissue type=Error;sourcepath=C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio\2022\Enterprise\MSBuild\Microsoft\VisualStudio\v17.0\AppxPackage\Microsoft.AppXPackage.Targets;linenumber=3715;columnnumber=5;code=MSB6006;]"mspdbcmf.exe" exited with code 1106.
C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio\2022\Enterprise\MSBuild\Microsoft\VisualStudio\v17.0\AppxPackage\Microsoft.AppXPackage.Targets(3715,5): error MSB6006: "mspdbcmf.exe" exited with code 1106. [D:\a\1\s\OurApp.Package\OurApp.Package.wapproj]

[Skintkingle]

Wondering if this event caused the issue:

https://status.dev.azure.com/_event/543117809

[Wuppie007]

Also run into this is issue. The last succesfully completed pipeline for me was with runner image version 20240811.1.0. At this image the "Fastlink to Full PDB Converter" version was 14.33.31424.0.

[max-zaytsev]

Hi @Skintkingle, @Wuppie007

It doesn't seem like an agent issue to me.
If it's an image issue, please open a ticket in the runner-images repo actions/runner-images#10601

[Skintkingle]

Okay, I've raised the issue there as well.