Travis CI: gradlew permission denied because git lost the exec bit

TL;DR

Restore the executable bit in the git index with git update-index --chmod=+x gradlew, then commit and push. This bites whenever the wrapper was created or edited on Windows or copied without permissions; fixing it in the repo fixes it for every CI run and every fresh clone.

Steps

1. Restore the executable bit in the git index with git update-index --chmod=+x gradlew, then commit and push. Verify with git ls-tree HEAD that gradlew shows mode 100755. This bites whenever the wrapper was created or edited on Windows or copied without permissions; fixing it in the repo fixes it for every CI run and every fresh clone.

When to use

You are seeing this: Verify with git ls-tree HEAD that gradlew shows mode 100755. Use this skill when you run into "Travis CI: gradlew permission denied because git lost the exec bit".

When not to use

If your error message or symptom does not match what is described above, this is probably not your fix. Search for your exact error text instead of forcing this one to fit.

Versions

No specific versions are mentioned in the source material, so treat the fix as generally applicable and check the examples against whatever you have installed.

Why this happens

The original report does not dig into a root cause. It documents the symptom and the fix that resolved it.

Source: Stack Overflow #33820638 (accepted answer, 130 votes): the build fails with ./gradlew: Permission denied and exit 126. The accepted answer traces it to the file mode stored in git: gradlew is committed as 644 instead of 755, so the checkout is not executable.

Verified resolution: Restore the executable bit in the git index with git update-index --chmod=+x gradlew, then commit and push. Verify with git ls-tree HEAD that gradlew shows mode 100755. This bites whenever the wrapper was created or edited on Windows or copied without permissions; fixing it in the repo fixes it for every CI run and every fresh clone.

Source URL: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/33820638/travis-yml-gradlew-permission-denied