PermissionError when bitsandbytes scans system path /var/lib/gitea/libcudart.so

[RewaaHummedi]

System Info

System Info:

• OS: Ubuntu
• CUDA version: 11.8
• PyTorch: 2.1.2
• bitsandbytes: 0.41.1 (built from source)
• Used inside a Conda environment
• Model: Unsloth gemma-3-12b-it in 4-bit mode

Reproduction

Hi, I'm encountering a PermissionError during import due to bitsandbytes trying to scan a restricted system path for CUDA libraries:

PermissionError: [Errno 13] Permission denied: '/var/lib/gitea/libcudart.so'
This happens during the execution of:

from unsloth.chat_templates import get_chat_template
import bitsandbytes

Even after setting LD_LIBRARY_PATH and CUDA_HOME, and reinstalling bitsandbytes==0.41.1 from source using --no-binary, the issue persists.
Since the library scans all entries in os.environ, it hits unreadable directories like /var/lib/gitea, which causes the crash.

Expected behavior

This is breaking inference workflows even when bitsandbytes is built locally. Please advise on a proper patch or ignore logic for unreadable system paths.

Thank you!

[matthewdouglas]

Hi,

I cannot find a tag in the repo for v0.41.1, but will assume it's 18e827d. When you install with pip --no-binary in this version, it's not going to build any of the binaries automatically. You would still need to build libbitsandbytes manually as described here: https://github.com/bitsandbytes-foundation/bitsandbytes/blob/0.41.0/compile_from_source.md

I would advise that you upgrade PyTorch and use a newer version of bitsandbytes, whether it is built from source or from PyPI. bitsandbytes v0.41.1 does not support serialization, so to use the unsloth 4bit model, you need at least bitsandbytes>=0.42.0. Additionally, I would expect this specific issue to be resolved for you in v0.42.0+.

May I ask what Ubuntu version and what GPU you are using? Do you happen to be on an aarch64 or ppc64le platform?