[Question]: Microsoft.Azure.DevOps.Pipelines.Agent externsion Could not create lock directory '/agent/.agent.lock' '.

[Gaurdevops]

Describe your question

We are using the Azure Self Hosted agents , Pool type - Azure Virtual Machine Scale set. We are observing a lot our Virtual Machines are stuck in creating(running) state. And are not getting registered with the Azure Devops Server.
This is error we are seeing -

VM has reported a failure when processing extension 'Microsoft.Azure.DevOps.Pipelines.Agent' (publisher 'Microsoft.VisualStudio.Services' and type 'TeamServicesAgentLinux'). Error message: 'The Extension failed to execute: Pipeline script execution failed with exit code 1. 2025-09-05 04:42:45 Could not create lock directory '/agent/.agent.lock' '.

Its blocking quite a bit. Does anyone know or have seen this error? Has something changed?

Versions

Azure DevOps Service - Version Dev20.M261.1 (AzureDevOps_M261_20250901.4)
OS - ubuntu2404

{
"isPipelinesAgent": true,
"agentFolder": "/agent",
"agentDownloadUrl": "https://download.agent.dev.azure.com/agent/4.260.0/vsts-agent-linux-x64-4.260.0.tar.gz",
"enableScriptDownloadUrl": "https://vstsagenttools.blob.core.windows.net/tools/ElasticPools/Linux/17/enableagent.sh"
}

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)

Operation system

Ubuntu2404

Version controll system

No response

Azure DevOps Server Version (if applicable)

No response

[iamcloud-curt]

We're getting this today

    "statusMessage": "{\"status\":\"Failed\",\"error\":{\"code\":\"ResourceOperationFailure\",\"message\":\"The resource operation completed with terminal provisioning state 'Failed'.\",\"details\":[{\"code\":\"VMExtensionProvisioningError\",\"message\":\"Multiple VM extensions failed to be provisioned on the VM. The Extensions failed due to the errors: \\n[Extension Name: 'CustomScriptExtension'\\nError Message: VM has reported a user failure when processing extension 'CustomScriptExtension'. Please correct the error and try again. (publisher 'Microsoft.Compute' and type 'CustomScriptExtension'). Error code: '54'. Error message: 'File download failure'. Detailed error: ''. More information on troubleshooting is available at https://aka.ms/VMExtensionCSEWindowsTroubleshoot.]\\n\\n[Extension Name: 'Microsoft.Azure.DevOps.Pipelines.Agent'\\nError Message: VM Extension 'Microsoft.Azure.DevOps.Pipelines.Agent' is marked as failed since it depends upon the VM Extension 'CustomScriptExtension' which has failed.]\\n\"}]}}",

Any ideas

[Avanasea]

Is this being looked at? We’re getting the same error and creating the agent folder didn’t help

[angaaruriakhil]

We are also facing this issue intermittently on Ubuntu 22.04 agents.

[jrowme]

We are seeing the same issue as well.

VM has reported a failure when processing extension 'Microsoft.Azure.DevOps.Pipelines.Agent' (publisher 'Microsoft.VisualStudio.Services' and type 'TeamServicesAgentLinux'). Error message: 'The Extension failed to execute: Pipeline script execution failed with exit code 1.\n2025-11-01 03:52:00 Could not create lock directory '/agent/.agent.lock'\n'. More information on troubleshooting is available at https://aka.ms/vmextensionlinuxtroubleshoot.