Bundler command not working, it says "undefined method []= for nil:NilClass"

Question

I recently installed ruby 2.4.0 using rbenv. Then I installed bundler but every time I try to run bundle ("bundle install", "bundle help", basically any bundle command) I get the following error:

/Users/cone/.rbenv/versions/2.4.0/lib/ruby/gems/2.4.0/gems/bundler-
1.15.3/lib/bundler/yaml_serializer.rb:67:in `block in load': undefined 
method `[]=' for nil:NilClass (NoMethodError)
    from 
/Users/cone/.rbenv/versions/2.4.0/lib/ruby/gems/2.4.0/gems/bundler-
1.15.3/lib/bundler/yaml_serializer.rb:55:in `each'
    from 
/Users/cone/.rbenv/versions/2.4.0/lib/ruby/gems/2.4.0/gems/bundler-
1.15.3/lib/bundler/yaml_serializer.rb:55:in `load'
    from 
/Users/cone/.rbenv/versions/2.4.0/lib/ruby/gems/2.4.0/gems/bundler-
1.15.3/lib/bundler/settings.rb:324:in `block in load_config'
    from 
/Users/cone/.rbenv/versions/2.4.0/lib/ruby/gems/2.4.0/gems/bundler-
1.15.3/lib/bundler/shared_helpers.rb:108:in `filesystem_access'
    from 
/Users/cone/.rbenv/versions/2.4.0/lib/ruby/gems/2.4.0/gems/bundler-
1.15.3/lib/bundler/settings.rb:320:in `load_config'
    from 
/Users/cone/.rbenv/versions/2.4.0/lib/ruby/gems/2.4.0/gems/bundler-
1.15.3/lib/bundler/settings.rb:49:in `initialize'
    from 
/Users/cone/.rbenv/versions/2.4.0/lib/ruby/gems/2.4.0/gems/bundler-
1.15.3/lib/bundler.rb:249:in `new'
    from 
/Users/cone/.rbenv/versions/2.4.0/lib/ruby/gems/2.4.0/gems/bundler-
1.15.3/lib/bundler.rb:249:in `rescue in settings'
    from 
/Users/cone/.rbenv/versions/2.4.0/lib/ruby/gems/2.4.0/gems/bundler-
1.15.3/lib/bundler.rb:247:in `settings'
    from 
/Users/cone/.rbenv/versions/2.4.0/lib/ruby/gems/2.4.0/gems/bundler-
1.15.3/lib/bundler/env.rb:32:in `report'
    from 
/Users/cone/.rbenv/versions/2.4.0/lib/ruby/gems/2.4.0/gems/bundler-
1.15.3/lib/bundler/friendly_errors.rb:95:in `request_issue_report_for'
    from 
/Users/cone/.rbenv/versions/2.4.0/lib/ruby/gems/2.4.0/gems/bundler-
1.15.3/lib/bundler/friendly_errors.rb:45:in `log_error'
    from 
/Users/cone/.rbenv/versions/2.4.0/lib/ruby/gems/2.4.0/gems/bundler-
1.15.3/lib/bundler/friendly_errors.rb:123:in `rescue in 
with_friendly_errors'
    from 
/Users/cone/.rbenv/versions/2.4.0/lib/ruby/gems/2.4.0/gems/bundler-
1.15.3/lib/bundler/friendly_errors.rb:121:in `with_friendly_errors'
    from 
/Users/cone/.rbenv/versions/2.4.0/lib/ruby/gems/2.4.0/gems/bundler-
1.15.3/exe/bundle:22:in `<top (required)>'
    from /Users/cone/.rbenv/versions/2.4.0/bin/bundle:23:in `load'
    from /Users/cone/.rbenv/versions/2.4.0/bin/bundle:23:in `<main>'

I'm using:

gem 2.6.12
rbenv 1.1.1
bundler 1.15.3
ruby 2.4.0p0 (2016-12-24 revision 57164) [x86_64-darwin15]
xcode 8.2.1

my computer OS is: OSX El Capitan 10.11.6

I have tried removing rbenv completely and installing it again, then installing ruby 2.4.0, and finally bundler, but I get the same error again.

this is the result of 'gem list':

actioncable (5.1.2)
actionmailer (5.1.2)
actionpack (5.1.2)
actionview (5.1.2)
activejob (5.1.2)
activemodel (5.1.2)
activerecord (5.1.2)
activesupport (5.1.2)
arel (8.0.0)
bigdecimal (default: 1.3.0)
builder (3.2.3)
bundler (1.15.3)
concurrent-ruby (1.0.5)
did_you_mean (1.1.0)
erubi (1.6.1)
globalid (0.4.0)
i18n (0.8.6)
io-console (default: 0.4.6)
json (default: 2.0.2)
loofah (2.0.3)
mail (2.6.6)
method_source (0.8.2)
mime-types (3.1)
mime-types-data (3.2016.0521)
mini_portile2 (2.2.0)
minitest (5.10.1)
net-telnet (0.1.1)
nio4r (2.1.0)
nokogiri (1.8.0)
openssl (default: 2.0.2)
power_assert (0.4.1)
psych (default: 2.2.2)
rack (2.0.3)
rack-test (0.6.3)
rails (5.1.2)
rails-dom-testing (2.0.3)
rails-html-sanitizer (1.0.3)
railties (5.1.2)
rake (12.0.0)
rdoc (default: 5.0.0)
rubygems-update (2.6.12)
sprockets (3.7.1)
sprockets-rails (3.2.0)
test-unit (3.2.3)
thor (0.19.4)
thread_safe (0.3.6)
tzinfo (1.2.3)
websocket-driver (0.6.5)
websocket-extensions (0.1.2)
xmlrpc (0.2.1)

This is what I have in my $PATH: /Users/cone/.rbenv/shims:/Users/cone/.nvm/versions/node/v6.9.1/bin:/Users/cone/bin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/local/vlt/bin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/bin:/bin:/usr/sbin:/sbin:/usr/local/git/bin:/usr/local/share/npm/bin:/usr/local/axis2/bin

Some of my co-workers have ruby 2.4.0 and bundler 1.15.3 and it's working fine for them, unfortunately they haven't been able to help me with this. So I hope someone here can give me a hint.

Answer 1

Ok, I just got help by a co-worker who is a top Ruby developer. It seems that bundler was trying to read from the file ~/.bundle/config which apparently was corrupted or something like that. So after deleting that file, bundler started working! I hope this helps someone in the same situation in the future :)