Virtualisation Server not started

[grumpy_burton]

Hi all,

I've just downloaded and installed the AlfrescoCommunity-2.0Preview-Setup.exe using its JDK and HSQL on a winXP box and get the following after following the WCM_BETA_Eval_Guide.pdf tutorial and trying to preview the web site

INFO: Find registry server-registry.xml at classpath resource 22/02/2007 14:42:47 org.apache.catalina.startup.Catalina start
INFO: Server startup in 32578 ms
14:43:26,609 WARN  [web.config.ClientConfigElement] Virtualisation Server not started - reverting to default IP: 127-0-0-1.ip.alfrescodemo.net
14:43:26,609 WARN  [web.config.ClientConfigElement] Virtualisation Server not started - reverting to default port: 8180
‍‍‍‍‍

It looks like the Virtualisation server never starts, as there is nothing in the virtual-tomcat logs or temp directories… any ideas?

Thanks,
Alex.

[rkylberg]

I have also found that the virtualization server startup with the community version is unreliable (linux.fc5 and mac).

Although it is supposed to throw errors until a connection with the Alfresco webapp is made (see jcox above) this doesn't always work.

I have had to start the virtualization server manually after starting the alfresco webapp to get a stable environment:

./alfresco.sh start 
<wait until startup is complete>
./virtual_start.sh
‍‍‍‍‍

This is the manual version of mattruby's solution and is a hassle, but it works every time.

[tezbir]

Hi
I have just installed alfresco-community-wcm-2.0 _WCM
and was following the WCM_BETA_Eval_Guide.pdf document .
Got the following error when I clicked on preview website:

Server Error
The following error occurred:

 Cannot connect due to potential loopback problems 


——————————————————————————–
Please contact the administrator.‍‍‍‍‍

[tezbir]

14:31:07,034 WARN  [app.servlet.AuthenticationHelper] Unable to login as Guest:
Access Denied.  You do not have the appropriate permissions to perform this oper
ation.
14:31:53,489 WARN  [web.config.ClientConfigElement] Virtualisation Server not st
arted - reverting to default IP: 127-0-0-1.ip.alfrescodemo.net
14:31:53,489 WARN  [web.config.ClientConfigElement] Virtualisation Server not st
arted - reverting to default port: 8180

[kvc]

The virtualization server will just emit warnings until the alfersco webapp
is up.  Once, the Alfresco webapp is fully initialized, the virtualization
server will connect to it, and will stop issuing warnings.

Therefore, you don't need to take any special measures to "baby sit"
the startup.   For that reason, I recommend that you remove the
modifications you've made to this bat file – they aren't necessary.

In the future, I'll try to make this warning more explicit.

Cheers,
-Jon

Yikes!  Actually, definately include the PAUSE in the start-up script.  The problem:  the virt server only waits for a certain period of time before shutting down.  The pause allows you to ensure the Alfresco server is started before the virt server tries and comes up.

This will be fixed in the start-up script for our upcoming 2.0.1 maintenance release and all upcoming community builds.

Kevin

[jcox]

Kevin,

If for some reason your virtualization server is shutting down early,
you must have some other problem in your configuration. 
It is a very bad idea to start introducing things like PAUSE.
Don't do it – you're only masking a deeper problem on your
machine that is sure to emerge elsewhere.  

Actually, definately include the PAUSE in the start-up script.
The problem: the virt server only waits for a certain period of time
before shutting down.

This is not true.

I'm assuming that if you're running on Windows, you've installed
the virtualization server as a Windows service.  If not, depending
on where your output is going, you may end up blocking your
process on output.   Be sure everything is installed as a service
and you start/stop via the  Windows service manager console.

On both Windows and UNIX you can start the servers in any order.
To observe this first-hand, deliberately start the virtualization server first,
then tail its log files.  As the virtualization  server starts up, it will
complain about how it cannot connect to the Alfresco server
(as you'd expect).   Let it run for hours if you'd like.   The virtualization
server *never* gives up.

Now start the tomcat instance that hosts the Alfresco webapp.
It's useful to monitor its logfiles also.

What happens is revealing.
Assuming you're running on Windows, and you've got Tomcat set up
as a service,  the service manager will claim that the Alfresco tomcat
is up long before the webapp itself is fully up.  Thus, if all you're looking
at is the logfile for the virtualzation server and the Windows service
console it seems like the Alfresco Tomcat has started yet the
virtualization server is still looking for it.  However, the Windows
service manager declares "mission accomplished" very early in
the game … and there's a considerable delay until the Alfresco webapp
is responsive to the lonesome cries of  the virtualization server!
If you are monitoring the logfiles from both tomcats you can see
what's happening.

As soon as the Alfresco webapp is *actually* up, the virtualizaton server
connects to it just as easily as if the Alfresco webapp had started first.

[jcox]

The two windows machines I'm testing on installed
the virt server as a service.  Unfortunately, the
default installer has the virt server running as a
console app.   This which is not good,
due to the IO blocking issue I referenced earlier.

To understand why adding a PAUSE to the starup scripts
is such a bad solution, consider this:   if the virt server
hangs on blocked IO after a few minutes of not being
able to contact the Alfresco webapp,  inserting a PAUSE
just prevents the logging of *these* initial errors from
filling up the blocking IO buffers & triggering the hang.
However, the underlying problem of blocking on log IO
remains… therefore, when running as a console app,
logged messages after startup will have the same effect.
You won't notice it right away though, because post-starup
errors/warnings are typically less frequent and less verbose;
eventually, you'll still hang.

This bug has been filed in JIRA as:
http://issues.alfresco.com/browse/WCM-422

Hopefully, we can get a fairly quick fix out there,
but in the meanwhile, I suggest that Windows users
install the virt server as a service on their own,
instead of running as a console app & inserting a PAUSE.

[invantix]

The pause worked for me but I thought you might want the stack trace from before I added the pause.

In my case the v server tries repeatedly displaying
WARNING: Retrying JNDI connection….
and loads and unloads beans and properties…

finally before closing it reports:

java.lang.reflect.InvocationTargetException
        at sun.reflect.NativeMethodAccessorImpl.invoke0(Native Method)
        at sun.reflect.NativeMethodAccessorImpl.invoke(NativeMethodAccessorImpl.java:39)
        at sun.reflect.DelegatingMethodAccessorImpl.invoke(DelegatingMethodAccessorImpl.java:25)
        at java.lang.reflect.Method.invoke(Method.java:585)
        at org.apache.catalina.startup.Bootstrap.start(Bootstrap.java:294)
        at org.apache.catalina.startup.Bootstrap.main(Bootstrap.java:432)
Caused by: org.springframework.beans.factory.BeanCreationException:
   Error creating bean with name 'authenticationService'
      defined in URL [file:C:/Alfresco/virtual-tomcat/conf/alfresco-virtserver-context.xml]:
      Initialization of bean failed; nested exception is java.rmi.NotBoundException: authentication
           at org.springframework.beans.factory.support.AbstractAutowireCapableBeanFactory.createBean(AbstractAutowireCapableBeanFactory.java:370)
           at org.springframework.beans.factory.support.AbstractBeanFactory.getBean(AbstractBeanFactory.java:226)

[heiho1]

I'm trying to run the virtualization server for alfresco from a HEAD build of subversion checked out yesterday.  I have the main virtualization server running fine and the build outputs all of the configuration files to the virtual tomcat location as well as the standard webapp output.  However, when I start the main tomcat instance using the standard startup.bat file, the main instance runs fine but launching the second tomcat does not.

Is it possible to run the virtualization server from a Subversion build? 

Thanks,

James

[jcox]

Depending on your configuration, a PAUSE worked around WCM-750.
This issue has just been resolved in Alfresco 2.1 E.
PAUSE will become unnecessary in all configurations.