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T
TwoEdge
Inspiring
August 1, 2025
Answered

CF2025 Installation Failure

  • August 1, 2025
  • 2 replies
  • 987 views

I have had a nightmare trying for two weeks to get CF2025 installed on a brand new linux server.  I spent 2.5 hours on a call with CFSupport and they could not help me, and in fact made it worse.

 

This has been the worst experience, and I do not think I could ever recommend ColdFusion to anyone despite having used it for nearly 30 years.

 

I don't know where to turn since Adobe themseslves were not able to get it successfully intalled and working as it should be.  

 

I guess I am posting out of sheer frustration and shock at how hard this has been. Also, the documentation for linux installation is absolutely terrible and still has references to older versions and inaccuracies and ommitted steps.

 

I don't know why the ColdFusion team does not care about making installation something that acheivable without knowing lots of obscure and arcane settings.  There are too many moving parts without any clear documenation or trouble shooting guides that are helpful.

 

If my entrie codebase was not in ColdFusion, I woud have given up days ago.  I am stuck and don't know where to turn. Has anyone else been having the same problems?

 

    Correct answer TwoEdge
    quote

    Yes, it has been a nightmare with no documentation.  The thing is I wped the server and installed Ubuntu on it. I followed everything and it still won't work. The CF Admin panel won't let me in - it keeps saying it's running the wizard and then shows me the login screen over and over.  It's not a password error becuase when I purposely try to use an incorrect password, it gives me an error. In this case, no error in the browser, it

     

     Quote from above where i said I switched to Ubuntu and what the problem is that I am currentlly trying to solve. It must have gotten lost in the mix. In any case, I still can't update coldfusion from the CFAdmin Panel. I just can't figure out what is not working. It seems like it's the "check.cfm" page is returing a "success" but nothing else to the browser. And it's not stopping ColdFusion to do the update.

     

    It's just been one issue after the other.


    I did a manual install of the updated detailed here: https://helpx.adobe.com/coldfusion/kb/coldfusion-2025-update-1.html 

     

    The manual install worked, and then hotfix 2 was able to be initiated from the CFAdmin panel.

     

    So now I have to test, but I think I am finally fully installed.

    2 replies

    BKBK
    Community Expert
    BKBKCommunity Expert
    Community Expert
    August 2, 2025

    Hi @TwoEdge , Sorry to hear about the difficulties you're facing during installation of ColdFusion 2025 on Linux. Let's hope that this discussion will help you solve the problems.

    My suggestion focuses on your choice of Operating System. To be fair, you cannot lay too much blame on CF Support.  As their ColdFusion 2025 Support Matrix documentation clearly says, the supported Linux versions are:

    • RHEL 9.5 and later
    • Ubuntu 24 LTS
    • SUSE 15.5 and later


    Firstly, do you have the correct Ubuntu version? Ensure you do before installing ColdFusion 2025.

     

    Secondly, you say you use SELinux and Ubuntu. As Dave has said, correctly, "That's your problem right there." 

    SELinux is mostly meant for Red Hat. SELinux and Ubuntu are not a good fit. As far as I know, Ubuntu does not ship with SELinux policies for its packages like Red Hat does. So applications on Ubuntu won’t have SELinux contexts defined. This can lead to denials, breakages, or degraded functionality. Granted, SELinux is a powerful option for Ubuntu if you need extremely high, mission-critical security. But you will then have to invest the time to learn how to configure and debug it, as that can be hard to do. 

     

    In short, leaving ColdFusion aside, it is quite complex to integrate SELinux with Ubuntu. Debugging SELinux issues can be very complex. Hence, instead of SELinux, you should use AppArmor, which is simpler and fully supported.

     

     

    T
    TwoEdgeAuthor
    Inspiring
    August 2, 2025

    You did not read correctly. I appreciate any help, but please read the whole thread. I *switiched* to Ubuntu. Ubuntu does NOT have SELinux. I'm not sure where you got that I was trying to integrate SELinux with Ubuntu. I am running far away from it.

     

    I got it intalled and running for virtual hosts, but now I can't update it (run a hotfix) from the CF Admin panel. It will not stop the coldfusion instance.  

     

    Also many of the install scripts did not configure to use the sysinit script which is needed for permissons and a few other things. They instead were using a "coldfusion". Notably, the installation instructions are horrendous. Also, I spent 2.5 hours on the phone with CFSupport. The *first* thing I asked CFSupport was should I switch to Ubuntu or stick with what I had. They opted to work with what I had.  After that session, I decided on the switch.

     

    Rocky Linux runs the exact same binaries as REHL. REHL has SELinux.  So if they support REHL then there should be at least a mention of SELinux on the install page for Linux. There is not.

     

    I have been using ColdFusion for 25 years, but for all the advancments made in so many aspects of it, the installation process has always been a nightmare, and it has not improved. If this was still 2005, I would understand. By comparison, on the exact same machine, I installed Node, and had test single page app with routes and database connectivity up and serving in literally less than ten minutes. I probably typed less than 10 commands into the terminal to do so. 

     

    I love developing with ColdFusion but the experince of actually installing and maintaining the server is so confusing that you need often need arcane knowledge. For me at least, it leads to a lot of wasted time and emotional energy. 

    BKBK
    Community Expert
    BKBKCommunity Expert
    Community Expert
    August 2, 2025

    Please reread your text yourself. You will see that you suggested that you had errors with SELinux. Then, without specifying any other Operating System, you mentioned Ubuntu. It's only now you mention Rocky Linux / RHEL. Can you see how this could confuse a reader?

    W
    w49369461
    Participating Frequently
    August 1, 2025

    Can you provide some details about the actual issue? What doesnt work, errors, whats been tried etc etc

    T
    TwoEdgeAuthor
    Inspiring
    August 1, 2025

    Mod_jk.so throws a segmenation fault. I can not get it to work with Apache and Virtual Hosts. JKMount does not seems to forward the the proper path info to the server, so it won't look for files in the virtual hosts only in cfusion/wwwroot.  In general, there were tons of permssions errors dealing with SELinux context issues.  It's unclear how to run it as the runtime user, or what user has to own what files. I spent 2.5 hours on a call with CFSupport and he gave up. It was very frustrating.  

    D
    Community Expert
    Dave WattsCommunity Expert
    Community Expert
    August 1, 2025
    SELinux

    That's your problem right there.

     

    More seriously, there just isn't much (any?) documentation about using CF 2025 with SELinux. I haven't had to do this since CF 9, I think. I doubt Adobe support will be especially helpful with this. Can you temporarily disable SELinux or at least set it to permissive mode?

     

    Dave Watts, Eidolon LLC
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