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iclark3509
Inspiring
May 2, 2025
Answered

Ubuntu coldfusion2025 PDFManager not working

  • May 2, 2025
  • 3 replies
  • 4337 views

I am trying to get the PDF manager to work on coldfusion 2025 (developer addition) running on Ubuntu with Apache web server. I did the full GUI install (ColdFusion_2025_GUI_WWEJ_linux64.bin ) select developer addition, all add ons etc. Did no install the separate addons download. So jetty is instslled under cfusion.

After installation I can verify the PDF  Manager ( in my case the install changed the port to 8999). Like some other post I have seen I was seeing the unregistered in the log. Selecting edit and saving without any changes allowed me to verify and provided the reghistered log item:

May 2, 2025 07:15:06 AM Information [http-nio-8500-exec-4] - PDFg service manager http://127.0.0.1:8997/PDFgServlet/ unregistered.
May 2, 2025 07:15:06 AM Information [http-nio-8500-exec-4] - PDFg service manager http://127.0.0.1:8997/PDFgServlet/ registered.

I do have it connected to appache anbd the web root is set so in a file called test.cfm I have:

<cfhtmltopdf>
<h1>Hello World</h1>
</cfhtmltopdf>

When I naviage here (http://localhost/library/pfdf/test.cfm) the server tings about it and finally display this:

http://localhost/library/pfdf/test.cfm?&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__&__

 

There is nothig written to the coldfusion or Jetty logs!! I an at a loss as to why. Previously I have used windows with no issues. But I need it to run on linux for a customer. Does any body have any ideas as to what is going on?

Correct answer iclark3509

Charlie, thank you for your help and here are my final notes:

 

To summarize, we had wanted to setup on Red Hat Enterprise Servers a single instance of the PDF Manager to handle calls from multiple ColdFusion servers ( currently running coldfusion 2023).

 

If you follow the Adobe instructions you will get the fonts that go in usr/share/fonts, but what you will not see is that first the PDFReactor underlying the remote pdf service requires a JVM flag -Djava.awt.headless=true, that goes in to jetty start.ini file. You also need to edit the jetty/etc/jetty-ipaccess.xml file on that server to add the IP of any cf server that needs to access the PDF service.

 

The next big items are the required ports. From the client to the PDF Manager server, you need 8995 (default for 2023 but it could be different). The one that there is no apparent documentation on is that port 5500 on the calling cf server must be reachable from the pdf service machine. This is the one that had been giving me issues.  This is used to receive the rendered PDF from the PDF Manager.

 

And I made sure the firewall had this port open, but it still did not connect. I initially thought it might be still some other firewall or gateway machine blocking it.

 

But while trying to set a web server connection between ColdFusion and Apache and getting 503 error messages, I saw references to "SELinux". This is a security layer on Red Hat Linux servers that was enabled without my knowledge, which was blocking the port.

 

As soon as port 5500 was opened up in SELINUX, my connector worked and so did the remote PDF generation.

 

While I did waste a lot of time on these port issues, as a developer I did get our Linux Admins to think about giving the developers more insight into what was configured on the virtual servers so hopefully going forward we will have more insight and visibility.

 

Ian

3 replies

Charlie Arehart
Community Expert
Charlie ArehartCommunity Expert
Community Expert
July 28, 2025

Readers who come here to the bottom of this multi-page list of replies should take note that Ian had raised in late July a new issue about remote PDF services issues. Some good news is that it seems he's come to a resolution on that, but given the threaded nature of this UI it's not here at the end (or even on this currently second page) but instead in another discussion.

See the couple of messages between us above and below this one of his where he reported seeming to have made real progress, especially dealing with firewall matter which I suspected was at issue--regarding the port 5500 that the remote add-on service calls back to (in the CF instance trying to create the PDF). Much more on this there.

I just want to add this here for those who may "jump to the bottom" to find the conclusion. I realize that it's possible that in time still other new messages may appear here, but I'm writing this on the preumption this may just as likely remain as the "last message" in the thread here. 🙂

/Charlie (troubleshooter, carehart. org)
I
iclark3509AuthorCorrect answer
Inspiring
August 13, 2025

Charlie, thank you for your help and here are my final notes:

 

To summarize, we had wanted to setup on Red Hat Enterprise Servers a single instance of the PDF Manager to handle calls from multiple ColdFusion servers ( currently running coldfusion 2023).

 

If you follow the Adobe instructions you will get the fonts that go in usr/share/fonts, but what you will not see is that first the PDFReactor underlying the remote pdf service requires a JVM flag -Djava.awt.headless=true, that goes in to jetty start.ini file. You also need to edit the jetty/etc/jetty-ipaccess.xml file on that server to add the IP of any cf server that needs to access the PDF service.

 

The next big items are the required ports. From the client to the PDF Manager server, you need 8995 (default for 2023 but it could be different). The one that there is no apparent documentation on is that port 5500 on the calling cf server must be reachable from the pdf service machine. This is the one that had been giving me issues.  This is used to receive the rendered PDF from the PDF Manager.

 

And I made sure the firewall had this port open, but it still did not connect. I initially thought it might be still some other firewall or gateway machine blocking it.

 

But while trying to set a web server connection between ColdFusion and Apache and getting 503 error messages, I saw references to "SELinux". This is a security layer on Red Hat Linux servers that was enabled without my knowledge, which was blocking the port.

 

As soon as port 5500 was opened up in SELINUX, my connector worked and so did the remote PDF generation.

 

While I did waste a lot of time on these port issues, as a developer I did get our Linux Admins to think about giving the developers more insight into what was configured on the virtual servers so hopefully going forward we will have more insight and visibility.

 

Ian

Charlie Arehart
Community Expert
Charlie ArehartCommunity Expert
Community Expert
August 13, 2025

Great to see the concluding summary and to hear that the key was first that port 5500 (which readers can find I introduced and discussed more above) and then that selinux was blocking it even once you'd opened it in your firewall (this is the first mention of that here, so thanks). 

 

These are indeed all valuable things for folks (and Adobe) to consider about enabling remote pdf services, especially when they are on different machines or using selinux. I hope the additional discussion of diagnosing the problem may help others, especially when the port numbers maybe different (for any of several reasons, also discussed above).

 

Best of all, glad it's resolved for you. When you first raised this new part of the discussion in May, you seemed on the verge of feeling you'd need to move off of CF, or perhaps only for pdf services. Surely many get to that point, and some may feel justified or even encouraged by that prospect (or alternatives they may find).

 

Given that Adobe licenses PDF Reactor as the underlying engine for cfhtmltopdf (since cf2023), which would be VERY expensive for us to do on our own, I'm all the more happy that we all on this thread have contributed key knowledge to the community. Indeed, I hope to do a blog post with my own summary of the conclusion, as some won't have the stomach to wade through all this, or may not even see your summary--which I will mark now as another "answer" for this thread. 🙂 

/Charlie (troubleshooter, carehart. org)
I
iclark3509Author
Inspiring
June 9, 2025

I did not get an answer from Adobe but I found that PDFReactor required a JVM setting if it was not running with a graphicl inferface. So in the jetty start.ini I added -Djava.awt.headless=true restarted Jetty and it worked. Ubuntu has a GUI so it kind of threw me as to why this would work. But in did. This was on a developer addition of ColdFusion2025. I then had a docker container with coldfusion2023 that had the same issue. I checked it heare and it worked as well.

So for now this appears to be resolved.

BKBK
Community Expert
BKBKCommunity Expert
Community Expert
June 10, 2025

Thanks for sharing your solution, @iclark3509 .

A
Community Manager
AbhishekJhaCommunity Manager
Community Manager
May 2, 2025

@iclark3509 Please reach out to cfsup@adobe.com

 

Thanks,

Abhishek

BKBK
Community Expert
BKBKCommunity Expert
Community Expert
May 7, 2025

@iclark3509  and @AbhishekJha , I hope you did eventually identify and resolve the issue. If so, could you please share?

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