ColdFusion 11 - Jetty Unresponsive - can't access solr

[marco99]

I can't access the ColdFusion collections from the CF Admin. I went to access solr directly through the jetty server interface (127.0.0.1:8987/solr/) and the screen is blank (web page never loads - browser just keeps trying to load it). Looking at log files, everything seems ok with solr - there are no startup issues recorded in the jetty log files (it ends with stating that solr and PDFgServlet are loaded and available) or any of the CF log files.

The server is a Windows 2012 R2 box with latest patches. CF 11 Enterprise with latest patch (I rolled back to patch #3 just to see if it was a recent CF patch that caused the issue, but no change). 96 GB of RAM and Xeon processors leads be to believe it isn't a resource issue (RAM and CPU resources aren't being taxed in the slightest). The only other software on the server is SQL Server 2016 Web Edition.

I tried this on another server with the same configuration, same problem. I tried a 3rd server with a slightly different model Xeon processors and SQL Server 2014 Web Edition and it works on this server. I doubt that SQL Server 2016 is the issue. I stopped the SQL 2016 instances and still couldn't connect to jetty.

I think that the issue is the jetty web server and not solr. I see nothing in the log files that shows there is any issue loading solr. I also launched solr with debugging turned on, which provided a ton of information, but nothing showing any errors.

Any ideas? Anyone with any other jetty issues?

[Vikram Kumar M]

Hi Marc,

Are you seeing any error message while accessing the ColdFusion collections? Also, please check if the port 8987 is open.

Thanks,

Vikram

[marco99]

Port 8987 is open. I even tried moving it to another port just to verify and ended up with the same result. I saw another thread in here about issues with solr (same initial issue in that the user couldn't access their collections) and there was a recommendation to install the standalone add-on services for ColdFusion 11, so I tried that (assigned to a different port) with no luck as well. I've read that the most recent versions of solr (6.0+) don't use jetty, but I would have no idea how to connect it to work with ColdFusion.

When accessing the ColdFusion Collections, after a long delay, there is a message that appears:

Unable to retrieve collections from the Search Services.

Ensure that you have installed ColdFusion Search Service and it is running.

This seems to be a general message that ColdFusion can't talk to solr. I get the same message if I completely shut down the add-on service (killing solr and jetty services).

[Vikram Kumar M]

Hi Marc,

Could you please contact us at cf.install@adobe.com to investigate further on this issue?

Thanks,

Vikram

[marco99]

Done. Thanks Vikram. This is a very puzzling issue and I'm digging deeper into jetty/solr than my experience will support.

[WolfShade]

Just out of curiosity:

1) Which version of the CF11 installer did you use, the one with Java 1.7, or Java 1.8?

2) If you used the one with Java 1.7, did you upgrade the Java to 1.8?

The reason I ask is because I've had issues with CF10 (originally installed with Java 1.6) and upgrading the Java.  Once we reached Java 1.7 u 25, that was the last time we could successfully access Solr collections.  Once we upgraded to Java 1.7 u 31, the Solr collections could no longer be used.  We had to roll back to 1.7 u 25, because Sun had removed certain network permissions from u 31 that were available in prior versions.

CF11 installer originally used Java 1.7.  There is now a Java 1.8 version available (or at least there was - Adobe really sucks when it comes to being able to download previous versions of any of their products.)  If not, you could always look into the CFREPO download section to see.  The CF10 installer with Java 1.8 did not cause any issues with Solr collections.  I suspect that the Java 1.8 version of CF11 will also work fine with Solr.

HTH,

^_^

[marco99]

It is Java 1.8. That's the version in the ColdFusion11\jre as well as the version bundled with jetty (ColdFusion11\cfusion\jetty\jre).

[marco99]

Just poking around I stumbled across the jetty.xml configuration file in ColdFusion11\cfusion\lib and noted that it referenced a jetty instance to be loaded at port 5500, so I tried pointing a browser to that (http:\\localhost:5500) and got a 404 error msg (file not found) with a "Powered by Jetty" footer. So, at least I know that jetty is running.

[marco99 · Accepted solution]

I talked to Adobe support and walked through this problem and, the ultimate fix was to reinstall the Adobe Add-On Service (uninstall it, then reinstall it back into the same location with otherwise default settings). As soon as that was done, it worked just like it should. I had previously tried this, but I let it install in the default folder it recommended, outside of the CF Server instance root (cfusion).

I would also like to add that Adobe support was very helpful through this process. I've used ColdFusion since Macromedia CF 4.5 and support has always been a pain point, outside of the user community. When this error occurred and I posted it here, I just assumed, based on previous experiences, that Adobe wouldn't be providing assistance. I was pleasantly surprised the Adobe stepped up and took ownership of helping resolve the issue. Thank you Vikram and thank you Adobe!