Apache fails to start

Submitted by Shirehosting on Sun, 01/11/2015 - 18:13 Pro Licensee

Hi

Apache is failing to start after an update.

Output of dpkg -l libapache2-mod-php5

dpkg -l libapache2-mod-php5 Desired=Unknown/Install/Remove/Purge/Hold | Status=Not/Inst/Conf-files/Unpacked/halF-conf/Half-inst/trig-aWait/Trig-pend |/ Err?=(none)/Reinst-required (Status,Err: uppercase=bad) ||/ Name Version Architecture Description +++-==================================-=============================-============-========================================================================== rc libapache2-mod-php5 5.4.36-0+deb7u1 amd64 server-side, HTML-embedded scripting language (Apache 2 module)

Thanks

Status: 
Active

Comments

Submitted by andreychek on Sun, 01/11/2015 - 20:35

Howdy -- ah, it looks like mod_php is no longer installed.

Did you happen to enable Apache's threaded "worker" mode recently? If the default prefork mode is removed, it will take mod_php with it, and can cause what you're seeing.

We can determine that with this command:

dpkg -l 'apache*'`

If you don't need the Apache worker mode though, the above can be corrected by either reinstalling mod_php, or by commenting out the lines that are causing the syntax error in the Apache config (we can help with how to reinstall mod_php).

Submitted by Shirehosting on Sun, 01/11/2015 - 21:05 Pro Licensee

Hi thanks for the response.

This server has just been sitting there running for months I never touch it, as it only has 2 sites on it. (we have 5 other servers pro and gpl running as well). So I don't know other then this stopped working with the last virtualmin update yesterday.

So .If I'm understanding you right,

the mode I use here is FCGId, not mod_php, but if it doesn't cause any security concerns to reinstall mod_php but still use FCGId then I'm happy to do that.

Output of dpkg -l 'apache*

dpkg -l 'apache*' Desired=Unknown/Install/Remove/Purge/Hold | Status=Not/Inst/Conf-files/Unpacked/halF-conf/Half-inst/trig-aWait/Trig-pend |/ Err?=(none)/Reinst-required (Status,Err: uppercase=bad) ||/ Name Version Architecture Description +++-==================================-=============================-============-========================================================================== un apache (no description available) un apache-common (no description available) un apache-utils (no description available) ii apache2 2.2.22-13+deb7u4 amd64 Apache HTTP Server metapackage un apache2-common (no description available) ii apache2-doc 2.2.22-13+deb7u4 all Apache HTTP Server documentation un apache2-mpm (no description available) un apache2-mpm-event (no description available) un apache2-mpm-itk (no description available) ii apache2-mpm-prefork 2.2.22-13+deb7u4 amd64 Apache HTTP Server - traditional non-threaded model un apache2-mpm-worker (no description available) un apache2-suexec (no description available) ii apache2-suexec-custom 2.2.22-13+deb7u4 amd64 Configurable suexec program for Apache 2 mod_suexec ii apache2-utils 2.2.22-13+deb7u4 amd64 utility programs for webservers ii apache2.2-bin 2.2.22-13+deb7u4 amd64 Apache HTTP Server common binary files ii apache2.2-common 2.2.22-13+deb7u4 amd64 Apache HTTP Server common files

Submitted by andreychek on Sun, 01/11/2015 - 21:13

Yeah it looks like it might just be a matter of re-installing mod_php. You can do that with this command:

apt-get install libapache2-mod-php5

Once you do that, are you then able to start Apache?

Submitted by Shirehosting on Sun, 01/11/2015 - 21:20 Pro Licensee

Hi AndrewChek

I reinstalled as requested and now its up and running again.

Thanks for your time as usual.

BTW any ideas why it stopped working ? (just for future reference).

Thanks Michael

Submitted by MattWilcox on Mon, 01/12/2015 - 07:52

That has worked for me too, Apache's back up; I have no idea why the PHP module was uninstalled though, that doesn't make much sense to me :/

Submitted by andreychek on Mon, 01/12/2015 - 10:05

Hmm, that's all very unusual! I'm not sure what might be causing mod_php to be uninstalled.

I can't see any reason why Virtualmin itself would remove that, though I'm do some testing with it, along with other recent Debian/Ubuntu updates, to see if we can reproduce that.

Submitted by MattWilcox on Mon, 01/12/2015 - 10:29

Thanks :) FYI I'm on Debian 7.8, I'm pretty sure the machine started out on 7.7 so I'm not sure if it's recently done an auto update :/

Submitted by Shirehosting on Tue, 01/13/2015 - 06:42 Pro Licensee

I'm on Deb 7.7

Submitted by TheULi on Tue, 01/13/2015 - 15:08

Hello, this was a failure of updating apache thru webmin.

/var/log/apt/history.log ...

Start-Date: 2015-01-10  21:58:19
Commandline: apt-get -y install apache2
Install: apache2-mpm-itk:amd64 (2.2.22-13+deb7u4, automatic)
Upgrade: apache2:amd64 (2.2.22-13+deb7u3, 2.2.22-13+deb7u4), apache2.2-common:amd64 (2.2.22-13+deb7u3, 2.2.22-13+deb7u4), apache2.2-bin:amd64 (2.2.22-13+deb7u3, 2.2.22-13+deb7u4)
Remove: libapache2-mod-php5:amd64 (5.4.36-0+deb7u1), apache2-mpm-prefork:amd64 (2.2.22-13+deb7u3)
End-Date: 2015-01-10  21:58:58

it removes libapache2-mod-php5 but did not install it again.

Regards. Ulrich

Francewhoa's picture
Submitted by Francewhoa on Sat, 08/01/2015 - 21:12

We're confirming this bug with Virtualmin 4.18.gpl

Manually reinstalling "libapache2-mod-php5" package fixed that bug. Thanks to AndrewChek and Ulrich/TheULi for the tip :)

Steps to reproduce that bug

  1. Using Virtualmin update to Apache 2.2
  2. Reboot. Apache will not start. Error message below.

Using

  • Operating system: Debian GNU/Linux 7.8 (Wheezy)
  • Virtualmin: 4.18.gpl
  • Webmin version: 1.760

Below is an extract from Virtualmin message. Notice that "libapache2-mod-php5" is automatically removed while updating to Apache 2.2 thru Virtualmin. And not automatically install again.

The following packages will be REMOVED:
  apache2-mpm-prefork libapache2-mod-php5

Below is the full first part of Virtualmin message

Update Packages

Now updating apache2 ..

Installing package(s) with command apt-get -y install apache2 ..

Reading package lists...
Building dependency tree...
Reading state information...
The following package was automatically installed and is no longer required:
  php-console-table
Use 'apt-get autoremove' to remove it.
The following extra packages will be installed:
  apache2-mpm-itk apache2.2-bin apache2.2-common
The following packages will be REMOVED:
  apache2-mpm-prefork libapache2-mod-php5
The following NEW packages will be installed:
  apache2-mpm-itk
The following packages will be upgraded:
  apache2 apache2.2-bin apache2.2-common
3 upgraded, 1 newly installed, 2 to remove and 3 not upgraded.
Need to get 1089 kB of archives.
[...]

Error message when starting Apache 2.2

Error 

Failed to start service :

Starting web server: apache2Syntax error on line 33 of /etc/apache2/sites-enabled/[***].conf:

Invalid command 'php_admin_value', perhaps misspelled or defined by a module not included in the server configuration

Action 'start' failed.

The Apache error log may have more information.

failed!

Submitted by Shirehosting on Tue, 08/18/2015 - 10:25 Pro Licensee

Hi Guys

This is still happening with apache updates (2 times in the last month). Will this be looked at or are we doomed to reinstall mod_php each time ?

Thanks Michael

Submitted by andreychek on Tue, 08/18/2015 - 10:32

Sorry for the delay, I'm talking to Jamie about how best we can address that issue.

Submitted by MattWilcox on Tue, 08/18/2015 - 10:46

Thanks for looking into this - I had such a panic when I got hit by this again a few weeks ago, and I'd forgotten what the problem was. Turned out to be the same thing when I eventually stumbled on this post again.

I've now documented the problem in my wiki so I can at least remember to try re-installing libapache2-mod-php5 if it happens again.

Francewhoa's picture
Submitted by Francewhoa on Tue, 08/18/2015 - 12:25

Thanks for investigating andreychek and Jamie :)

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