Can't run Confluence due to com.atlassian.config.ConfigurationException: Failed to parse config file
Platform notice: Server and Data Center only. This article only applies to Atlassian products on the Server and Data Center platforms.
Support for Server* products ended on February 15th 2024. If you are running a Server product, you can visit the Atlassian Server end of support announcement to review your migration options.
*Except Fisheye and Crucible
Problem
After changes in Confluence's MySQL database URL, Confluence is not running and following appears in the catalina.out:
2015-03-24 07:45:29,857 ERROR [localhost-startStop-1] [atlassian.config.bootstrap.DefaultAtlassianBootstrapManager] init Home is not configured properly:
com.atlassian.config.ConfigurationException: Failed to parse config file: Error on line 23 of document : The reference to entity "zeroDateTimeBehavior" must end with the ';' delimiter. Nested exception: The reference to entity "zeroDateTimeBehavior" must end with the ';' delimiter.
at com.atlassian.config.xml.DefaultDom4jXmlConfigurationPersister.load(DefaultDom4jXmlConfigurationPersister.java:35)
at com.atlassian.config.xml.DefaultDom4jXmlConfigurationPersister.load(DefaultDom4jXmlConfigurationPersister.java:65)
at com.atlassian.config.ApplicationConfig.load(ApplicationConfig.java:262)
at com.atlassian.config.bootstrap.DefaultAtlassianBootstrapManager.init(DefaultAtlassianBootstrapManager.java:68)
at com.atlassian.config.util.BootstrapUtils.init(BootstrapUtils.java:36)
at com.atlassian.confluence.setup.ConfluenceConfigurationListener.initialiseBootstrapContext(ConfluenceConfigurationListener.java:129)
at com.atlassian.confluence.setup.ConfluenceConfigurationListener.contextInitialized(ConfluenceConfigurationListener.java:64)
at org.apache.catalina.core.StandardContext.listenerStart(StandardContext.java:4973)
at org.apache.catalina.core.StandardContext.startInternal(StandardContext.java:5467)
at org.apache.catalina.util.LifecycleBase.start(LifecycleBase.java:150)
at org.apache.catalina.core.ContainerBase$StartChild.call(ContainerBase.java:1559)
at org.apache.catalina.core.ContainerBase$StartChild.call(ContainerBase.java:1549)
at java.util.concurrent.FutureTask$Sync.innerRun(Unknown Source)
at java.util.concurrent.FutureTask.run(Unknown Source)
at java.util.concurrent.ThreadPoolExecutor.runWorker(Unknown Source)
at java.util.concurrent.ThreadPoolExecutor$Worker.run(Unknown Source)
at java.lang.Thread.run(Unknown Source)
Caused by: org.dom4j.DocumentException: Error on line 23 of document : The reference to entity "zeroDateTimeBehavior" must end with the ';' delimiter. Nested exception: The reference to entity "zeroDateTimeBehavior" must end with the ';' delimiter.
at org.dom4j.io.SAXReader.read(SAXReader.java:355)
at org.dom4j.io.SAXReader.read(SAXReader.java:261)
at com.atlassian.config.xml.AbstractDom4jXmlConfigurationPersister.loadDocument(AbstractDom4jXmlConfigurationPersister.java:68)
at com.atlassian.config.xml.DefaultDom4jXmlConfigurationPersister.load(DefaultDom4jXmlConfigurationPersister.java:31)
... 16 more
Cause
Confluence can't start due to the special character in the XML file (&). In above scenario, there is a delimiter ';' before zeroDateTimeBehavior entity.
This has also been observed when special characters are present in the database password string: hibernate.connection.password
Resolution
- Shut down Confluence.
- Open
confluence.cfg.xmlin text editor. - Shut down Confluence.
Edit
<confluence-home>/confluence.cfg.xmlfile and change the"hibernate.connection.url"and remove '&' from the URL:jdbc:mysql://localhost/confluencedb?autoReconnect=true&<EntityFromError>
Please replace <EntityFromError>to your entity.- Start Confluence.
- Clear Confluence plugins cache.
- Try to generate backup.