Summary

When an agent opens any request from a Jira Service Management (JSM) project, the Related knowledge base articles panel is empty and only shows a red exclamation mark without any error:

Environment

• Jira Service Management (JSM) Server/Data Center on 4.12.0 and any higher version
• A knowledge base is setup in a JSM project with a space Confluence Cloud (not Confluence Server/Data Center), as per Set up a knowledge base with Confluence Cloud

Diagnosis

• The JSM Server/Data Center application was properly configured per Set up a knowledge base with Confluence Cloud, meaning that the Confluence Cloud was added via the page ⚙ > Applications > Confluence Cloud integration
  
  

• Checking the atlassian-jira.log file, the following error can be seen:

  2023-01-17 15:28:05,624+0100 https-jsse-nio-443-exec-89 ERROR svetlana.saponjic@atlanticgrupa.com 928x2398634x1 1euqw48 10.81.29.96 /rest/servicedesk/knowledgebase/latest/articles/search [c.a.p.r.c.error.jersey.ThrowableExceptionMapper] Uncaught exception thrown by REST service: null
  java.lang.StackOverflowError
  	at java.base/java.lang.String.toLowerCase(Unknown Source)
  	at java.base/java.lang.String.toLowerCase(Unknown Source)
  	at com.sun.jersey.core.util.StringIgnoreCaseKeyComparator.hash(StringIgnoreCaseKeyComparator.java:53)
  	at com.sun.jersey.core.util.StringIgnoreCaseKeyComparator.hash(StringIgnoreCaseKeyComparator.java:48)
  	at com.sun.jersey.core.util.KeyComparatorHashMap.keyComparatorHash(KeyComparatorHashMap.java:294)
  	at com.sun.jersey.core.util.KeyComparatorHashMap.containsKey(KeyComparatorHashMap.java:359)
  	at com.sun.jersey.api.client.filter.HTTPBasicAuthFilter.handle(HTTPBasicAuthFilter.java:102)
  	at com.sun.jersey.api.client.filter.HTTPBasicAuthFilter.handle(HTTPBasicAuthFilter.java:105)
  	at com.sun.jersey.api.client.filter.HTTPBasicAuthFilter.handle(HTTPBasicAuthFilter.java:105)
  	at com.sun.jersey.api.client.filter.HTTPBasicAuthFilter.handle(HTTPBasicAuthFilter.java:105)
  	at com.sun.jersey.api.client.filter.HTTPBasicAuthFilter.handle(HTTPBasicAuthFilter.java:105)
  	at com.sun.jersey.api.client.filter.HTTPBasicAuthFilter.handle(HTTPBasicAuthFilter.java:105)
  	at com.sun.jersey.api.client.filter.HTTPBasicAuthFilter.handle(HTTPBasicAuthFilter.java:105)
  	at com.sun.jersey.api.client.filter.HTTPBasicAuthFilter.handle(HTTPBasicAuthFilter.java:105)

• Checking the atlassian-servicedesk.log file, the following error might be seen:

  2023-01-03 15:24:24,861-0500 https-jsse-nio-8443-exec-68 url:/issues/rest/se...les/<ISSUE_KEY> username:someuser ERROR <SANITIZED DATA> /rest/servicedesk/knowledgebase/latest/articles/<ISSUE_KEY> [confluenceknowledgebase.cloud.client.ConfluenceCloudClientImpl] Failed to call Confluence Cloud API for path /rest/api/search
  com.sun.jersey.api.client.ClientHandlerException: java.lang.IllegalStateException: Stream handler unavailable due to: null
  	at com.sun.jersey.client.urlconnection.URLConnectionClientHandler.handle(URLConnectionClientHandler.java:155)
  	at com.sun.jersey.api.client.filter.HTTPBasicAuthFilter.handle(HTTPBasicAuthFilter.java:105)
  	at com.sun.jersey.api.client.filter.HTTPBasicAuthFilter.handle(HTTPBasicAuthFilter.java:105)
  	at com.sun.jersey.api.client.filter.HTTPBasicAuthFilter.handle(HTTPBasicAuthFilter.java:105)
  	at com.sun.jersey.api.client.filter.HTTPBasicAuthFilter.handle(HTTPBasicAuthFilter.java:105)
  	at com.sun.jersey.api.client.filter.HTTPBasicAuthFilter.handle(HTTPBasicAuthFilter.java:105)
  	at com.sun.jersey.api.client.filter.HTTPBasicAuthFilter.handle(HTTPBasicAuthFilter.java:105)
  	at com.sun.jersey.api.client.filter.HTTPBasicAuthFilter.handle(HTTPBasicAuthFilter.java:105)
  	at com.sun.jersey.api.client.filter.HTTPBasicAuthFilter.handle(HTTPBasicAuthFilter.java:105)
  	at com.sun.jersey.api.client.filter.HTTPBasicAuthFilter.handle(HTTPBasicAuthFilter.java:105)
  	at com.sun.jersey.api.client.filter.HTTPBasicAuthFilter.handle(HTTPBasicAuthFilter.java:105)
  	at com.sun.jersey.api.client.filter.HTTPBasicAuthFilter.handle(HTTPBasicAuthFilter.java:105)
  	at com.sun.jersey.api.client.filter.HTTPBasicAuthFilter.handle(HTTPBasicAuthFilter.java:105)
  	at com.sun.jersey.api.client.filter.HTTPBasicAuthFilter.handle(HTTPBasicAuthFilter.java:105)
  	at com.sun.jersey.api.client.filter.HTTPBasicAuthFilter.handle(HTTPBasicAuthFilter.java:105)

Cause

This issue is caused by a JSM bug, where the filter allowing to authenticate the request made to Confluence Cloud is added at each request. This is causing a stack overflow when an exception occurs on Confluence side but also eats up a lot of memory unnecessarily even when the request works fine.

Link to the JSM bug: JSDSERVER-12210 - Getting issue details... STATUS

Solution

Short Term Solution

The short term workaround is to restart the Jira application.

Please note that the Jira restart is not a long term workaround, because the calls will eventually build up into the error which will occur again, making it necessary to restart the Jira application again.

Long Term Solution

Upgrade the JSM application to the fixed version mentioned in the link bug ticket.