Apache :: Apache 2.2 not Auto starting Server 2012 Essentials

Rickhtoo

I will greatly appreciate any input on my problem, I only have a few hairs left.. We have used Apache on Server 2012 Standard without any problems at all, but it simply will not auto start using 2012 Essentials.

I installed Essentials, demoted the Domain and removed all Domain and web server services. Apache will start and stop manually without any problems, but that is the only way. I have tried everything I can think of including creating a task in task scheduler to run it on start up but still nothing... All of our other services start normally including mysql, it's only Apache that is giving us headaches.

If I restart and open services immediately after logging in, I can see that the service is 'starting' but when I refresh again, it's stopped stays that way. I enable the crash recovery options, and they do nothing. Once it fails to start, it never tries again. However, as soon as it fails I can manually start it with a batch file, and it starts right up..

I'm at my wits end, if anyone has a clue what might be causing this I would greatly appreciate any help you can give. Thanks!

Rick

Steffen

Which version of Apache ?

How did you installed the Aapache service ? With >httpd -k install ?

Anything in the Apache and/or Windows Event viewer ?

Rickhtoo

Thanks for the reply. Version 2.2.15.

Yes, that is the command used to install the service, which has always worked. I can manually remove, install, stop, and start the service without a problem.

The failure message in the event viewer is no help at all, it simply says the service did not respond in a timely fashion, and took longer than the default 30000 milliseconds..

We also use Team Viewer as remote access, so I have to make sure Apache is running when I install it so it won't try and take port 80. After that it has always worked flawlessly until now.

After much troubleshooting, I was able to get the service to auto start but only under a specific set of settings. They are:

Apache service set to delayed start
TV set to not use port 80 and 443.
Creating a start up task in the scheduler to run the start command

If any of those settings are changed, it will fail to auto start. Even though TV does not take port 80, I still have to have the setting enabled for this to work. immediately after the service fails to start, I can manually start the service without a problem. It actually is the scheduled task that is starting the service, but it only works under those specific settings which are not ideal for our purposes..

Something is different about Essentials compared to Standard and I just can't figure it out. I have duplicated the service settings between the 2 versions so they should work exactly the same way, but there is something special about it I cant' figure out.

Rick

Rickhtoo

Another oddity I found, I tried increasing the service timeout period, and it doesn't appear to have any affect.. Although in the event log error message, it notes the longer timeout period, it still times out in a short amount of time (30 seconds).. There are also times when I can't start it using the service start function, but I can start it using the command line. Then there are other times when the command line doesn't work but the service start method does.. Only I could run into a situation this weird...

During the times when the service start method fails, it tries for the default 30 seconds and then stops even though the ServicePipeTimeout is set for 180 seconds..

James Blond

my guess is to create a new local user and let the service run with that user.

Rickhtoo

Unfortunately, that is not an option, it must start without a user logging in.

However it appears that the fix will be to upgrade to 2.4 as it works properly. We are in the process of reconfiguring 2.4 to work with our software. For some reason, 2.2 has a compatibility issue with Essentials, or at least will not auto start on it's own.

One must change to keep up with advancements in technology..

Thanks

James Blond

That is not what I meant!
You can run the service as different local user. it will use the user without a login.

Rickhtoo

I guess I still don't understand what you are saying, but I doubt what you are saying will work. I believe I may have figured out what is happening, and I think it's because I have been using the R2 version of Essentials.

It works properly on Server 2012 Standard (non R2) so I am going to try the non R2 version of Essentials and see what happens. Using any 2012 R2 OS it appears will have this issue, if my observations are correct, and will require a total update of Apache, PHP, and Mysql to make it work properly.

The other option is to simply let the task scheduler start Apache, and continue with R2 for now until we have the time to update and test a newer version of the software. Thanks

James Blond

See the answer from http://superuser.com/questions/301864/run-tomcat-service-as-different-user-on-windows-7