After attempting to install plugin, Discourse no longer loads (Phusion Passenger Cannot Start the web application)

Product Support Self-hosting

AI-generated summary

Josh_Universe encountered a critical issue after attempting to install a plugin on their Bitnami-hosted Discourse instance, causing Phusion Passenger to fail and the forum to become inaccessible Josh_Universe. They followed Bitnami’s plugin installation guide but encountered errors detailed in pastebin logs Josh_Universe. Stephen explained that Bitnami packages are unsupported here and recommended switching to the standard Discourse installation, which is simpler and well-supported. Josh asked about migrating data without frontend access Josh_Universe, and Stephen advised restoring from a backup — but Josh confirmed no backup existed Josh_Universe. After discussing the importance of preserving members Josh_Universe, Josh decided to rebuild using the official Discourse installation method, which succeeded Josh_Universe. They now have backups in place and are working on Mailgun integration, inviting community suggestions for improvements. The key takeaway: avoid unsupported third-party packages like Bitnami for Discourse unless you’re prepared to handle breakage without official support.

1

Greetings,

I was attempting to install a Discourse plugin for my forums and upon doing so, Discourse completely stopped working due the plugin installation breaking Phusion Passenger not working.

I followed this guide when installing the plugin: https://docs.bitnami.com/aws/apps/discourse/configuration/install-plugins/

When you visit https://forum.joshuniverse.com you receive the following error page:

— ERROR MSG —
pastebin com/ Ft0cAWNC

– LOG FILE –

pastebin com/ uBxs6vJ3

I am unable to upload a log file so I have provided the log below the error message. The pastebin links are missing a dot and have a space before the slash because “new users cannot upload more than 2 links”. Thank you to anyone who decides to help me get this fixed :heart:

2

Hey Josh, how was this instance installed?

3

Hi, I used this here: AWS Marketplace

Please note that it was working perfectly until I ran these commands(trying to install plugins) pastebin com/uBxs6vJ3 by following this guide: https://docs.bitnami.com/aws/apps/discourse/configuration/install-plugins/

4

I’m afraid we can’t offer support for the bitnami packages here. They’ve been created by a third party and issues like yours aren’t uncommon. If you want to continue using them I would recommend you reach out to the creators of the package.

The free assistance offered here focuses on the standard install, which is very straightforward and can usually be completed in less than 30 minutes.

5

is there a way to like move files from one sever to another like just from the backend since I cannot access the front end?

6

If you can access the filesystem and have taken a recent backup, then you can restore from said backup.

7

becuase the normal way looks just like the other way but just installing the package and the normal discourse config so it doesn’t look bad

8

i have not taken a backup :c

9

Is this a new site? Is it active? What specifically would you be looking to preserve?

10

https://forum.joshuniverse.com

I am looking to preserve members without having to reinvite people

11

If I can just preserve the members then I am good to reinstall it

12

Yeah, I was not able to figure it out so I created a forum using the official installation method and it worked! I am still trying to get it to work with mailgun. Also made sure to backup both the discourse backup and the disk backup!

If you have any suggestions to help me improve it, please LMK! https://forum.joshuniverse.com/