# Discourse Went Down Suddenly. No one can log in
**URL:** https://meta.discourse.org/t/discourse-went-down-suddenly-no-one-can-log-in/272552
**Category:** Self-hosting
**Tags:** two-container
**Created:** [July 23, 2023, 1:27pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/discourse-went-down-suddenly-no-one-can-log-in/272552 "2023-07-23T13:27:02Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@WesPenre](https://meta.discourse.org/u/WesPenre)
#### Post date: [July 23, 2023, 1:27pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/discourse-went-down-suddenly-no-one-can-log-in/272552/1 "2023-07-23T13:27:03Z")
My Discourse at [wespenreboards.com](http://wespenreboards.com) has been down for a few hours. Members tell me that some get the error message that the forum could have been hacked. Another says that they get the message the certificate has expired. A third person now gets this message: “FetchEvent.respondWith received an error:no-response.”
When I try to log in myself (I’m the Admin), I just get the spinning wheel. The forum is up-to-date, so the certificate should be also. To be sure I ran this:
```plaintext
cd /var/discourse
git pull
./launcher bootstrap web_only && ./launcher destroy web_only && ./launcher start web_only
```
But it doesn’t help.
Anyone having any ideas?
---
### Author:  [@Ed\_S](https://meta.discourse.org/u/Ed_S)
#### Post date: [July 24, 2023, 11:22am UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/discourse-went-down-suddenly-no-one-can-log-in/272552/5 "2023-07-24T11:22:26Z")
Do you have any kind of CDN in play?
If you ssh to your server, and try
```plaintext
wget -q --timeout=3 https://localhost/privacy -O - |egrep generator
```
does that work?
How about
```plaintext
wget -q --no-check-certificate --timeout=3 https://localhost/privacy -O - |egrep generator
```
How about if you put your full URL in there instead of localhost? Try both versions of the command.
---
### Author:  [@JammyDodger](https://meta.discourse.org/u/JammyDodger)
#### Post date: [July 24, 2023, 11:29am UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/discourse-went-down-suddenly-no-one-can-log-in/272552/6 "2023-07-24T11:29:37Z")
Hey Wes :slight_smile:
It doesn’t look like your site is up at the moment. Have you done anything in the meantime?
I’m wondering if you may need to update your data container if it’s not been done in awhile. I’m still a little hazy on the two-container set-up, so I’ll pop an @pfaffman bat signal in as I’m sure he knows more about the rhythm for that. :crossed_fingers: :slight_smile:
---
### Author:  [@WesPenre](https://meta.discourse.org/u/WesPenre)
#### Post date: [July 24, 2023, 11:50am UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/discourse-went-down-suddenly-no-one-can-log-in/272552/7 "2023-07-24T11:50:28Z")
Hi Jammy! I remember you since before. I did an update/upgrade in the meantime. That’s all… OK, I’ll wait until pfaffman comes on then.
---
### Author:  [@WesPenre](https://meta.discourse.org/u/WesPenre)
#### Post date: [July 24, 2023, 11:50am UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/discourse-went-down-suddenly-no-one-can-log-in/272552/8 "2023-07-24T11:50:44Z")
OK, I’ll try that…
---
### Author:  [@WesPenre](https://meta.discourse.org/u/WesPenre)
#### Post date: [July 24, 2023, 12:01pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/discourse-went-down-suddenly-no-one-can-log-in/272552/9 "2023-07-24T12:01:33Z")
> [@Ed\_S](#):
>
> ```plaintext
> wget -q --timeout=3 https://localhost/privacy -O - |egrep generator
>
> ```
>
> does that work?
>
> How about
>
> ```plaintext
> wget -q --no-check-certificate --timeout=3 https://localhost/privacy -O - |egrep genera
>
> ```
These commands don’t work, but I might do it incorrectly. Do I exchange `https://localhost/privacy` with `https://wespenreboards.com/privacy`?
What does `/privacy` stand for in this case?
---
### Author:  [@Ed\_S](https://meta.discourse.org/u/Ed_S)
#### Post date: [July 24, 2023, 12:22pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/discourse-went-down-suddenly-no-one-can-log-in/272552/10 "2023-07-24T12:22:22Z")
Better if you try them first using literally localhost, and then subsequently try them with your actual domain.
/privacy is just a standard page on every forum: what we’re doing here is seeing if the forum is responding at all, locally.
---
### Author:  [@JammyDodger](https://meta.discourse.org/u/JammyDodger)
#### Post date: [July 24, 2023, 12:31pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/discourse-went-down-suddenly-no-one-can-log-in/272552/11 "2023-07-24T12:31:15Z")
> [@Ed\_S](#):
>
> /privacy is just a standard page on every forum: what we’re doing here is seeing if the forum is responding at all, locally.
This may have updated recently as now the `/privacy` and `/tos` pages only appear when `company name` has been filled in. I don’t know if this would affect the test in this case, but thought it sounded relevant.
There a bit more info on the decision here:
> [@Should privacy policy and ToS be automatically generated on install?](https://meta.discourse.org/t/should-privacy-policy-and-tos-be-automatically-generated-on-install/268778/4):
>
> Hi Jurica! Welcome to Discourse, and good catch. eagle This is a recent change that we made just in the last week. Many sites do not need these legalese pages, especially small, private ones that are not connected to a company or brand. But if you add your company name on the last step in the setup wizard they will be created for you. You can then go and edit them to suit your needs. You also always have the option of linking to TOS and Privacy notice on your main website if you have one. Lo…
---
### Author:  [@WesPenre](https://meta.discourse.org/u/WesPenre)
#### Post date: [July 24, 2023, 12:39pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/discourse-went-down-suddenly-no-one-can-log-in/272552/12 "2023-07-24T12:39:35Z")
> [@Ed\_S](#):
>
> Better if you try them first using literally localhost, and then subsequently try them with your actual domain.
>
> /privacy is just a standard page on every forum: what we’re doing here is seeing if the forum is responding at all, locally.
OK. So, I tried with localhost/privacy. Then only localhost. Then [wespenreboards.com](http://wespenreboards.com) only, and last [wespenreboards.com/localhost](http://wespenreboards.com/localhost). The result was the same using any of them:
---
### Author:  [@WesPenre](https://meta.discourse.org/u/WesPenre)
#### Post date: [July 24, 2023, 12:42pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/discourse-went-down-suddenly-no-one-can-log-in/272552/13 "2023-07-24T12:42:00Z")
> [@JammyDodger](#):
>
> This may have updated recently as now the `/privacy` and `/tos` pages only appear when `company name` has been filled in. I don’t know if this would affect the test in this case, but thought it sounded relevant.
>
> There a bit more info on the decision here:
>
> > [@](#):
> >
> > Hi Jurica! Welcome to Discourse, and good catch. eagle This is a recent change that we made just in the last week. Many sites do not need these legalese pages, especially small, private ones that are not connected to a company or brand. But if you add your company name on the last step in the setup wizard they will be created for you. You can then go and edit them to suit your needs. You also always have the option of linking to TOS and Privacy notice on your main website if you have one. Lo…
So there is nothing I need to do with this?
---
### Author:  [@Ed\_S](https://meta.discourse.org/u/Ed_S)
#### Post date: [July 24, 2023, 12:51pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/discourse-went-down-suddenly-no-one-can-log-in/272552/14 "2023-07-24T12:51:07Z")
> [@JammyDodger](#):
>
> This may have updated recently as now the `/privacy` and `/tos` pages only appear when `company name` has been filled in. I don’t know if this would affect the test in this case, but thought it sounded relevant.
That’s interesting - it’s used in discourse-doctor. So that might need to be updated.
> [@WesPenre](#):
>
> The result was the same using any of them
Is that a zero which should be an upper-case O perhaps? Did you also try the versions with `--no-check-certificate` ?
If /privacy doesn’t work, perhaps try /about instead.
---
### Author:  [@WesPenre](https://meta.discourse.org/u/WesPenre)
#### Post date: [July 24, 2023, 1:07pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/discourse-went-down-suddenly-no-one-can-log-in/272552/15 "2023-07-24T13:07:42Z")
> [@Ed\_S](#):
>
> Is that a zero which should be an upper-case O perhaps? Did you also try the versions with `--no-check-certificate` ?
>
> If /privacy doesn’t work, perhaps try /about instead.
Yes, it’s a zero. OK, I’ll try an O instead and /about.
And yes, I tried the other algorithm, too, but I used a zero, so I’ll do both…
---
### Author:  [@WesPenre](https://meta.discourse.org/u/WesPenre)
#### Post date: [July 24, 2023, 1:13pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/discourse-went-down-suddenly-no-one-can-log-in/272552/16 "2023-07-24T13:13:23Z")
I tried both commands, but it’s not working:
---
### Author:  [@tobiaseigen](https://meta.discourse.org/u/tobiaseigen)
#### Post date: [July 24, 2023, 3:33pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/discourse-went-down-suddenly-no-one-can-log-in/272552/17 "2023-07-24T15:33:23Z")
> [@WesPenre](#):
>
> So there is nothing I need to do with this?
The change to when TOS and privacy pages are created is fairly recent. If your site is not new then it does not affect you.
> [@Ed\_S](#):
>
> it’s used in discourse-doctor. So that might need to be updated.
Not sure how it is used in `discourse-doctor`. @pfaffman can you weigh in here? Is it used for troubleshooting, or just to verify that the links exist?
We’ll be doing more to educate new site owners about this functionality.
---
### Author:  [@Ed\_S](https://meta.discourse.org/u/Ed_S)
#### Post date: [July 24, 2023, 4:29pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/discourse-went-down-suddenly-no-one-can-log-in/272552/18 "2023-07-24T16:29:26Z")
> [@WesPenre](#):
>
> but it’s not working
ok, so the problem you have isn’t a reachability problem, it’s probably a problem that Discourse isn’t starting up properly. Can you paste the entirety of what you see when you run the launcher start?
---
### Author:  [@Ed\_S](https://meta.discourse.org/u/Ed_S)
#### Post date: [July 24, 2023, 4:33pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/discourse-went-down-suddenly-no-one-can-log-in/272552/19 "2023-07-24T16:33:36Z")
> [@tobiaseigen](#):
>
> Not sure how it is used in `discourse-doctor`
It’s used by get\_discourse\_version which is called by check\_if\_hostname\_resolves\_here which may report DNS PROBLEM if the connection to localhost and to the fully qualified domain don’t report the same version. However, it looks like it might be silent if both connections fail. See [here](https://github.com/discourse/discourse_docker/blob/aa9d0a11edd58a31fcca0d0fce856155e5b389d5/discourse-doctor#L151C31-L151C42).
---
### Author:  [@WesPenre](https://meta.discourse.org/u/WesPenre)
#### Post date: [July 24, 2023, 4:58pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/discourse-went-down-suddenly-no-one-can-log-in/272552/21 "2023-07-24T16:58:33Z")
> [@Ed\_S](#):
>
> ok, so the problem you have isn’t a reachability problem, it’s probably a problem that Discourse isn’t starting up properly. Can you paste the entirety of what you see when you run the launcher start?
So how do I run the launcher start? I’m unfamiliar with all this terminology, unfortunately.
---
### Author:  [@Ed\_S](https://meta.discourse.org/u/Ed_S)
#### Post date: [July 24, 2023, 5:35pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/discourse-went-down-suddenly-no-one-can-log-in/272552/22 "2023-07-24T17:35:52Z")
> [@WesPenre](#):
>
> how do I run the launcher start
Something like
```plaintext
cd /var/discourse
git pull
./launcher start web_only
```
(Bearing in mind that I’m not personally familiar with the two-container setup that you are apparently using. Also bearing in mind the question upthread as to whether you should update your data container.)
---
### Author:  [@WesPenre](https://meta.discourse.org/u/WesPenre)
#### Post date: [July 24, 2023, 6:14pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/discourse-went-down-suddenly-no-one-can-log-in/272552/24 "2023-07-24T18:14:51Z")
This is how it turned out:
---
### Author:  [@WesPenre](https://meta.discourse.org/u/WesPenre)
#### Post date: [July 24, 2023, 6:16pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/discourse-went-down-suddenly-no-one-can-log-in/272552/25 "2023-07-24T18:16:31Z")
Awesome! I tried to log in, and now it works! Thanks a lot, Ed.
Why did this happen in the first place, do you know?
[Next page](https://meta.discourse.org/t/discourse-went-down-suddenly-no-one-can-log-in/272552.md?page=2)