# Troubleshooting bootstrap failures in Discourse

**URL:** https://meta.discourse.org/t/troubleshooting-bootstrap-failures-in-discourse/376072
**Category:** Self-hosting
**Created:** [July 27, 2025, 6:20pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/troubleshooting-bootstrap-failures-in-discourse/376072 "2025-07-27T18:20:00Z")
**Posts on this page:** 1
**Showing post:** 1

<div class="post-metadata">

### Author: ![Thomas\_Rother](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/meta/user_avatar/meta.discourse.org/thomas_rother/32/423597_2.png) [@Thomas\_Rother](https://meta.discourse.org/u/Thomas_Rother)
#### Post date: [July 27, 2025, 6:20pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/troubleshooting-bootstrap-failures-in-discourse/376072/1 "2025-07-27T18:20:00Z")

</div>

I am still struggling with the new “pre-bundling” process. The bootstrap fails on my test instance and I dont know why. Note that this is is a setup with an external postgres database. The containers run behind a haproxy as ssl accelerator. I only bootstrap the web\_only container here. The current build version (before the bootstrap) is 3.5.0.beta8-dev, [Commits · discourse/discourse · GitHub](https://github.com/discourse/discourse/commits/2f8d35aebd786d90dfeab2424b32e9e9d99568ec)

This is the currently failing yml:

```plaintext
# IMPORTANT: SET A SECRET PASSWORD in Postgres for the Discourse User
# TODO: change SOME_SECRET in this template

templates:
  - "templates/web.template.yml"
  ## Uncomment the next line to enable the IPv6 listener
  #- "templates/web.ipv6.template.yml"
  - "templates/web.ratelimited.template.yml"
  - "templates/web.socketed.template.yml"
  ## Uncomment these two lines if you wish to add Lets Encrypt (https)
  #- "templates/web.ssl.template.yml"
  #- "templates/web.letsencrypt.ssl.template.yml"

## which TCP/IP ports should this container expose?
## If you want Discourse to share a port with another webserver like Apache or nginx,
## see https://meta.discourse.org/t/17247 for details
expose:
  - "80:80" # http
  - "443:443" # https

# Use 'links' key to link containers together, aka use Docker --link flag.
links:
  - link:
      name: redis
      alias: data

# any extra arguments for Docker?
# docker_args:

params:
  ## Which Git revision should this container use? (default: tests-passed)
  #version: tests-passed

env:
  LC_ALL: en_US.UTF-8
  LANG: en_US.UTF-8
  LANGUAGE: en_US.UTF-8
  DISCOURSE_DEFAULT_LOCALE: de

  ## How many concurrent web requests are supported? Depends on memory and CPU cores.
  ## will be set automatically by bootstrap based on detected CPUs, or you can override
  UNICORN_WORKERS: 4

  ## TODO: The domain name this Discourse instance will respond to
  DISCOURSE_HOSTNAME: 'forum2.netzwissen.de'

  ## Uncomment if you want the container to be started with the same
  ## hostname (-h option) as specified above (default "$hostname-$config")
  #DOCKER_USE_HOSTNAME: true

  ## TODO: List of comma delimited emails that will be made admin and developer
  ## on initial signup example 'user1@example.com,user2@example.com'
  DISCOURSE_DEVELOPER_EMAILS: 'admin@netzwissen.de'

  ## TODO: The SMTP mail server used to validate new accounts and send notifications
  # SMTP ADDRESS, username, and password are required
  # WARNING the char '#' in SMTP password can cause problems!
  DISCOURSE_SMTP_ADDRESS: mail.netzwissen.de
  DISCOURSE_SMTP_PORT: 587
  DISCOURSE_SMTP_USER_NAME: discourse@netzwissen.de
  DISCOURSE_SMTP_PASSWORD: [xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx}
  #DISCOURSE_SMTP_ENABLE_START_TLS: true # (optional, default true)
  #DISCOURSE_SMTP_DOMAIN: discourse.example.com # (required by some providers)
  DISCOURSE_NOTIFICATION_EMAIL: discourse@netzwissen.de # (address to send notifications from)

  ## If you added the Lets Encrypt template, uncomment below to get a free SSL certificate
  #LETSENCRYPT_ACCOUNT_EMAIL: me@example.com

## configure connectivity to the databases
  DISCOURSE_DB_SOCKET: ''
  DISCOURSE_DB_USERNAME: [xxxxxxxxxxx]
  DISCOURSE_DB_NAME: [xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx]
  DISCOURSE_DB_HOST: [xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx]
  DISCOURSE_DB_PASSWORD: [xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx]
  ## redis caching on the neighbouring container
  DISCOURSE_REDIS_HOST: redis

  ## The http or https CDN address for this Discourse instance (configured to pull)
  ## see https://meta.discourse.org/t/14857 for details
  #DISCOURSE_CDN_URL: https://discourse-cdn.example.com

  ## The maxmind geolocation IP account ID and license key for IP address lookups
  ## see https://meta.discourse.org/t/-/173941 for details
  #DISCOURSE_MAXMIND_ACCOUNT_ID: 123456
  #DISCOURSE_MAXMIND_LICENSE_KEY: 1234567890123456

volumes:
  - volume:
      host: /mnt/data/discourse/shared/web-only
      guest: /shared
  - volume:
      host: /mnt/data/discourse/shared/web-only/log/var-log
      guest: /var/log

## Plugins go here
## see https://meta.discourse.org/t/19157 for details
hooks:
  after_code:
    - exec:
        cd: $home/plugins
        cmd:
          - git clone https://github.com/discourse/docker_manager.git
          - git clone https://github.com/discourse/discourse-shared-edits.git
# some plugins are removed, as they are now bundled with core
# https://meta.discourse.org/t/bundling-more-popular-plugins-with-discourse-core/373574
## = now bundled
## - git clone https://github.com/discourse/discourse-chat-integration.git
## - git clone https://github.com/discourse/discourse-openid-connect.git
## - git clone https://github.com/discourse/discourse-calendar.git
## - git clone https://github.com/angusmcleod/discourse-events.git
## - git clone https://github.com/discourse/discourse-data-explorer.git
## - git clone https://github.com/discourse/discourse-reactions.git
## - git clone https://github.com/discourse/discourse-chat.git
## - git clone https://github.com/discourse/discourse-ai.git
## - git clone https://github.com/discourse/discourse-topic-voting.git
## - git clone https://github.com/discourse/discourse-post-voting.git
## - git clone https://github.com/discourse/discourse-user-notes.git
## - git clone https://github.com/discourse/discourse-solved.git
          - git clone https://github.com/discourse/discourse-docs-card-filter.git
          - git clone https://github.com/discourse/discourse-doc-categories.git
## - git clone https://github.com/discourse/discourse-assign.git
## - git clone https://github.com/discourse/discourse-templates.git
          - git clone https://github.com/discourse/discourse-saved-searches.git
          - git clone https://github.com/discourse/discourse-tooltips.git
          - git clone https://github.com/discourse/discourse-category-experts.git
          - git clone https://github.com/discourse/discourse-activity-pub.git
          - git clone https://github.com/discourse/discourse-follow.git
          - git clone https://github.com/nathan-nz/discourse-wikified-posts.git
          - git clone https://github.com/discourse/discourse-whos-online.git
          - git clone https://github.com/merefield/discourse-workflow.git

## Remember, this is YAML syntax - you can only have one block with a name
run:
  - exec: echo "Beginning of custom commands"

  ## If you want to configure password login for root, uncomment and change:
  ## Use only one of the following lines:
  #- exec: /usr/sbin/usermod -p 'PASSWORD_HASH' root
  - exec: /usr/sbin/usermod -p "$(mkpasswd -m sha-256 'xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx')" root

## for operation behind haproxy load balancer with local nginx on the container host 
  - replace:
      filename: /etc/nginx/conf.d/discourse.conf
      from: "types {"
      to: |
        set_real_ip_from 127.0.0.1/24;
        set_real_ip_from 10.0.0.0/24;
        real_ip_header X-Forwarded-For;
        real_ip_recursive on;
        proxy_set_header Host $http_host;
        proxy_set_header X-Request-Start “t=${msec}”;
        proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-For $proxy_add_x_forwarded_for;
        proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-Proto https; # replaced $thescheme;
        proxy_set_header X-Real-IP $remote_addr;
        types {

  ## If you want to authorized additional users, uncomment and change:
  #- exec: ssh-import-id username
  #- exec: ssh-import-id anotherusername

  - exec: echo "End of custom commands"
  - exec: awk -F\# '{print $1;}' ~/.ssh/authorized_keys | awk 'BEGIN { print "Authorized SSH keys for this container:"; } NF>=2 {print $NF;}'

```

Even when I add a rm -rf block into the ymll:

```plaintext
- rm -rf discourse-chat-integration  
- rm -rf discourse-openid-connect         
- rm -rf discourse-calendar         
- rm -rf discourse-events         
- rm -rf discourse-data-explorer         
- rm -rf discourse-reactions         
- rm -rf discourse-chat         
- rm -rf discourse-ai         
- rm -rf discourse-topic-voting         
- rm -rf discourse-post-voting         
- rm -rf discourse-user-notes         
- rm -rf discourse-solved         
- rm -rf discourse-assign         
- rm -rf discourse-templates

```

The bootstrap still fails with

```plaintext
/usr/local/lib/ruby/gems/3.3.0/gems/pups-1.3.0/lib/pups.rb
/usr/local/bin/pups --stdin

FAILED
--------------------
Pups::ExecError: cd /var/www/discourse && su discourse -c 'bundle exec rake db:migrate' failed with return #<Process::Status: pid 669 exit 1>
Location of failure: /usr/local/lib/ruby/gems/3.3.0/gems/pups-1.3.0/lib/pups/exec_command.rb:131:in `spawn'
exec failed with the params {"cd"=>"$home", "tag"=>"migrate", "hook"=>"db_migrate", "cmd"=>["su discourse -c 'bundle exec rake db:migrate'"]}

```

I would interprete that as an error with the database migration at “bundle exec rake db:migrate”. But what is the root cause here? The discourse2 database already **has** the vector extension which was required for the (previously already installed) discourse-ai plugin:

```plaintext
postgres=# \c discourse2  
psql (15.12 (Ubuntu 15.12-1.pgdg22.04+1), server 13.20 (Ubuntu 13.20-1.pgdg22.04+1))  
You are now connected to database "discourse2" as user "postgres".  
discourse2=# \dx  
                                   List of installed extensions  
  Name | Version | Schema | Description                               
----------+---------+------------+-------------------------------------------------------------------  
hstore | 1.7 | public | data type for storing sets of (key, value) pairs  
pg_trgm | 1.5 | public | text similarity measurement and index searching based on trigrams  
plpgsql | 1.0 | pg_catalog | PL/pgSQL procedural language  
unaccent | 1.1 | public | text search dictionary that removes accents  
vector | 0.8.0 | public | vector data type and ivfflat and hnsw access methods  
(5 rows)

```

Later on I also see the plugin hints although the “git clone” lines are all commented in the yml:

```plaintext
---
HINT: The plugin 'discourse-openid-connect' is now bundled with Discourse and should not be included in your container configuration.
Remove the line 'git clone https://github.com/discourse/discourse-openid-connect' from your containers/web_only.yml file, then try again.
For more information, see https://meta.discourse.org/t/373574
---

```

To be honest, I am a bit lost now :😪 …

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