Problem with database

[Nick]

Hello. I'v been using already installed (not by me sadly) Confluence for a while. Around 10-12 december of 2022 I got error messages on main page. Some time after i stop-started through sh scripts and now i have a "set up database" page. I dont know which db was used and who installed it. I have access to server where Confluence installed. Is there any chance to retrieve data I had there? I can attach logs but there is a lot of them in logs dir.

[Nic Brough -Adaptavist- · Accepted solution]

Welcome to the Atlassian Community!

Your config file says you are using the h2 database, which is not suitable for production use, it's for development, testing, and demos only.  The person who built your Confluence was told this at the time they did the installation.

The reason it's only for short term occasional, non-production use is that it can fail, catastrophically, without warning. 

In my experience, it always does fail, eventually, with the likelihood rising exponentially as the volume of data grows.

"Please set up database" is one of the symptoms of a failure here, it's quite likely that you have lost everything.

Do you have any backups?  Either in the <confluence home>/export directory (by default Confluence creates backups in their regularly) or any backed up copies of the files in <confluence home>/database?

[Nick]

Thanks for detailed answer! Sadly I was too lazy (and thought that admin will do it) and didnt set up backups and export and database have nothing inside. But any experience is good so I will continue have such a good product and set up this myself. 

[Velizar Borisov · Accepted solution]

Hello @Николай and welcome to the community!

At the server side you can check for a file called confluence.cfg.xml.

It contains the setup of the database and it is located your home directory. I would start debugging the problem from there. Check up if somehow the settings gone missing.

Other important files and folders can be found here; https://confluence.atlassian.com/doc/confluence-home-and-other-important-directories-590259707.html

Hope that helps,
Velizar

[Nick]

Thanks. Find home dir (it was /var/atlassian/application-data/confluence) and 2 files with name confluence.cfg.xml. I am attaching the one with info (but without database string). It looks like old one "confluence.cfg.xml" is not here and this one is for new state of confluence (installing database). From this point it looks like my chances to dig up old data going to zero, hah. Last idea maybe - If database was H2 embedded can i get smth out of there?