Mailman not starting after restoring from snapshot
I made a snapshot of my mailman3 VM before running a script to modify a bunch of lists. I stupidly did not turn the VM off before I made the snapshot, so Im almost certain this is a corrupted DB problem from doing a snapshot restore. The issue is now that the mailman service will not start automatically. Im able to get to the web interface but I see the error "Mailman REST API not available. Please start Mailman core." I can su to the mailman user and run 'mailman start -f' which seems to get things going again and shows the lists as they were before the snapshot, which is good, but I would like to get the issue fixed so that services start normally. Any help is appreciated. Here is some terminal output:
''' root@mlist3:~# systemctl status mailman3 × mailman3.service - GNU Mailing List Manager Loaded: loaded (/etc/systemd/system/mailman3.service; enabled; preset: enabled) Active: failed (Result: exit-code) since Mon 2025-04-28 13:24:43 UTC; 1min 39s ago Process: 1873 ExecStart=/opt/mailman/venv/bin/mailman start (code=exited, status=2) CPU: 776ms
Apr 28 13:24:42 mlist3 systemd[1]: Starting mailman3.service - GNU Mailing List Manager... Apr 28 13:24:43 mlist3 mailman[1873]: Usage: mailman start [OPTIONS] Apr 28 13:24:43 mlist3 mailman[1873]: Try 'mailman start -h' for help. Apr 28 13:24:43 mlist3 mailman[1873]: Error: A previous run of GNU Mailman did not exit cleanly (stale_lock). Try using --force Apr 28 13:24:43 mlist3 systemd[1]: mailman3.service: Control process exited, code=exited, status=2/INVALIDARGUMENT Apr 28 13:24:43 mlist3 systemd[1]: mailman3.service: Failed with result 'exit-code'. Apr 28 13:24:43 mlist3 systemd[1]: Failed to start mailman3.service - GNU Mailing List Manager.
root@mlist3:~# systemctl start mailman3 Job for mailman3.service failed because the control process exited with error code. See "systemctl status mailman3.service" and "journalctl -xeu mailman3.service" for details. root@mlist3:~# journalctl -xeu mailman3.service ░░ ░░ A start job for unit mailman3.service has begun execution. ░░ ░░ The job identifier is 662. Apr 28 13:24:43 mlist3 mailman[1873]: Usage: mailman start [OPTIONS] Apr 28 13:24:43 mlist3 mailman[1873]: Try 'mailman start -h' for help. Apr 28 13:24:43 mlist3 mailman[1873]: Error: A previous run of GNU Mailman did not exit cleanly (stale_lock). Try using --force Apr 28 13:24:43 mlist3 systemd[1]: mailman3.service: Control process exited, code=exited, status=2/INVALIDARGUMENT ░░ Subject: Unit process exited ░░ Defined-By: systemd ░░ Support: http://www.ubuntu.com/support ░░ ░░ An ExecStart= process belonging to unit mailman3.service has exited. ░░ ░░ The process' exit code is 'exited' and its exit status is 2. Apr 28 13:24:43 mlist3 systemd[1]: mailman3.service: Failed with result 'exit-code'. ░░ Subject: Unit failed ░░ Defined-By: systemd ░░ Support: http://www.ubuntu.com/support ░░ ░░ The unit mailman3.service has entered the 'failed' state with result 'exit-code'. Apr 28 13:24:43 mlist3 systemd[1]: Failed to start mailman3.service - GNU Mailing List Manager. ░░ Subject: A start job for unit mailman3.service has failed ░░ Defined-By: systemd ░░ Support: http://www.ubuntu.com/support ░░ ░░ A start job for unit mailman3.service has finished with a failure. ░░ ░░ The job identifier is 662 and the job result is failed. Apr 28 13:30:21 mlist3 systemd[1]: Starting mailman3.service - GNU Mailing List Manager... ░░ Subject: A start job for unit mailman3.service has begun execution ░░ Defined-By: systemd ░░ Support: http://www.ubuntu.com/support ░░ ░░ A start job for unit mailman3.service has begun execution. ░░ ░░ The job identifier is 1074. Apr 28 13:30:21 mlist3 mailman[1986]: Usage: mailman start [OPTIONS] Apr 28 13:30:21 mlist3 mailman[1986]: Try 'mailman start -h' for help. Apr 28 13:30:21 mlist3 mailman[1986]: Error: A previous run of GNU Mailman did not exit cleanly (stale_lock). Try using --force Apr 28 13:30:22 mlist3 systemd[1]: mailman3.service: Control process exited, code=exited, status=2/INVALIDARGUMENT ░░ Subject: Unit process exited ░░ Defined-By: systemd ░░ Support: http://www.ubuntu.com/support ░░ ░░ An ExecStart= process belonging to unit mailman3.service has exited. ░░ ░░ The process' exit code is 'exited' and its exit status is 2. Apr 28 13:30:22 mlist3 systemd[1]: mailman3.service: Failed with result 'exit-code'. ░░ Subject: Unit failed ░░ Defined-By: systemd ░░ Support: http://www.ubuntu.com/support ░░ ░░ The unit mailman3.service has entered the 'failed' state with result 'exit-code'. Apr 28 13:30:22 mlist3 systemd[1]: Failed to start mailman3.service - GNU Mailing List Manager. ░░ Subject: A start job for unit mailman3.service has failed ░░ Defined-By: systemd ░░ Support: http://www.ubuntu.com/support ░░ ░░ A start job for unit mailman3.service has finished with a failure. ░░ ░░ The job identifier is 1074 and the job result is failed. '''
Thank you in advance for any assistance.
On Mon, Apr 28, 2025 at 4:45 PM <zachr@mta.ca> wrote:
I made a snapshot of my mailman3 VM before running a script to modify a bunch of lists. I stupidly did not turn the VM off before I made the snapshot, so Im almost certain this is a corrupted DB problem from doing a snapshot restore. The issue is now that the mailman service will not start automatically. Im able to get to the web interface but I see the error "Mailman REST API not available. Please start Mailman core." I can su to the mailman user and run 'mailman start -f' which seems to get things going again and shows the lists as they were before the snapshot, which is good, but I would like to get the issue fixed so that services start normally. Any help is appreciated. Here is some terminal output:
''' root@mlist3:~# systemctl status mailman3 × mailman3.service - GNU Mailing List Manager Loaded: loaded (/etc/systemd/system/mailman3.service; enabled; preset: enabled) Active: failed (Result: exit-code) since Mon 2025-04-28 13:24:43 UTC; 1min 39s ago Process: 1873 ExecStart=/opt/mailman/venv/bin/mailman start (code=exited, status=2) CPU: 776ms
Apr 28 13:24:42 mlist3 systemd[1]: Starting mailman3.service - GNU Mailing List Manager... Apr 28 13:24:43 mlist3 mailman[1873]: Usage: mailman start [OPTIONS] Apr 28 13:24:43 mlist3 mailman[1873]: Try 'mailman start -h' for help. Apr 28 13:24:43 mlist3 mailman[1873]: Error: A previous run of GNU Mailman did not exit cleanly (stale_lock). Try using --force
cd /opt/mailman/var/locks/ rm *master*
Then start mailman,
-- Best regards, Odhiambo WASHINGTON, Nairobi,KE +254 7 3200 0004/+254 7 2274 3223 In an Internet failure case, the #1 suspect is a constant: DNS. "Oh, the cruft.", egrep -v '^$|^.*#' ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ :-) [How to ask smart questions: http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html]
zachr@mta.ca writes:
web interface but I see the error "Mailman REST API not available. Please start Mailman core." I can su to the mailman user and run 'mailman start -f' which seems to get things going again and shows the lists as they were before the snapshot, which is good, but I would like to get the issue fixed so that services start normally.
Have you done "systemctl restart mailman3" since running "mailman start -f"? The only thing that the "-f" (or "--force") flag does is to try to delete the stale master lock safely. Since Mailman did start, it did delete that lock. I expect that now it should start successfully without further exceptional intervention.
We now recommed putting --force in the ExecStart line of the mailman3.service unit.
I suppose it is possible to corrupt the database by snapshotting without stopping, but PostgreSQL and MySQL are quite robust to that kind of thing. You should continue to watch for weird behavior, but I would think you should run normally now.
Any help is appreciated. Here is some terminal output:
I don't see anything there that suggests you're not ready to go.
-- GNU Mailman consultant (installation, migration, customization) Sirus Open Source https://www.siriusopensource.com/ Software systems consulting in Europe, North America, and Japan
participants (3)
-
Odhiambo Washington -
Stephen J. Turnbull -
zachr＠mta.ca