Setup: Tomcat is misconfigured

[Ryan_Smith]

Hello, 

I recently enabled SSL for Jira. Since doing so, when starting up I receive the message "The server.xml file is missing parameters needed by Jira to handle requests that contain special characters."

I've checked the server.xml file and it appears to match what https://confluence.atlassian.com/jirakb/jira-server-startup-fails-with-tomcat-misconfigured-error-958453799.html outlines to do but still fails to start. I've inserted the server.xml contents below. Any advice would be greatly appreciated!

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?><!--
Licensed to the Apache Software Foundation (ASF) under one or more
contributor license agreements. See the NOTICE file distributed with
this work for additional information regarding copyright ownership.
The ASF licenses this file to You under the Apache License, Version 2.0
(the "License"); you may not use this file except in compliance with
the License. You may obtain a copy of the License at

http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0

Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software
distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS,
WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied.
See the License for the specific language governing permissions and
limitations under the License.
--><Server port="8005" shutdown="SHUTDOWN">
<Listener className="org.apache.catalina.startup.VersionLoggerListener"/>
<Listener SSLEngine="on" className="org.apache.catalina.core.AprLifecycleListener"/>
<Listener className="org.apache.catalina.core.JreMemoryLeakPreventionListener"/>
<Listener className="org.apache.catalina.mbeans.GlobalResourcesLifecycleListener"/>
<Listener className="org.apache.catalina.core.ThreadLocalLeakPreventionListener"/>

<Service name="Catalina">
<!--
==============================================================================================================
DEFAULT - Direct connector with no proxy for unproxied access to Jira.

If using a http/https proxy, comment out this connector.
==============================================================================================================
-->

<!-- Relaxing chars because of JRASERVER-67974 -->

<!--
==============================================================================================================
HTTP - Proxying Jira via Apache or Nginx over HTTP

If you're proxying traffic to Jira over HTTP, uncomment the below connector and comment out the others.
Ensure the proxyName and proxyPort are updated with the appropriate information if necessary as per the docs.

See the following for more information:

Apache - https://confluence.atlassian.com/x/4xQLM
nginx - https://confluence.atlassian.com/x/DAFmGQ
==============================================================================================================
-->

<!--
<Connector port="8067" relaxedPathChars="[]|" relaxedQueryChars="[]|{}^&#x5c;&#x60;&quot;&lt;&gt;"
maxThreads="150" minSpareThreads="25" connectionTimeout="20000" enableLookups="false"
maxHttpHeaderSize="8192" protocol="HTTP/1.1" useBodyEncodingForURI="true" redirectPort="8443"
acceptCount="100" disableUploadTimeout="true" bindOnInit="false" scheme="https"
proxyName="<subdomain>.<domain>.com" proxyPort="80"/>

-->
<!--
==============================================================================================================
HTTPS - Proxying Jira via Apache or Nginx over HTTPS

If you're proxying traffic to Jira over HTTPS, uncomment the below connector and comment out the others.
Ensure the proxyName and proxyPort are updated with the appropriate information if necessary as per the docs.

See the following for more information:

Apache - https://confluence.atlassian.com/x/PTT3MQ
nginx - https://confluence.atlassian.com/x/DAFmGQ
==============================================================================================================
-->

<!--
<Connector port="8067"relaxedPathChars="[]|" relaxedQueryChars="[]|{}^&#x5c;&#x60;&quot;&lt;&gt;" maxThreads="150" minSpareThreads="25" connectionTimeout="20000" enableLookups="false" maxHttpHeaderSize="8192" protocol="HTTP/1.1" useBodyEncodingForURI="true" redirectPort="8443" acceptCount="100" disableUploadTimeout="true" bindOnInit="false"
maxHttpHeaderSize="8192" protocol="HTTP/1.1" useBodyEncodingForURI="true" redirectPort="8443"
acceptCount="100" disableUploadTimeout="true" bindOnInit="false" secure="true" scheme="https"
proxyName="<subdomain>.<domain>.com" proxyPort="443"/>
-->

<!--
==============================================================================================================
AJP - Proxying Jira via Apache over HTTP or HTTPS

If you're proxying traffic to Jira using the AJP protocol, uncomment the following connector line
See the following for more information:

Apache - https://confluence.atlassian.com/x/QiJ9MQ
==============================================================================================================
-->

<!--
<Connector port="8009" URIEncoding="UTF-8" enableLookups="false" protocol="AJP/1.3"/>
relaxedPathChars="[]|" relaxedQueryChars="[]|{}^&#x5c;&#x60;&quot;&lt;&gt;" maxThreads="150" minSpareThreads="25" connectionTimeout="20000" enableLookups="false" maxHttpHeaderSize="8192" protocol="HTTP/1.1" useBodyEncodingForURI="true" redirectPort="8443" acceptCount="100" disableUploadTimeout="true" bindOnInit="false" -->

<Engine defaultHost="localhost" name="Catalina">
<Host appBase="webapps" autoDeploy="true" name="localhost" unpackWARs="true">

<Context docBase="${catalina.home}/atlassian-jira" path="" reloadable="false" useHttpOnly="true">
<Resource auth="Container" factory="org.objectweb.jotm.UserTransactionFactory" jotm.timeout="60" name="UserTransaction" type="javax.transaction.UserTransaction"/>
<Manager pathname=""/>
<JarScanner scanManifest="false"/>
<Valve className="org.apache.catalina.valves.StuckThreadDetectionValve" threshold="120"/>
</Context>

</Host>
<Valve className="org.apache.catalina.valves.AccessLogValve" pattern="%a %{jira.request.id}r %{jira.request.username}r %t &quot;%m %U%q %H&quot; %s %b %D &quot;%{Referer}i&quot; &quot;%{User-Agent}i&quot; &quot;%{jira.request.assession.id}r&quot;"/>
</Engine>
<Connector SSLEnabled="true" acceptCount="100" clientAuth="false" connectionTimeout="20000" disableUploadTimeout="true" enableLookups="false" keyAlias="jira" keystoreFile="C:\Program Files\Atlassian\Jira\jira.jks" keystorePass="password" keystoreType="JKS" maxHttpHeaderSize="8192" maxSpareThreads="75" maxThreads="150" minSpareThreads="25" port="8067" protocol="org.apache.coyote.http11.Http11NioProtocol" scheme="https" secure="true" sslProtocol="TLS" useBodyEncodingForURI="true"/><Connector acceptCount="100" connectionTimeout="20000" disableUploadTimeout="true" enableLookups="false" maxHttpHeaderSize="8192" maxSpareThreads="75" maxThreads="150" minSpareThreads="25" port="8066" protocol="HTTP/1.1" redirectPort="8067" useBodyEncodingForURI="true"/></Service>
</Server>

[Petter Gonçalves]

Hello @Ryan_Smith

Welcome to the Atlassian community!

Based on other persons also facing the same problem even though the steps this documentation were executed, I believe you might still have any connectors in server.xml that still need to be added with:

relaxedPathChars="[]|" relaxedQueryChars="[]|{}^\`"<>"

That being said, please check if you have added those parameters to:

- All connectors operating in any other ports (aside from the 8080)

- All connectors using both HTTP and HTTPS

Here are some threads for reference:

Tomcat misconfigured due to requests for special characters (2018) 

Jira core cannot starting error server.xml 

Let us know if you have any questions.