ERR_CONNECTION_TIMED_OUT from different PCs at different times

Question

Hi All

We have an extremely odd issue that I am yet to figure out what is going on.

Confluence stops working for all users at different times than each other on different browsers but will work if you try a different browser or use incognito.

For example, I use Chrome and when I first start my PC it will work for a random amount of time and then stop working with ERR_CONNECTION_TIMED_OUT and I switch to firefox where it works just fine. This also happens to everybody else but NOT at the same time as eachother and NOT only Chrome. Some people use Firefox and then switch to Chrome to get it working. Some use Edge and switch to Firefox to get it working.

Any help will be appreciated!!

Abby Maris · Answer

I faced a similar issue with ERR_CONNECTION_TIMED_OUT on Confluence and it turned out to be related to cached session/cookie data causing conflicts. Since it works in a different browser or incognito, that points to local browser cache, stored cookies, or corrupted DNS entries. What worked for us was clearing browser cache and cookies for the Confluence domain, flushing the local DNS cache, and making sure no security extension or proxy setting was interfering.

Also, check if your load balancer or reverse proxy session handling is consistent we found sticky sessions misconfigured in our case. After fixing that and clearing caches, the random timeouts stopped. I hope it helps!

Ellite Hanry · Answer

The error ERR_CONNECTION_TIMED_OUT does not indicate a dangerous problem or an infected file that can harm your system. Instead, it denotes that the system can not connect successfully with the target server. The error in question can also originate due to issues on the server side, mainly if the website is experiencing high traffic or resource constraints, which is mostly the case with shared hosting platforms. There are different reasons for the error to occur, which are as follows:-

1) Invalid URL

2) Slow Internet connection

3) Firewall settings

4) Server delay or error

There can be many different ways to fix the error, which you need to understand properly in detail.

Brant Schroeder · Answer

@Gerds I would check a couple of things.

* Work with your network team to make sure that your routing is setup correctly and traffic is flowing as it should.  If you have Splunk then they can monitor this for you.  If you do not have that you could try wireshark when the error occurs.  
* Check the Windows Server logs to see if you are having any errors, specifically connection errors.   
* You can also check the browsers developer tools when the error is happening to see what issue the browser is having 504 or 404.