Ubuntu error with apache: (98)Address already in u

Question

I am getting this error when I try to start Apache in Ubuntu.

 (98)Address already in use: make_sock: could not bind to address 0.0.0.0:80
 no listening sockets available, shutting down
 Unable to open logs
 Action 'start' failed.

I have this in my ports.conf

NameVirtualHost *:80
Listen 80

This is my vhost file

<VirtualHost *:80>
          ServerAdmin [e-mail]
          ServerName rails.server.com
          # ServerAlias
          DocumentRoot /var/www/sample_app/current/public
          ErrorLog /var/www/sample_app/error.log

          RailsEnv production
        <Directory "/var/www/sample_app/current/public">
          Options Indexes FollowSymLinks MultiViews
          Order allow,deny
          Allow from all
        </Directory>
</VirtualHost>

What am I missing?

Answer 1

It seems port 80 is already taken. Use another port or try netstat (grep the result to select only the row with value 80 in it), ps and kill to see what application occupies the port and shut it down.

Answer 2

sudo netstat -tulpn| grep :80

pkill the process (nginx?)

Disable whatever virtualhost is binding to port 80 that you don't want to (nginx?). It's in /etc/nginx/sites-enabled or /etc/apache2/sites-enabled

Answer 3

When you restart or start your server via terminal you might have forgot to add sudo before the command.

Use sudo /etc/init.d/apache2 reload instead of /etc/init.d/apache2 reload

Answer 4

List of currently running services,

$ sudo netstat -tulpn

Active Internet connections (only servers)
Proto Recv-Q Send-Q Local Address           Foreign Address         State       PID/Program name
tcp        0      0 0.0.0.0:8069            0.0.0.0:*               LISTEN      6399/python     
tcp        0      0 0.0.0.0:53670           0.0.0.0:*               LISTEN      6681/Brackets-node
....
....

Find only specific services,

$ sudo netstat -tulpn| grep python
jpa@jpa-dell:~/odoo/master-hr-holidays-newapi-jpa$ sudo netstat -tulpn| grep python
tcp        0      0 0.0.0.0:8069            0.0.0.0:*               LISTEN      6399/python     
tcp        0      0 127.0.0.1:41974         0.0.0.0:*               LISTEN      3123/python 

Did you notice above result PID (6399) running python.

Kill that service using following command,

$ sudo kill -9 -6399

Now services is completely stop, you can start again normally.

---

Extra command for finding running srrvices,

$ ps -ef
$ ps -ef | grep python

Answer 5

I got this error on a fresh install of Ubuntu 12.10 when starting apache2.

It's a bug in the apache2. It gets hung in the background. Here is my walkthrough to where the bugs might be in the software.

Here's the error I got:

el@titan:~$ sudo service apache2 start
 * Starting web server apache2               
(98)Address already in use: make_sock: could not bind to address 0.0.0.0:80
no listening sockets available, shutting down
Unable to open logs
Action 'start' failed.
The Apache error log may have more information.
                                                                         [fail]

Address already in Use? What could be using it? Check it out:

el@titan:~$ grep -ri listen /etc/apache2
/etc/apache2/apache2.conf:#   supposed to determine listening ports for incoming connections, and which
/etc/apache2/apache2.conf:# Include list of ports to listen on and which to use for name based vhosts
/etc/apache2/ports.conf:Listen 80
/etc/apache2/ports.conf:    Listen 443
/etc/apache2/ports.conf:    Listen 443

That means apache2 is preventing apache2 from starting. Bizarre. This will confirm:

el@titan:~$ ps -ef | grep apache2
root      1146   954  0 15:51 ?        00:00:00 /bin/sh /etc/rc2.d/S91apache2 start
root      1172  1146  0 15:51 ?        00:00:00 /bin/sh /usr/sbin/apache2ctl start
root      1181  1172  0 15:51 ?        00:00:00 /usr/sbin/apache2 -k start
root      1193  1181  0 15:51 ?        00:00:00 /bin/bash /usr/share/apache2/ask-for-passphrase 127.0.1.1:443 RSA
el        5439  5326  0 16:23 pts/2    00:00:00 grep --color=auto apache2

Yes, in this case apache2 is running, I was trying to start apache2 a second time on the same port.

What confuses me is that service reports that apache2 is NOT running:

el@titan:~$ sudo service apache2 status
Apache2 is NOT running.

And when you query apache2ctl for its status, it hangs.

root@titan:~# /usr/sbin/apache2ctl status
**hangs until Ctrl-C is pressed.

So Ubuntu seems to be having trouble managing apache2 on bootup. Time to stop apache2:

root@titan:~# /usr/sbin/apache2ctl stop
httpd (no pid file) not running

A big clue! You try to stop apache2 and it lost the process id! So Ubuntu can't stop apache2 because it doesn't know where it is!

You would think a reboot would fix it, but it doesn't because apache2 starts on boot and hangs. The normal boot process for apache2 is not working right.

So How to fix it?

I was able to fix this by analyzing the ps command output. Notice that the ps command tells us that that process was started by "/etc/rc2.d/S91apache2 start".

That is the offending program that needs a swift kick.

/etc/rc2.d/S91apache2 is the symbolic link used to start apache2 for you when the computer starts. For some reason it seems to be starting apache2 and then hangs. So we'll have to tell it to not do that.

So go take a look at that /etc/rc2.d/S91apache2.

el@titan:/etc/rc2.d$ ls -l
lrwxrwxrwx   1 root root    17 Nov  7 21:45 S91apache2 -> ../init.d/apache2*

It's a symbolic link that we don't want it to be there. Do this to prevent apache2 from starting on boot:

root@titan:~# sudo update-rc.d -f apache2 remove
 Removing any system startup links for /etc/init.d/apache2 ...
   /etc/rc0.d/K09apache2
   /etc/rc1.d/K09apache2
   /etc/rc2.d/S91apache2
   /etc/rc3.d/S91apache2
   /etc/rc4.d/S91apache2
   /etc/rc5.d/S91apache2
   /etc/rc6.d/K09apache2

Reboot the computer to make sure apache2 doesn't start and hang. Ok good. Now you COULD put apache2 back the way it was, but that would make it fail again.

root@titan:~$ sudo update-rc.d apache2 defaults     //(don't do this)
 Adding system startup for /etc/init.d/apache2 ...
   /etc/rc0.d/K20apache2 -> ../init.d/apache2
   /etc/rc1.d/K20apache2 -> ../init.d/apache2
   /etc/rc6.d/K20apache2 -> ../init.d/apache2
   /etc/rc2.d/S20apache2 -> ../init.d/apache2
   /etc/rc3.d/S20apache2 -> ../init.d/apache2
   /etc/rc4.d/S20apache2 -> ../init.d/apache2
   /etc/rc5.d/S20apache2 -> ../init.d/apache2

Instead, start the apache2 like this:

sudo service apache2 start

And the apache2 is back up and serving pages again. There seems to be some serious bugs with apache2/Ubuntu 12.10 that causes apache2 to start and hang. This is a workaround, I suppose the fix is to get newer versions of apache2 and Ubuntu and hope for the best.

Answer 6

sudo kill -9 -2321 (pid) Restart BT Done..... no need to make changes in conf. file.