RabbitMQ on Windows Server 2016 does not recognizes rabbitmq.conf

[Dennis Boldt]

I installed RabbitMQ on a Windows server (otp_win64_22.2.exe and rabbitmq-server-3.8.2.exe). I also installed the Management Console. If I look into the file enabled_plugins located in %AppData%\RabbitMQ, I can see the following:

[rabbitmq_management].

I can also access the Management Console via http://srv:15672/, but I cannot login, since I get the following message: User can only log in via localhost

Thus, I created a rabbitmq.conf in %AppData%\RabbitMQ with the following content:

loopback_users.guest = false

I still cannot login. I also tried other configuration options.

Issue: The RabbitMQ service does not recognizes my rabbitmq.conf at all. What do I miss?

P.S.: I cross-posted this also on Stackoverflow, since I found the group afterwards.

[Dennis Boldt]

I realized two two things:

1) Diagnostics broken

The command rabbitmq-diagnostics -q status created an error (unfortunately, i did not documented which).

2) Empty log file

The log file was quite empty. Smth like this didn't appear in the log:

node           : rabbit@example
home dir       : /var/lib/rabbitmq
config file(s) : /var/lib/rabbitmq/hare.conf (not found)

Observation)

Somehow the installation seems to be broken

Solution)

I decided to uninstall and reinstall RabbitMQ. Et voilà, rabbitmq-diagnostics shows all informations, including the path to the config file, and the rabbitmq.conf is recognized, since I can login to the Management UI.

[Dennis Boldt]

To verify the installation steps, I tested it on a a second server.

The %AppData%\RabbitMQ looks as follows: It contains advanced.config and rabbitmq.conf and the log-folder:

The rabbitmq.conf contains the following:

And if I start RabbitMQ, again it does not recognizes the rabbitmq.conf. It only recognizes the advanced.config, as it can be seen from the log-file from the log-folder:

And idea, why the rabbitmq.conf is not recognized is appreciated.

[Renya Walker]

Hello Dennis, 

In Windows systems, restarting the service is not enough to load the rabbitmq.conf file (at least that's what I've noticed when I was trying to set up RMQ on my server). 

So I would suggest to reinstall the rabbitmq service (rabbitmq-service remove), then before installing the service again, make sure rabbitmq.conf is in the user's folder.

Also check if you have RABBITMQ_CONFIG_FILE environment variable set - for some reason this can also affect the loading of the config file. 

If all else fails, reinstall Erlang and RabbitMQ, this time make sure rabbitmq.conf is already in the user's app folder before installing the service.

[Dennis Boldt]

Hey Renya,

thanks or your hint. I can confirm, that the following works (I just used the start menu entries):

• RabbitMQ Service - stop
• RabbitMQ Service - remove
• RabbitMQ Service - (re)install
• RabbitMQ Service - start
  

Both, the command rabbitmq-diagnostics -q status and the log file show the rabbitmq.conf now, and the configured parameters are taken into account by RMQ.

One question remains: Why the rabbitmq.conf is not recognized when it is created after the installation. I don't understand this. I'll create a bug report.

[Luke Bakken]

Hi Dennis,

This isn't a bug, it's a quirk of RabbitMQ on Windows. When you install the service, it creates a fixed argument to the erl.exe virtual machine that is run when the windows service starts, and the argument contains information about what configuration files are in place. The only way (at this time) to re-genereate the argument is to re-install the service.

At some point in the future this will be addressed, and I have made a note of it in our internal project tracker.

Thanks -
Luke