Confluence blog navigation menu is missing
Platform Notice: Data Center Only - This article only applies to Atlassian products on the Data Center platform.
Note that this KB was created for the Data Center version of the product. Data Center KBs for non-Data-Center-specific features may also work for Server versions of the product, however they have not been tested. Support for Server* products ended on February 15th 2024. If you are running a Server product, you can visit the Atlassian Server end of support announcement to review your migration options.
*Except Fisheye and Crucible
Summary
The blogs navigation menu in Confluence does not render for some spaces. For example, you might see the navigation menu appear similar to the following:
Environment
7.15.0
Diagnosis
In the atlassian-confluence.log file, we will see the following error:
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
2022-05-26 09:13:43,035 ERROR [http-nio-8090-exec-10] [plugin.descriptor.web.ConfluenceWebInterfaceManager] getHtml Failed to render web panel: com.atlassian.plugin.web.descriptors.DefaultWebPanelModuleDescriptor$ContextAwareWebPanel@6fb45b6b2022-05-26 09:13:43,035 ERROR [http-nio-8090-exec-10] [plugin.descriptor.web.ConfluenceWebInterfaceManager] getHtml Failed to render web panel: com.atlassian.plugin.web.descriptors.DefaultWebPanelModuleDescriptor$ContextAwareWebPanel@6fb45b6b -- space: 524289 | url: /pages/viewrecentblogposts.action | traceId: 3dc16e210030d7a9 | userName: admin | referer: http://localhost:8090/display/LOU/2022/05/26/blog2 |
action: viewrecentblogpostsjava.lang.NullPointerException at java.base/java.util.Calendar.setTime(Calendar.java:1800)
at com.atlassian.confluence.plugins.ia.impl.DefaultBlogTreeService.getBlogTree(DefaultBlogTreeService.java:75)
at com.atlassian.confluence.plugins.ia.ui.DefaultSoySidebarContextProvider.populateWithContextualNavData(DefaultSoySidebarContextProvider.java:247)
at com.atlassian.confluence.plugins.ia.ui.DefaultSoySidebarContextProvider.getContextMap(DefaultSoySidebarContextProvider.java:121)
at com.atlassian.plugin.web.descriptors.DefaultWebPanelModuleDescriptor$ContextAwareWebPanel.getHtml(DefaultWebPanelModuleDescriptor.java:134)
at com.atlassian.confluence.plugin.descriptor.web.ConfluenceWebInterfaceManager$ExceptionHandlingWebPanel.getHtml(ConfluenceWebInterfaceManager.java:133)
Furthermore, we can run the following diagnostic query against the Confluence database to confirm there are blogs with a null creationdate:
1
2
3
4
5
SELECT *
FROM content
WHERE contenttype = 'BLOGPOST'
AND prevver IS null
AND creationdate IS null;
ℹ️ This query was tested against a Postgres database, if you are using a different database then you may need to make a few tweaks.
Cause
This can occur if a blog has a null value in the content table for the creationdate column. As the blogs are loaded in the navigation menu according to the date information, a null value in a blog may cause this to occur.
Solution
Solution 1 - Delete Blogs (✔️ Recommended)
The first option here is to manually delete the blogs which have a null creationdate values. This is recommended as it is a safer option. To do so:
First, backup the content of these blogs by running the following query:
1 2 3 4 5 6SELECT c.*, bc.* FROM content c INNER JOIN bodycontent bc ON bc.contentid = c.contentid WHERE c.contenttype = 'BLOGPOST' AND c.prevver IS null AND c.creationdate IS null;ℹ️ This query was tested against a Postgres database, if you are using a different database then you may need to make a few tweaks.
Next, for each contentid returned by the above query, visit the following URL replacing the pageId parameter (999999) with the contentId from the query results.
<confluence-base-URL>/pages/removeblogpost.action?pageId=999999
Finally, verify the blog navigation appears as expected
Solution 2 - Update Blogs in Database
The second option here is to update the null creationdate values in the Confluence database. This option is a bit more risky and requires Confluence to be shutdown. To do so:
⚠️ First, please work with your DBA to capture a full Confluence database backup.
Shutdown Confluence
Backup the content of these blogs by running the following query and dumping the results to a CSV file:
1 2 3 4 5 6SELECT c.*, bc.* FROM content c INNER JOIN bodycontent bc ON bc.contentid = c.contentid WHERE c.contenttype = 'BLOGPOST' AND c.prevver is null AND c.creationdate is null;Run the following update query:
1 2 3 4 5UPDATE content SET creationdate = '2022-01-01 00:00:00' WHERE contenttype = 'BLOGPOST' AND prevver IS null AND creationdate IS null;ℹ️ This will set a false date for the blog. While it should fix the larger issue of the blog navigation not showing, the date of these blogs are being set to Jan 1 2022.
Restart Confluence
Finally, let's verify the blog navigation appears as expected.
⚠️ As with all recommendations made by Atlassian Support, please follow best practices for Change Management and test and validate these settings in a Test or Development environment prior to deploying any changes to a Production environment. This allows for the validation of these changes while minimizing the risk and impact to end users. If a Test environment isn't available, then perform this test during a maintenance window or after hours.
Was this helpful?