Exception During Upgrade to JIRA 6.x Fails due to NullPointerException
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
Symptoms
Upgrading to JIRA 6.x seemingly completes but fails when starting up and the following appears in the atlassian-jira.log:
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2013-06-30 14:51:16,114 localhost-startStop-1 ERROR [atlassian.jira.upgrade.UpgradeManagerImpl] Exception thrown during upgrade: java.lang.NullPointerException
com.atlassian.util.concurrent.LazyReference$InitializationException: java.lang.NullPointerException
at com.atlassian.util.concurrent.LazyReference.getInterruptibly(LazyReference.java:149)
at com.atlassian.util.concurrent.LazyReference.get(LazyReference.java:112)
at com.atlassian.util.concurrent.ResettableLazyReference.get(ResettableLazyReference.java:87)
at com.atlassian.jira.issue.fields.CustomFieldImpl.getCustomFieldSearcher(CustomFieldImpl.java:1807)
at com.atlassian.jira.issue.fields.CustomFieldImpl.<init>(CustomFieldImpl.java:249)
at com.atlassian.jira.issue.fields.CustomFieldImpl.<init>(CustomFieldImpl.java:222)
at com.atlassian.jira.issue.managers.DefaultCustomFieldManager$CustomFieldCache.cloneCustomFields(DefaultCustomFieldManager.java:730)
at com.atlassian.jira.issue.managers.DefaultCustomFieldManager$CustomFieldCache.getAllCustomFields(DefaultCustomFieldManager.java:717)
at com.atlassian.jira.issue.managers.DefaultCustomFieldManager$CopyOnWriteCustomFieldCache.getAllCustomFields(DefaultCustomFieldManager.java:621)
at com.atlassian.jira.issue.managers.DefaultCustomFieldManager.getAllCustomFields(DefaultCustomFieldManager.java:417)
at com.atlassian.jira.issue.managers.DefaultCustomFieldManager.getCustomFieldObjects(DefaultCustomFieldManager.java:412)
at com.atlassian.jira.upgrade.tasks.UpgradeTask_Build6045.getCustomFields(UpgradeTask_Build6045.java:132)
at com.atlassian.jira.upgrade.tasks.UpgradeTask_Build6045.doUpgrade(UpgradeTask_Build6045.java:59)
at com.atlassian.jira.upgrade.UpgradeManagerImpl.doUpgradeTaskSuccess(UpgradeManagerImpl.java:673)
at com.atlassian.jira.upgrade.UpgradeManagerImpl.runUpgradeTasks(UpgradeManagerImpl.java:526)
at com.atlassian.jira.upgrade.UpgradeManagerImpl.doUpgrade(UpgradeManagerImpl.java:456)
...
Caused by: java.lang.NullPointerException
at com.atlassian.jira.util.JiraUtils.loadComponent(JiraUtils.java:96)
Cause
The JIRA instance has plugins installed that are not compatible with the new JIRA version.
Resolution
Stop JIRA.
Rename the
$JIRA_HOME/plugins/installed-pluginsto something else, for exampletmp. This effectively prevents all your plugins from starting up when JIRA starts.Start JIRA and retry the upgrade.
Once the upgrade has successfully completed, reinstall all the previous plugins through the Add-on Manager. This will automatically install versions that are compatible with the new JIRA version.
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