JIRA throws Application failed to authenticate error when configuring a Crowd User Directory
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
Problem
When configuring JIRA to use Atlassian Crowd as a user directory and everything is already configured correctly (including credentials), JIRA still throws the following error in the UI
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Connection test failed. Response from the server:
com.atlassian.crowd.exception.InvalidAuthenticationException: Application failed to authenticateThe following stack trace is thrown in atlassian-jira.log
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2015-06-16 19:43:12,114 http-bio-8080-exec-3 ERROR admin 1183x1167x1 17i2lib 192.168.0.1,127.0.0.1 /plugins/servlet/embedded-crowd/configure/crowd/ [crowd.embedded.admin.ConfigurationController] Configuration test failed for user directory: [ Crowd Server], type: [ CROWD ]
com.atlassian.crowd.exception.runtime.OperationFailedException: com.atlassian.crowd.exception.InvalidAuthenticationException: Application failed to authenticate
at com.atlassian.crowd.embedded.core.CrowdDirectoryServiceImpl.testConnection(CrowdDirectoryServiceImpl.java:78)
at sun.reflect.GeneratedMethodAccessor787.invoke(Unknown Source)
at sun.reflect.DelegatingMethodAccessorImpl.invoke(DelegatingMethodAccessorImpl.java:43)
at java.lang.reflect.Method.invoke(Method.java:497)
at com.atlassian.plugin.osgi.hostcomponents.impl.DefaultComponentRegistrar$ContextClassLoaderSettingInvocationHandler.invoke(DefaultComponentRegistrar.java:134)
at com.sun.proxy.$Proxy230.testConnection(Unknown Source) <+2> (DelegatingMethodAccessorImpl.java:43)
at java.lang.reflect.Method.invoke(Method.java:497)
...
Caused by: com.atlassian.crowd.exception.InvalidAuthenticationException: Application failed to authenticate
at com.atlassian.crowd.integration.rest.service.RestExecutor$MethodExecutor.throwError(RestExecutor.java:643)
at com.atlassian.crowd.integration.rest.service.RestExecutor$MethodExecutor.andReceive(RestExecutor.java:485)
at com.atlassian.crowd.integration.rest.service.RestCrowdClient.searchUsers(RestCrowdClient.java:553)
at com.atlassian.crowd.integration.rest.service.RestCrowdClient.testConnection(RestCrowdClient.java:541)
at com.atlassian.crowd.directory.RemoteCrowdDirectory.testConnection(RemoteCrowdDirectory.java:834)
... 217 moreDiagnosis
JIRA and/or Crowd is running behind a reverse proxy
The Server URL field when configuring the user directory in JIRA uses the proxied URL
When bypassing proxy by adding an additional HTTP connector and then using the unproxied URL in the Server URL field, connection works fine
The following
RequestHeader unset Authorizationline has been added to the apache configuration page as per Troubleshooting Apache
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<Location /jira>
RequestHeader unset Authorization
ProxyPreserveHost On
ProxyPass http://jiraserver/jira
ProxyPassReverse http://jiraserver/jira
</Location>Cause
The RequestHeader unset Authorization line added to the proxy configuration is the cause of a failed authentication from JIRA to Crowd.
Solution
Resolution
Remove or comment that line out
1 2 3 4 5 6<Location /jira> # RequestHeader unset Authorization ProxyPreserveHost On ProxyPass http://jiraserver/jira ProxyPassReverse http://jiraserver/jira </Location>Restart the Apache service
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