Gunicorn.errors.haltserver: <haltserver 'worker failed to boot.' 3>.

Question

Problem :

I am very new to Django. I have recently installed the Django app and now I am trying to set it up with the Gunicorn first and soon after with the Supervisor and Nginx. My Django app is running with a normal Django command as expected for example python manage.py runserver. I have already  installed my Gunicorn using the pip for example pip install gunicorn and my Django version is 1.5.3. But when I try to run a below command and it is inside a virtual env as shown below

gunicorn hello.wsgi:application -b xx.xxx.xxx.xx:8000

And getting the below error

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "/root/Envs/proj/bin/gunicorn", line 9, in <module>
    load_entry_point('gunicorn==19.0.0', 'console_scripts', 'gunicorn')()
  File "/root/Envs/proj/local/lib/python2.7/site-packages/gunicorn/app/wsgiapp.py", line 74, in run
    WSGIApplication("%(prog)s [OPTIONS] [APP_MODULE]").run()
  File "/root/Envs/proj/local/lib/python2.7/site-packages/gunicorn/app/base.py", line 166, in run
    super(Application, self).run()
  File "/root/Envs/proj/local/lib/python2.7/site-packages/gunicorn/app/base.py", line 71, in run
    Arbiter(self).run()
  File "/root/Envs/proj/local/lib/python2.7/site-packages/gunicorn/arbiter.py", line 169, in run
    self.manage_workers()
  File "/root/Envs/proj/local/lib/python2.7/site-packages/gunicorn/arbiter.py", line 477, in manage_workers
    self.spawn_workers()
  File "/root/Envs/proj/local/lib/python2.7/site-packages/gunicorn/arbiter.py", line 537, in spawn_workers
    time.sleep(0.1 * random.random())
  File "/root/Envs/proj/local/lib/python2.7/site-packages/gunicorn/arbiter.py", line 209, in handle_chld
    self.reap_workers()
  File "/root/Envs/proj/local/lib/python2.7/site-packages/gunicorn/arbiter.py", line 459, in reap_workers
    raise HaltServer(reason, self.WORKER_BOOT_ERROR)
gunicorn.errors.HaltServer: <HaltServer 'Worker failed to boot.' 3>

Can some expert help me in fixing above error?

Answer 1

I have gone through your problem and I can assure that I have the quick fix for your issue. Your problem here is related to wsgi file itself in the past before the Django 1.3 a wsgi file was named with an extension of .wsgi, but now in the recent versions it will be created with and the extension of your .py that is a wsgi file must be the python module. So your file must be hello_wsgi.py and so your command should be as shown below:

gunicorn  hello:application -b xx.xxx.xxx.xx:8000

I hope you will be able to save your time in fixing your problem with the help of my above solution.

Answer 2

really the problem here was the wsgi file itself, formerly before django 1.3 the wsgi file was named with an extension of .wsgi, however now in the current versions it will be created with and extension of .py that is the wsgi file should be a python module

so the file must be hello_wsgi.py and command must be

gunicorn  hello:application -b xx.xxx.xxx.xx:8000

run guncorn with --preload can view the error log, like this

gunicorn app:application --preload -b 0.0.0.0:5000 

This will generally give you a more detailed error message.

You don't displayed a full output. It's possibly looks like

$ gunicorn elcarweb.wsgi
[2015-10-27 21:01:47 +0000] [5429] [INFO] Starting gunicorn 19.2.1
[2015-10-27 21:01:47 +0000] [5429] [INFO] Listening at: http://127.0.0.1:8000 (5429)
[2015-10-27 21:01:47 +0000] [5429] [INFO] Using worker: sync
[2015-10-27 21:01:47 +0000] [5434] [INFO] Booting worker with pid: 5434
[2015-10-27 21:01:47 +0000] [5434] [ERROR] Exception in worker process:
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "/home/tomek/Elcar/elcarweb/env/lib/python2.7/site-packages/gunicorn/arbiter.py", line 503, in spawn_worker
    worker.init_process()
  File "/home/tomek/Elcar/elcarweb/env/lib/python2.7/site-packages/gunicorn/workers/base.py", line 116, in init_process
    self.wsgi = self.app.wsgi()
  File "/home/tomek/Elcar/elcarweb/env/lib/python2.7/site-packages/gunicorn/app/base.py", line 67, in wsgi
    self.callable = self.load()
  File "/home/tomek/Elcar/elcarweb/env/lib/python2.7/site-packages/gunicorn/app/wsgiapp.py", line 65, in load
    return self.load_wsgiapp()
  File "/home/tomek/Elcar/elcarweb/env/lib/python2.7/site-packages/gunicorn/app/wsgiapp.py", line 52, in load_wsgiapp
    return util.import_app(self.app_uri)
  File "/home/tomek/Elcar/elcarweb/env/lib/python2.7/site-packages/gunicorn/util.py", line 355, in import_app
    __import__(module)
ImportError: No module named elcarweb.wsgi
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "/home/tomek/Elcar/elcarweb/env/lib/python2.7/site-packages/gunicorn/arbiter.py", line 503, in spawn_worker
    worker.init_process()
  File "/home/tomek/Elcar/elcarweb/env/lib/python2.7/site-packages/gunicorn/workers/base.py", line 116, in init_process
    self.wsgi = self.app.wsgi()
  File "/home/tomek/Elcar/elcarweb/env/lib/python2.7/site-packages/gunicorn/app/base.py", line 67, in wsgi
    self.callable = self.load()
  File "/home/tomek/Elcar/elcarweb/env/lib/python2.7/site-packages/gunicorn/app/wsgiapp.py", line 65, in load
    return self.load_wsgiapp()
  File "/home/tomek/Elcar/elcarweb/env/lib/python2.7/site-packages/gunicorn/app/wsgiapp.py", line 52, in load_wsgiapp
    return util.import_app(self.app_uri)
  File "/home/tomek/Elcar/elcarweb/env/lib/python2.7/site-packages/gunicorn/util.py", line 355, in import_app
    __import__(module)
ImportError: No module named elcarweb.wsgi
[2015-10-27 21:01:47 +0000] [5434] [INFO] Worker exiting (pid: 5434)
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "/home/tomek/Elcar/elcarweb/env/bin/gunicorn", line 11, in <module>
    sys.exit(run())
  File "/home/tomek/Elcar/elcarweb/env/lib/python2.7/site-packages/gunicorn/app/wsgiapp.py", line 74, in run
    WSGIApplication("%(prog)s [OPTIONS] [APP_MODULE]").run()
  File "/home/tomek/Elcar/elcarweb/env/lib/python2.7/site-packages/gunicorn/app/base.py", line 189, in run
    super(Application, self).run()
  File "/home/tomek/Elcar/elcarweb/env/lib/python2.7/site-packages/gunicorn/app/base.py", line 72, in run
    Arbiter(self).run()
  File "/home/tomek/Elcar/elcarweb/env/lib/python2.7/site-packages/gunicorn/arbiter.py", line 170, in run
    self.manage_workers()
  File "/home/tomek/Elcar/elcarweb/env/lib/python2.7/site-packages/gunicorn/arbiter.py", line 473, in manage_workers
    self.spawn_workers()
  File "/home/tomek/Elcar/elcarweb/env/lib/python2.7/site-packages/gunicorn/arbiter.py", line 537, in spawn_workers
    time.sleep(0.1 * random.random())
  File "/home/tomek/Elcar/elcarweb/env/lib/python2.7/site-packages/gunicorn/arbiter.py", line 210, in handle_chld
    self.reap_workers()
  File "/home/tomek/Elcar/elcarweb/env/lib/python2.7/site-packages/gunicorn/arbiter.py", line 455, in reap_workers
    raise HaltServer(reason, self.WORKER_BOOT_ERROR)
gunicorn.errors.HaltServer: <HaltServer 'Worker failed to boot.' 3>

 However before You view necessary informations:

ImportError: No module named elcarweb.wsgi

In case You view this error, then resolution is run gunicorn with --chdir=/your/app/dir parameter.

I also had a same error in Ubuntu 16.04, Django 1.11, employing systemd.

My issue was that I had split my settings out into separate files; for example: instead of having all settings in project/settings.py, I have a some settings files like project/settings/dev.py.

I had to update DJANGO_SETTINGS_MODULE in the project/wsgi.py file from:

os.environ.setdefault("DJANGO_SETTINGS_MODULE", "project.settings")  

to

os.environ.setdefault("DJANGO_SETTINGS_MODULE", "project.settings.dev")