Starting neo4j from docker container shows "Neo4j is not running"

Question

I have been trying to use use neo4j community in a container and am getting errors. I think this might more a docker usage issues rather than neo4j usage.

I have built a container image from https://github.com/neo4j/docker-neo4j-publish 2.3.9, 3.3.3, 3.3.4 and 3.3.5 (only differences being some new ports in later versions). I have even pulled a native 3.3.3 from dockerhub.com

mkdir /tmp/data
chmod 777 /tmp/data
docker run --detach=true --name=neo4j --publish=7474:7474 --publish=7687:7687 --publish=7473:7473 --volume=/tmp/data:/data neo4j:3.3.3
docker exec -it neo4j find / -name '*.log'

and although it seems to be working with

neo4j> CREATE (n);
0 rows available after 50 ms, consumed after another 0 ms
Added 1 nodes
neo4j> CREATE (m),(o);
0 rows available after 15 ms, consumed after another 0 ms
Added 2 nodes
neo4j> MATCH (n) RETURN n;
+----+
| n  |
+----+
| () |
| () |
| () |
+----+

3 rows available after 21 ms, consumed after another 8 ms

I actually get errors like this:

docker exec -it neo4j neo4j status
Neo4j is not running

Now this one looks like I am mistakenly trying to start another instance of Neo4j over a running instance:

 docker exec -it neo4j neo4j console
Active database: graph.db
Directories in use:
  home:         /var/lib/neo4j
  config:       /var/lib/neo4j/conf
  logs:         /var/lib/neo4j/logs
  plugins:      /var/lib/neo4j/plugins
  import:       /var/lib/neo4j/import
  data:         /var/lib/neo4j/data
  certificates: /var/lib/neo4j/certificates
  run:          /var/lib/neo4j/run
Starting Neo4j.
2018-04-15 06:30:13.119+0000 WARN  Unknown config option: causal_clustering.discovery_listen_address
2018-04-15 06:30:13.123+0000 WARN  Unknown config option: causal_clustering.raft_advertised_address
2018-04-15 06:30:13.123+0000 WARN  Unknown config option: causal_clustering.raft_listen_address
2018-04-15 06:30:13.123+0000 WARN  Unknown config option: ha.host.coordination
2018-04-15 06:30:13.124+0000 WARN  Unknown config option: causal_clustering.transaction_advertised_address
2018-04-15 06:30:13.124+0000 WARN  Unknown config option: causal_clustering.discovery_advertised_address
2018-04-15 06:30:13.124+0000 WARN  Unknown config option: ha.host.data
2018-04-15 06:30:13.124+0000 WARN  Unknown config option: causal_clustering.transaction_listen_address
2018-04-15 06:30:13.146+0000 INFO  ======== Neo4j 3.3.3 ========
2018-04-15 06:30:13.186+0000 INFO  Starting...
2018-04-15 06:30:13.997+0000 INFO  Bolt enabled on 0.0.0.0:7687.
2018-04-15 06:30:14.094+0000 ERROR Failed to start Neo4j: Starting Neo4j failed: Component 'org.neo4j.server.database.LifecycleManagingDatabase@44a59da3' was successfully initialized, but failed to start. Please see the attached cause exception "Store and its lock file has been locked by another process: /var/lib/neo4j/data/databases/graph.db/store_lock. Please ensure no other process is using this database, and that the directory is writable (required even for read-only access)". Starting Neo4j failed: Component 'org.neo4j.server.database.LifecycleManagingDatabase@44a59da3' was successfully initialized, but failed to start. Please see the attached cause exception "Store and its lock file has been locked by another process: /var/lib/neo4j/data/databases/graph.db/store_lock. Please ensure no other process is using this database, and that the directory is writable (required even for read-only access)".
org.neo4j.server.ServerStartupException: Starting Neo4j failed: Component 'org.neo4j.server.database.LifecycleManagingDatabase@44a59da3' was successfully initialized, but failed to start. Please see the attached cause exception "Store and its lock file has been locked by another process: /var/lib/neo4j/data/databases/graph.db/store_lock. Please ensure no other process is using this database, and that the directory is writable (required even for read-only access)".

Does anybody have experience with Neo4j's docker implementation? Is it a single threaded issue meaning I need to call the CLI tools differently from the container?

Answer 1

The neo4j status command only works if you've started neo4j with neo4j start. Start creates a neo4j.pid file that status uses to see if neo4j is running. Starting under docker uses the console option instead of the start option. This does not create the PID file, so the status doesn't work. But that hardly matters, because neo4j is just about the only process running; if neo4j dies, the container will exit. If docker ps -a says that the container is up, then neo4j is up.