🟡 Medium   ⏱ 5–30 min  Last verified: 20 May 2026
Affected versions: FreeBSD 15

📖 ~1 min read

Table of contents
  1. Symptom & Impact
  2. Environment & Reproduction
  3. Root Cause Analysis
  4. Quick Triage
  5. Step-by-Step Diagnosis
  6. Solution – Primary Fix
  7. Solution – Alternative Approaches
  8. Verification & Acceptance Criteria
  9. Rollback Plan
  10. Prevention & Hardening
  11. Related Errors & Cross-Refs
  12. References & Further Reading

Symptom & Impact

Web service remains down after reboot until manually restarted.

Environment & Reproduction

Seen when web root is on late-mounted ZFS dataset.

service nginx onestart

Root Cause Analysis

Service starts before required filesystem is mounted and ready.

Quick Triage

Review boot logs for mount timing and rc.d sequence.

grep -Ei 'nginx|mount' /var/log/messages

Step-by-Step Diagnosis

Inspect rc.d script PROVIDE/REQUIRE and dataset mountpoint availability.

head -n 40 /usr/local/etc/rc.d/nginx
Illustrative mockup for freebsd-15 — nginx_boot_fail
nginx startup failure during boot — Illustrative mockup — Progressive Robot

Solution – Primary Fix

Adjust dependencies or delay start until required filesystems are online.

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sudo sysrc nginx_enable=YES && sudo service nginx restart
Illustrative mockup for freebsd-15 — rcorder_require_fix
Correcting rc.d dependency order — Illustrative mockup — Progressive Robot

Solution – Alternative Approaches

Add one-shot post-mount health check before exposing listener.

Verification & Acceptance Criteria

Service starts automatically on reboot with valid document root.

Rollback Plan

Restore previous rc.d script and manual startup workaround.

Prevention & Hardening

Test service startup sequence whenever storage topology changes.

Related to jail startup order and delayed network-mounted content.

Related tutorial: View the step-by-step tutorial for freebsd-15.

View all freebsd-15 tutorials on the Tutorials Hub →

Browse all common problems & solutions on the Tutorials Hub.

References & Further Reading

FreeBSD rcorder and service startup documentation.

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