MID Server won't start after new installation, password change or other config.xml edit because of SAXParseException due to using unencoded special characters that are invalid XML - Known Error

MID Server won't start after new installation, password change or other config.xml edit because of SAXParseException due to using unencoded special characters that are invalid XML Description MID Server won' t start after new installation, password change or other config.xml edit because of SAXParseException due to using unencoded special characters that are invalid XML. The XML specification defines five "predefined entities" representing special characters, and requires that all XML processors honor them. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_XML_and_HTML_character_entity_references

" & ' > If any parameter value in a MID Server config.xml file contains one of these characters un-escaped/encoded, the MID Server will fail to start with a SAXParseException shown in the agent log of the MID Server.

It is also possible to see the same symptom by accidently loosing the closing text of the parameter tag /> when editing config.xml, as selecting text in Word often ends up with more selected than you expected.

The ZIP installer would also have a similar issue with passwords.

Steps to Reproduce

Manually edit the config.xml file, adding a password that contains unencoded characters. Restart the MID Server An example of an ampersand, in this case the password included &JY on the end, and the parser thinks JY is an entity name.

Wrapper log:

2018/10/26 12:06:28 | Launching a JVM... 2018/10/26 12:06:28 | WrapperManager: Initializing... 2018/10/26 12:06:29 | Logger for 'glide' has not been configured by the container, configuring now: 2018/10/26 12:06:29 | Configuring log handler: java.util.logging.FileHandler 2018/10/26 12:06:29 | Setting useParentHandlers=false for Logger 'glide' 2018/10/26 12:06:29 | Overriding formatter to: com.glide.util.DefaultLogFormatter (for handler: java.util.logging.FileHandler) 2018/10/26 12:06:29 | [Fatal Error] :32:78: The reference to entity "JY" must end with the ';' delimiter. 2018/10/26 12:06:30 | ServiceNow MID Server Core service started. 2018/10/26 12:06:31 | Agent Log:

10/26/18 12:06:28 (978) WrapperStartStopAppMain Running under Java version: 1.8.0_191, java PID: 3488, args: start 10/26/18 12:06:28 (978) WrapperStartStopAppMain Initializing MID Server 10/26/18 12:06:28 (994) MIDServer Creating injector... 10/26/18 12:06:29 (244) MIDServer WARNING *** WARNING *** org.xml.sax.SAXParseException ; lineNumber: 32; columnNumber: 78; The reference to entity "JY" must end with the ';' delimiter . 10/26/18 12:06:29 (244) MIDServer Using configuration: C:\ServiceNow\MIDServers\Core_Production\agent\config.xml 10/26/18 12:06:29 (244) MIDServer WARNING *** WARNING *** XPathUtil.selectSingleNode called with null using xpath: //parameter[@name='refresh_rate'] 10/26/18 12:06:29 (244) MIDServer WARNING *** WARNING *** XPathUtil.selectSingleNode called with null using xpath: //parameter[@name='instance.date.format'] 10/26/18 12:06:29 (244) MIDServer WARNING *** WARNING *** XPathUtil.selectNodes called with null using xpath: //parameter 10/26/18 12:06:29 (244) MIDServer SEVERE *** ERROR *** Unexpected exception, terminating the MID server An older example of an ampersand in the password:

06/25/13 11:10:31 (394) MIDServer MID Server starting 06/25/13 11:10:32 (828) MIDServer WARNING *** WARNING *** org.xml.sax. SAXParseException : The entity name must immediately follow the '&' in the entity reference. 06/25/13 11:10:32 (828) MIDServer Using configuration: C:\Users\ServiceNow\Desktop\agent\config.xml 06/25/13 11:10:32 (875) MIDServer WARNING *** WARNING *** XPathUtil.selectSingleNode called with null using xpath: //parameter[@name='auto_upgrade'] 06/25/13 11:10:32 (875) MIDServer WARNING *** WARNING *** XPathUtil.selectSingleNode called with null using xpath: //parameter[@name='refresh_rate'] 06/25/13 11:10:32 (875) MIDServer WARNING *** WARNING *** XPathUtil.selectSingleNode called with null using xpath: //parameter[@name='instance.date.format'] 06/25/13 11:10:32 (875) MIDServer WARNING *** WARNING *** XPathUtil.selectNodes called with null using xpath: //parameter 06/25/13 11:10:32 (876) MIDServer SEVERE *** ERROR *** Unexpected exception terminating the MID server java.lang.NullPointerException at com.service_now.mid.services.Config.getParameters(Config.java:168) at com.service_now.mid.services.Config.loadProperties(Config.java:339) at com.service_now.mid.services.Config.init(Config.java:140) at com.service_now.mid.services.StartupSequencer.start(StartupSequencer.java:53) at com.service_now.mid.MIDServerState.initForStart(MIDServerState.java:177) at com.service_now.mid.MIDServerState.onStart(MIDServerState.java:77) at com.service_now.mid.MIDServerState.poll(MIDServerState.java:40) at com.service_now.mid.MIDServer.run(MIDServer.java:49) at com.service_now.mid.Main.runMID(Main.java:69) at com.service_now.mid.Main.handleStart(Main.java:31) at com.service_now.mid.Main.main(Main.java:25) at sun.reflect.NativeMethodAccessorImpl.invoke0(Native Method) at sun.reflect.NativeMethodAccessorImpl.invoke(Unknown Source) at sun.reflect.DelegatingMethodAccessorImpl.invoke(Unknown Source) at java.lang.reflect.Method.invoke(Unknown Source) at org.tanukisoftware.wrapper.WrapperStartStopApp.run(WrapperStartStopApp.java:238) at java.lang.Thread.run(Unknown Source)

06/25/13 11:10:33 (266) Thread-1 Shutdown hook entered; shutting down MID server An older example where quotation mark was used unescaped:

01/11/19 13:24:47 (752) WrapperStartStopAppMain Running under Java version: 1.8.0_60, java PID: 4772, args: start 01/11/19 13:24:47 (768) WrapperStartStopAppMain Initializing MID Server 01/11/19 13:24:47 (799) MIDServer Creating injector... 01/11/19 13:24:48 (580) MIDServer WARNING *** WARNING *** org.xml.sax.SAXParseException; lineNumber: 34; columnNumber: 3; The value of attribute "value" associated with an element type "parameter" must not contain the ' 01/11/19 13:24:48 (580) MIDServer Using configuration: C:\ServiceNow\Jakarta\agent\config.xml 01/11/19 13:24:48 (596) MIDServer WARNING *** WARNING *** XPathUtil.selectSingleNode called with null using xpath: //parameter[@name='refresh_rate'] 01/11/19 13:24:48 (596) MIDServer WARNING *** WARNING *** XPathUtil.selectSingleNode called with null using xpath: //parameter[@name='instance.date.format'] 01/11/19 13:24:48 (596) MIDServer WARNING *** WARNING *** XPathUtil.selectNodes called with null using xpath: //parameter 01/11/19 13:24:48 (596) MIDServer SEVERE *** ERROR *** Unexpected exception, terminating the MID server java.lang.NullPointerException at com.service_now.mid.services.Config.loadParameters(Config.java:217) at com.service_now.mid.services.Config.loadProperties(Config.java:346) at com.service_now.mid.services.Config.init(Config.java:189) at com.service_now.mid.MIDServer.createInjector(MIDServer.java:258) at com.service_now.mid.MIDServer.run(MIDServer.java:193) at com.service_now.mid.Main.runMID(Main.java:72) at com.service_now.mid.Main.handleStart(Main.java:33) at com.service_now.mid.Main.main(Main.java:27) at sun.reflect.NativeMethodAccessorImpl.invoke0(Native Method) at sun.reflect.NativeMethodAccessorImpl.invoke(NativeMethodAccessorImpl.java:62) at sun.reflect.DelegatingMethodAccessorImpl.invoke(DelegatingMethodAccessorImpl.java:43) at java.lang.reflect.Method.invoke(Method.java:497) at org.tanukisoftware.wrapper.WrapperStartStopApp.run(WrapperStartStopApp.java:264) at java.lang.Thread.run(Thread.java:745) Opening the config.xml file in a browser or an online parser will confirms it is bad XML:

In this case it was a missing closing /> on the end of the line e.g. instead of />

Workaround This is by design. For workaround information, see MID Server documentation:

MID Server configuration - Using special characters in an XML file MID Server protected records and reserved characters In summary:

replace " with &quot; replace & with &amp; replace ' with &apos; replace replace > with &gt; For example, to specify the password as test& in the MID Server config.xml file:

test&amp; "/> Related Problem: PRB586201