Symptoms in Confluence 4.3.2 and newer

Confluence starts, but throws a RuntimeException during the startup process. Accessing the site gives something like:

You cannot access Confluence at present. Look at the table below to identify the reasons

This page will automatically update every 60 seconds.

Time: 2012-09-20 11:54:12
Level:
Type: startup
Description: Confluence will not start up because the build number in the home directory [<HomeDirectoryBuildNumber>] is newer than the Confluence build number [<ConfluenceBuildNumber>].
Exception: fatal

Symptoms in Confluence 4.3.1 and below

Confluence starts, but throws a RuntimeException during the startup process. Accessing the site gives something like:

You cannot access Confluence at present. Look at the table below to identify the reasons

This page will automatically update every 60 seconds.

Time: 2009-09-02 22:08:18
Level:
Type: upgrade
Description: Upgrade failed. Please consult the system logs for details. You will need to fix these problems and restart. Your server id is: <ServerID>.
Exception: fatal

Cause

Confluence has been downgraded, perhaps unintentionally. This can happen after an upgrade, when the old version's startup.sh was run. Starting up with the correct script, Confluence will try to re-run the upgrade task and might fail due to the schema changes introduced or any other database integrity related problems.

Resolution

If using Confluence 4.3.2 and above and you need to start Confluence with an upgraded home directory, you need to set the com.atlassian.confluence.allow.downgrade system property to true. See Configuring System Properties for how to do that.

If using a version of Confluence older than 4.3.2, you can change your build number in <Confluence-Home>/confluence.cfg.xml file as:

    <buildNumber>1627</buildNumber>

That is the build number for Confluence v3.0.0_01. After it's corrected, restart Confluence.