Cannot start Local wp site

[Joost]

What issue or error are you experiencing?

I’m unable to start a site. I get the error message as seen in the screenshot. It also says that mailpit is missing. I tried instructions to get it reinstalled, but starting up Local again doesn’t re-install mailpit. It says it will be reinstalled the next time I start a site, but I can’t restart a site.

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What steps can be taken to replicate the issue? Feel free to include screenshots, videos, etc

Install site: ok, stop site: ok. Restart site: error.

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System Details

• Local Version: Version 9.2.7+6877

• Operating System (OS) and OS version: Mac OS 13.7.6 (22H625) (Intel)

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Local Logs

Attach your Local Logs here (Help Doc - Retrieving Local’s Log)

local-lightning-verbose.log (143.0 KB)

local-lightning.log (54.3 KB)

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Security Reminder
Local does a pretty good job of scrubbing private info from the logs and the errors it produces, however there’s always the possibility that something private can come through. Because these are public forums, always review the screenshots you are sharing to make sure there isn’t private info like passwords being displayed.

[nickc]

Thanks for this report, @Joost. You can try:

1. Removing Mailpit to force Local to copy a fresh version for you.

MailPit not starting On OSX

Thanks for sharing your sites.json, @sebastian. It looks correct to me. One thing you can try is to force Local to recopy the mailpit binary on startup (steps below assume macOS, Windows users reading this should follow these instructions instead). Stop any running sites. Quit Local. Open the Finder and choose Go → Go To Folder… Enter ~/Library/Application Support/Local/lightning-services and press Enter. Delete the folder named ‘mailpit-1.24.1+0’, but leave the Finder window open. Make sure …

2. Editing your sites.json to ensure your site is running the latest version of Mailpit (step 3 onwards):

Can't open MailPit

Thanks for clarifying, @sccr410. The port conflict sounds like you might have running services left over from previous Local launches. Mailpit failing to launch even after you’ve removed the old Mailpit files could be a versioning issue. You can try this to fix both: Quit Local. Open Activity Monitor and quit any running nginx processes. Take a backup of Local’s ~/Library/Application Support/Local/sites.json. Update Local’s ~/Library/Application Support/Local/sites.json and make sure all Mai…

[Joost]

Hi @nickc , thanks for the reply. I already tried the first solution. There isn’t a mailpit folder in the first place in the folder lighting-services. It also isn’t reproduced after restarting Local.

I also looked at the second solution. In the json file, the mailpit version already is 1.24.1. Which is the latest version I think.

Any other ideas?

[nickc]

Is it just one site you can’t restart, @Joost?

If so, you can try recreating it by zipping the site folder and importing it into Local with drag and drop, as described here:

https://localwp.com/help-docs/getting-started/how-to-import-a-wordpress-site-into-local/#restore-local-site-from-site-files

[Joost]

@nickc It’s both sites. I’m now trying to delete and re-install local itself.

[nickc]

@Joost Try reimporting both sites? It might be quicker than a reinstall.

[Joost]

@nickc I already did a full reinstall, with restarting my mac before starting the new install. I uninstalled the old installation following the instructions. After the new install (and before making a site) I checked if the Mailpit folder was present. It wasn’t. After making a site, the mailpit folder was not produced.

The first start of the website isn’t a problem. The problem only occurs after stopping the website and then restarting it. I get the same error message.

[nickc]

Thanks for trying that, @Joost. I haven’t been able to reproduce this so far.

I’ll DM you for a copy of your sites.json in case there’s anything there that’s unusual.

[nickc]

Fixed via DM by:

1. Taking a backup of sites.json by duplicating it as sites-backup.json (on macOS this is at ~/Library/Application Support/Local/sites.json).

2. Editing sites.json to change blocks like this in each site:

         "mailpit": {
           "name": "mailpit",
           "version": "1.24.1",
           "type": "lightning"
         },
   

   To look like this:

         "mailpit": {
           "name": "mailpit",
           "version": "1.24.1",
           "type": "lightning",
           "ports": { "WEB": [], "SMTP": [] }
         },
   

3. Restarting Local.

[stiff]

The problem is that the new version doesn’t install Mailpit in the support path at all — no matter how often you restart.
You need to install an older version first and then upgrade.

Check out my post for details:
Fix: Mailpit not starting in Local — seed with 9.2.5, then upgrade