Error: cURL error 28: Operation timed out after 10010 milliseconds with 0 bytes received (http_request_failed)

WordPress Questions
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This isn’t new. This issue has been discussed in WordPress circles for a few years, and outside of WordPress for at least a decade. I was struggling with this here in this forum with Local last year, and again just recently. It’s a real pain.
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(my detailed post)

This is also not specific to Local or Woocommerce or other applications. It’s not Windows-only. It doesn’t seem to be WordPress-specific. Here’s what I’ve learned in my own installation - your experience / symptoms / results may vary:

  1. None of the solutions offered in blogs or forums help.
  2. Most open requests for help on this topic are eventually closed without resolution. Closed reports seem to have been self-inflicted errors and I can’t determine the cause/fix in those situations.
  3. This seems to be specific to a loopback with Apache when cURL is used in PHP. It does not happen when running curl from the command-line to localhost or 127.0.0.1, for example to trigger wp-cron.
  4. I do not think this is related to security. I’ve turned off Windows firewall, deleted and/or disabled all security. I’ve temporarily disabled SSL/TLS with my Local sites.
  5. I do not think this is an Apache issue. The Local environment configures the Apache server and sites for us (yay). I have not been able to resolve this with changes in Apache configs, for example to call the same site on a different port, with changes to the server name, getting “localhost” to resolve to the same site as “mysite.local”, etc. I have probably not been thorough here.
  6. I do not think this is related to /etc/hosts.A
  7. I do not think this is related to my NIC, a policy, or network configuration. I’m on a laptop, LAN, DHCP. Again, a loopback request from the command-line works.

Given all of that, my best guess at this point is that there is something in the default (or a minimal) Apache and/or PHP configuration in Local that is causing this for us. I’ve gone through all Apache and PHP settings that are in the configs and I can’t find anything that impacts this - however there might be some setting that I have not added into the Apache configs or php.ini that would change a behavior related to this.

I’m really hoping Local/WPEngine Support can take a look at this. I’m anxious to help.

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