# Troubleshooting

> A session does not come up, a prefix is not announced, a command cannot reach ansage.

## Where to look

```sh
ansage show summary              # one line per neighbor: state, since when, prefixes
ansage show peer 10.0.0.1        # last error, last down, negotiated capabilities, counters
journalctl -u ansage -f          # the log
```

More detail in the log: `RUST_LOG=ansage=debug` in the unit's environment
(`systemctl edit ansage`, then `[Service]` `Environment=RUST_LOG=ansage=debug`).
`--log-format json` writes one JSON object per line for a log pipeline.

## The session does not come up

`ansage show peer` shows why in `Last error` (our side) or `Last down` (a NOTIFICATION):

```txt
  State: Idle for 3.0s
  Last error: 3.0s ago, connect: Connection refused (os error 111)
  Reconnect: backoff 10.0s, next attempt in 816ms
```

| Symptom                                                  | Likely cause                                                                                                            |
| -------------------------------------------------------- | ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| `connect: Connection refused`                            | the router does not listen, or does not know ansage's address as a neighbor                                             |
| `connect: ... timed out`, state stays `Connect`/`Active` | firewall or routing between ansage and the router; TCP port 179                                                         |
| `notification received: cease (6/7)`                     | the router rejected the connection (Connection Rejected): it has no neighbor for ansage's address, or already a session |
| OPEN error, Bad Peer AS                                  | `asn` on one side does not match `remote-as` / `neighbor ... as` on the other                                           |
| works without TCP-MD5, fails with it                     | keys differ, or only one side has one; check `password` / `password_file`                                               |
| works without `ttl_security`, fails with it              | the router does not send TTL 255 or is more hops away than set                                                          |

The reconnect delay doubles after every failure up to `max_connect_retry` (default 600 s).
`ansage peer 10.0.0.1 reset` connects again at once and resets the delay, see [Take one neighbor down](/docs/guides/peer-maintenance.md).

## The router does not have my prefix

1. `ansage show summary`: is the prefix under `Announcing`? A runtime `ansage withdraw` lasts
   until a restart.
2. Is ansage [drained](/docs/guides/drain.md)? `ansage show summary` says `Drained for ...`; routers
   prefer other paths then.
3. Is the `SENT v4/v6` count 0 for one family? The session runs over the other family and ansage
   has no next hop for it: set `next_hop_ipv6` (or `next_hop_ipv4`), see [Next hops](/docs/guides/next-hops.md).
4. Did the router accept it? FRR with `bgp ebgp-requires-policy` (the default) drops routes
   without a route map; BIRD needs `import` in the matching channel.

## A command cannot reach ansage

```txt
ansage: cannot connect to /run/ansage/ansage.sock: Permission denied (os error 13) (is ansage running, and is this its control_socket?)
```

Your user is not in group `ansage`. `sudo usermod -aG ansage "$USER"` (or the installer's
`--operator`), then log in again.

```txt
ansage: cannot connect to /run/ansage/ansage.sock: No such file or directory (os error 2) (is ansage running, and is this its control_socket?)
```

ansage is not running, or uses another `control_socket`: pass `-c /etc/ansage/ansage.toml`
(ansage reads the socket path from it) or `-s SOCKET`.

## ansage does not start

```sh
ansage check -c /etc/ansage/ansage.toml
```

prints what is wrong with the config, e.g. `prefix "10.0.0.1/8": host bits set, did you mean 10.0.0.0/8?`.
With `[kernel]`, ansage also refuses to start without CAP_NET_ADMIN and says so; the
installer enables it in the unit when the config has `[kernel]`.

## A reload is refused

`asn`, `router_id`, `listen`, `control_socket` and `metrics_listen` need a restart. A reload that
changes them, or an invalid file, changes nothing: ansage runs on with the old config.
See [Reload](/docs/guides/reload.md).