Troubleshoot 404 Errors

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CacheFly Team

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Date Posted:

December 9, 2016

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When a client accesses CacheFly’s CDN to request your content, every request we receive is responded to with an HTTP status code. These status codes represent how each request was handled. A brief overview of codes looks like the following;
  • 1xx Informational
  • 2xx Success
  • 3xx Redirection
  • 4xx Client Error
  • 5xx Server Error

Let’s focus on 4XX errors – specifically, 404 Page Not Found status codes, the common reasons for errors, and resolutions.

HOW TO FIND OUT IF YOUR FILES ARE 404ING

If you haven’t yet heard about it from an end-user, or stumbled upon a 404 page on your own, you can find out for certain if any of your files are 404ing via your CacheFly portal.

To generate a report, go to:  Statistics > Report Type > 404 by File

troubleshooting 404

HERE’S HOW TO TROUBLESHOOT WHERE YOU’RE 404ING

When using Reverse Proxy, use the CacheFly URL that is 404ing and replace ‘username.cachefly.net’ portion of the URL with your origin domain. This is the URL that we use to pull from your origin server. If the object is returning a 404 on your origin server, then we’re not able to proxy and cache it.

COMMON REASONS FOR 404 ERRORS

If you’ve run a report and founds errors, it’s time to troubleshoot why your page/s are 404ing. Here are some common reasons for 404 errors and how to resolve them.

File is Not Uploaded (push) 
A 404 can occur if any requests for objects have not yet been uploaded to ftp.cachefly.com. Visit our helpful starter guide for instructions on how to properly upload to CacheFly.

Inaccurate URL/Misspelled URL
Inaccurate URLs are a common reason for 404s. This can be caused by misspellings/typos or a misconfigured plugin.

Incorrect HTTP Referer
An incorrect HTTP referer occurs when you’ve setup referrer blocking rules in the customer portal to prevent hotlinking. To resolve this, include a valid referrer in your test request
(e.g. curl -I -e ‘http://www.valid-referrer.com’ http://username.cachefly.net/test_file.jpg).

Incorrect Origin Definition
If after your initial setup, all objects start 404ing from the CDN delivery edge, this is due to an incorrect origin definition. To remediate the issue, all you need to do is verify that your origin domain is resolving to the correct host. This should be a publicly reachable web server that will respond to our pull requests with a HTTP 200.

Incorrect CNAME Configuration
If you’ve created a CNAME record to alias your CacheFly provided subdomain, you’ll need to enter that alias in the hostname manager. Here’s a helpful tutorial on how to configure CNAMEs.

HTTP Links on an HTTPS Page
Unless we’ve added a Subject Alternative Name to our edge certificate, SSL requests made using a CNAME record will 404. To resolve this, contact support@cachefly.com for pricing and availability.

If you still need help, contact us at support@cachefly.com. We are always happy to assist!

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