Recovering a Failed Nextcloud AIO Stack

A self-hosted Nextcloud AIO deployment became unavailable because its PostgreSQL backend was not starting normally.

The preserved evidence supports a PostgreSQL configuration-file recovery. It does not establish corruption of PostgreSQL user data or prove the initiating cause of the configuration damage.

The visible application depended on a database service with persistent Docker storage. Container status alone was not enough to identify the fault.

• Followed the dependency chain from the visible Nextcloud failure to PostgreSQL.\n- Inspected PostgreSQL persistent Docker storage from the Linux host.\n- Examined the database service configuration instead of treating container status as the root cause.\n- Found extensive NUL-byte corruption in postgresql.conf.\n- Repaired the damaged configuration condition.\n- Verified PostgreSQL returned to service and verified the dependent Nextcloud stack recovered.

Inspected the persistent service state, repaired the demonstrated configuration condition, and verified recovery at both database and application layers.

The investigation focused on the persistent configuration layer and the service dependency chain.

The recovery work was limited to the demonstrated configuration condition. It did not assume the database itself was corrupt or claim an unproven root cause.

PostgreSQL subsequently reported a healthy ready-for-connections state and the dependent Nextcloud stack recovered.

Preserved shell evidence directly showed extensive NUL-byte content in postgresql.conf, followed by a healthy database service state and recovered dependent application stack.

This demonstrates systematic Linux troubleshooting, Docker volume inspection, PostgreSQL configuration diagnosis, service dependency analysis, persistent-state troubleshooting, and recovery verification. It is a configuration-file corruption case, not a claim of database corruption.