Support intro
Sorry to hear you’re facing problems. 
The community help forum (help.nextcloud.com) is for home and non-enterprise users. Support is provided by other community members on a best effort / “as available” basis. All of those responding are volunteering their time to help you.
If you’re using Nextcloud in a business/critical setting, paid and SLA-based support services can be accessed via portal.nextcloud.com where Nextcloud engineers can help ensure your business keeps running smoothly.
Getting help
In order to help you as efficiently (and quickly!) as possible, please fill in as much of the below requested information as you can.
Before clicking submit: Please check if your query is already addressed via the following resources:
- Official documentation (searchable and regularly updated)
- How to topics and FAQs
- Forum search
(Utilizing these existing resources is typically faster. It also helps reduce the load on our generous volunteers while elevating the signal to noise ratio of the forums otherwise arising from the same queries being posted repeatedly).
Some or all of the below information will be requested if it isn’t supplied; for fastest response please provide as much as you can. 
The Basics
- Nextcloud Server version (e.g., 29.x.x):
- nextcloud/all-in-one:latest 30 (don’t know exact version because I can’t access it anymore)
- Operating system and version (e.g., Ubuntu 24.04):
replace me
- Web server and version (e.g, Apache 2.4.25):
- OMV7 7.7.6-1 (Sandworm)
- Reverse proxy and version _(e.g. nginx 1.27.2)
- NPM
- PHP version (e.g, 8.3):
- Don’t know
- Is this the first time you’ve seen this error? (Yes / No):
- Yes.
- When did this problem seem to first start?
- I was cleaning up Shared Folder permissions and then this broke. So obviously I have some learning to do about Shared Folder permissions and ACLs because everything has been fine for weeks after my initial install.
- Installation method (e.g. AlO, NCP, Bare Metal/Archive, etc.)
- AIO in Docker on OMV
- Are you using CloudfIare, mod_security, or similar? (Yes / No)
- No
Summary of the issue you are facing:
I changed some shared folder permissions as I was reading more about how to limit permissions for better security, but must have restricted access to a shared folder I shouldn’t have. I think I have restored read/write access, then I composed down, then up the nextcloud-aio docker file, but when I navigate to my subdomain I get the error:
" Error
- Your data directory is invalid.Ensure there is a file called “.ncdata” in the root of the data directory. It should have the content: “# Nextcloud data directory”
I have navigated to the \server\appdata\nextcloud_data folder and there is in fact a “.ncdata” file (it was hidden on the SMB folder from windows, but I found it) and it has the # Nextcloud data directory" text noted above.
I also had an external drive mapped to nextcloud with photos, but that isn’t the problem at the moment. Its the lack of access to my nextcloud instance that I am looking for help with.
Steps to replicate it (hint: details matter!):
- Accessing the nextcloud server location, I get the error.
Log entries
Nextcloud
Please provide the log entries from your Nextcloud log that are generated during the time of problem (via the Copy raw option from Administration settings->Logging screen or from your nextcloud.log located in your data directory). Feel free to use a pastebin/gist service if necessary.
Not sure how to access the log file.
Web Browser
If the problem is related to the Web interface, open your browser inspector Console and Network tabs while refreshing (reloading) and reproducing the problem. Provide any relevant output/errors here that appear.
N/A (I think)
Web server / Reverse Proxy
The output of your Apache/nginx/system log in /var/log/____:
[08/May/2025:03:11:47 +0000] - 503 503 - GET https [server domain on npm] "/apps/richdocuments/settings/fonts.json" [Client [server ip address]] [Length 2310] [Gzip -] [Sent-to [server ip address] "COOLWSD HTTP Agent 24.04.13.2" "-"
Configuration
Nextcloud
The output of occ config:list system or similar is best, but, if not possible, the contents of your config.php file from /path/to/nextcloud is fine (make sure to remove any identifiable information!):
Your data directory is invalid.
Ensure there is a file called ".ncdata" in the root of the data directory. It should have the content: "# Nextcloud data directory"
An unhandled exception has been thrown:
Exception: Environment not properly prepared. in /var/www/html/lib/private/Console/Application.php:143
Stack trace:
#0 /var/www/html/console.php(81): OC\Console\Application->loadCommands(Object(Symfony\Component\Console\Input\ArgvInput), Object(Symfony\Component\Console\Output\ConsoleOutput))
#1 /var/www/html/occ(33): require_once('/var/www/html/c...')
#2 {main}$
Apps
The output of occ app:list (if possible).
Tips for increasing the likelihood of a response
- Use the
preformatted textformatting option in the editor for all log entries and configuration output. - If screenshots are useful, feel free to include them.
- If possible, also include key error output in text form so it can be searched for.
- Try to edit log output only minimally (if at all) so that it can be ran through analyzers / formatters by those trying to help you.