UnicodeDecodeError: 'utf-8' codec can't decode byte 0xe9 in position 2272: invalid continuation byte

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My domain is:
mydomain.ddns.net

I ran this command:
certbot -d mydomain.ddns.net

It produced this output:
Saving debug log to /var/log/letsencrypt/letsencrypt.log
An unexpected error occurred:
UnicodeDecodeError: 'utf-8' codec can't decode byte 0xe9 in position 2272: invalid continuation byte

My web server is (include version):
nginx/1.20.0
php7.3-fpm

The operating system my web server runs on is (include version):
Debian 10 x64

My hosting provider, if applicable, is:
myself but need to choice a provider soon

I can login to a root shell on my machine (yes or no, or I don't know):
yes

I'm using a control panel to manage my site (no, or provide the name and version of the control panel):
no

The version of my client is (e.g. output of certbot --version or certbot-auto --version if you're using Certbot):
certbot 0.31.0

letsencrypt.log:

2021-05-05 08:26:26,624:DEBUG:certbot.log:Exiting abnormally:
Traceback (most recent call last):
File "/usr/bin/certbot", line 11, in
load_entry_point('certbot==0.31.0', 'console_scripts', 'certbot')()
File "/usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/certbot/main.py", line 1365, in main
return config.func(config, plugins)
File "/usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/certbot/main.py", line 1101, in run
installer, authenticator = plug_sel.choose_configurator_plugins(config, plugins, "run")
File "/usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/certbot/plugins/selection.py", line 225, in choose_configurator_plugins
authenticator = installer = pick_configurator(config, req_inst, plugins)
File "/usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/certbot/plugins/selection.py", line 25, in pick_configurator
(interfaces.IAuthenticator, interfaces.IInstaller))
File "/usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/certbot/plugins/selection.py", line 106, in pick_plugin
verified.prepare()
File "/usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/certbot/plugins/disco.py", line 251, in prepare
return [plugin_ep.prepare() for plugin_ep in six.itervalues(self._plugins)]
File "/usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/certbot/plugins/disco.py", line 251, in
return [plugin_ep.prepare() for plugin_ep in six.itervalues(self._plugins)]
File "/usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/certbot/plugins/disco.py", line 132, in prepare
self._initialized.prepare()
File "/usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/certbot_nginx/configurator.py", line 152, in prepare
self.parser = parser.NginxParser(self.conf('server-root'))
File "/usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/certbot_nginx/parser.py", line 38, in init
self.load()
File "/usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/certbot_nginx/parser.py", line 45, in load
self._parse_recursively(self.config_root)
File "/usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/certbot_nginx/parser.py", line 66, in _parse_recursively
self._parse_recursively(subentry[1])
File "/usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/certbot_nginx/parser.py", line 56, in _parse_recursively
trees = self._parse_files(filepath)
File "/usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/certbot_nginx/parser.py", line 207, in _parse_files
parsed = nginxparser.load(_file)
File "/usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/certbot_nginx/nginxparser.py", line 123, in load
return loads(_file.read())
File "/usr/lib/python3.7/codecs.py", line 322, in decode
(result, consumed) = self._buffer_decode(data, self.errors, final)
UnicodeDecodeError: 'utf-8' codec can't decode byte 0xe9 in position 2272: invalid continuation byte

other debug:
grep -RP '[^\x00-\x7f]' /etc/nginx/ => return nothing
grep -RP '[^\x00-\x7f]' /etc/letsencrypt/ => return nothing

I don't know what happen, for my first subdomain, it work perfectly and now, i'l get his error...

1 Like

The Unicode is likely to be in /etc/nginx rather than /etc/letsencrypt.

I think all of the Unicode+nginx bugs have been fixed by now, but 0.31 is a very old release that doesn't have those fixes. If you can, try upgrading to the latest Certbot using the Debian instructions (snap) or pip instructions.

Otherwise, try look for that errant Unicode in /etc/nginx/.

2 Likes

Thanks very much, it help me :wink: and it work now

1 Like

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