CFWheels Error: Element RETURNVALUE is undefined in LOC

Question

I have a legacy site using CFWheels v. 1.3.3 It's hosted using ColdFusion 2018. I haven't changed anything on the site for a couple of years and all appeared to be working fine until recently when I got this error:

Error Occurred While Processing Request Element RETURNVALUE is undefined in LOC.

The error occurred in D:/home/mysite.com/wwwroot/wheels/events/onerror.cfm: line 19

18 :    <cfoutput>
19 :        #loc.returnValue#
20 :    </cfoutput>
21 : </cffunction>```

Here's the stack trace:
Stack Trace
at cfonerror2ecfm930916195$funcONERROR.runFunction(D:/home/mysite.com/wwwroot/wheels/events/onerror.cfm:19)

coldfusion.runtime.UndefinedElementException: Element RETURNVALUE is undefined in LOC.
    at coldfusion.runtime.DotResolver.resolveSplitNameInMap(DotResolver.java:185)
    at coldfusion.runtime.CfJspPage._resolve(CfJspPage.java:2362)
    at coldfusion.runtime.CfJspPage._resolveAndAutoscalarize(CfJspPage.java:2685)
    at coldfusion.runtime.CfJspPage._resolveAndAutoscalarize(CfJspPage.java:2675)
    at coldfusion.runtime.CfJspPage._resolveAndAutoscalarize(CfJspPage.java:2655)
    at cfonerror2ecfm930916195$funcONERROR.runFunction(D:\home\mysite.com\wwwroot\wheels\events\onerror.cfm:19)
    at coldfusion.runtime.UDFMethod.invoke(UDFMethod.java:553)
    at coldfusion.runtime.UDFMethod$ReturnTypeFilter.invoke(UDFMethod.java:484)
    at coldfusion.runtime.UDFMethod$ArgumentCollectionFilter.invoke(UDFMethod.java:447)
    at coldfusion.filter.FunctionAccessFilter.invoke(FunctionAccessFilter.java:95)
    at coldfusion.runtime.UDFMethod.runFilterChain(UDFMethod.java:398)
    at coldfusion.runtime.UDFMethod.runFilterChain(UDFMethod.java:371)
    at coldfusion.runtime.UDFMethod.invoke(UDFMethod.java:287)
    at coldfusion.runtime.TemplateProxy.invoke(TemplateProxy.java:830)
    at coldfusion.runtime.TemplateProxy.invoke(TemplateProxy.java:613)
    at coldfusion.runtime.TemplateProxy.invoke(TemplateProxy.java:438)
    at coldfusion.runtime.AppEventInvoker.invoke(AppEventInvoker.java:115)
    at coldfusion.runtime.AppEventInvoker.onError(AppEventInvoker.java:524)
    at coldfusion.filter.ApplicationFilter.invoke(ApplicationFilter.java:647)
    at coldfusion.filter.RequestMonitorFilter.invoke(RequestMonitorFilter.java:43)
    at coldfusion.filter.MonitoringFilter.invoke(MonitoringFilter.java:40)
    at coldfusion.filter.PathFilter.invoke(PathFilter.java:162)
    at coldfusion.filter.IpFilter.invoke(IpFilter.java:45)
    at coldfusion.filter.ExceptionFilter.invoke(ExceptionFilter.java:96)
    at coldfusion.filter.ClientScopePersistenceFilter.invoke(ClientScopePersistenceFilter.java:28)
    at coldfusion.filter.BrowserFilter.invoke(BrowserFilter.java:38)
    at coldfusion.filter.NoCacheFilter.invoke(NoCacheFilter.java:60)
    at coldfusion.filter.GlobalsFilter.invoke(GlobalsFilter.java:38)
    at coldfusion.filter.DatasourceFilter.invoke(DatasourceFilter.java:22)
    at coldfusion.filter.CachingFilter.invoke(CachingFilter.java:62)
    at coldfusion.CfmServlet.service(CfmServlet.java:226)
    at coldfusion.bootstrap.BootstrapServlet.service(BootstrapServlet.java:311)
    at org.apache.catalina.core.ApplicationFilterChain.internalDoFilter(ApplicationFilterChain.java:231)
    at org.apache.catalina.core.ApplicationFilterChain.doFilter(ApplicationFilterChain.java:166)
    at coldfusion.monitor.event.MonitoringServletFilter.doFilter(MonitoringServletFilter.java:46)
    at coldfusion.bootstrap.BootstrapFilter.doFilter(BootstrapFilter.java:47)
    at org.apache.catalina.core.ApplicationFilterChain.internalDoFilter(ApplicationFilterChain.java:193)
    at org.apache.catalina.core.ApplicationFilterChain.doFilter(ApplicationFilterChain.java:166)
    at org.apache.tomcat.websocket.server.WsFilter.doFilter(WsFilter.java:53)
    at org.apache.catalina.core.ApplicationFilterChain.internalDoFilter(ApplicationFilterChain.java:193)
    at org.apache.catalina.core.ApplicationFilterChain.doFilter(ApplicationFilterChain.java:166)
    at org.apache.catalina.core.StandardWrapperValve.invoke(StandardWrapperValve.java:202)
    at org.apache.catalina.core.StandardContextValve.invoke(StandardContextValve.java:96)
    at org.apache.catalina.authenticator.AuthenticatorBase.invoke(AuthenticatorBase.java:490)
    at org.apache.catalina.core.StandardHostValve.invoke(StandardHostValve.java:139)
    at org.apache.catalina.valves.ErrorReportValve.invoke(ErrorReportValve.java:92)
    at org.apache.catalina.core.StandardEngineValve.invoke(StandardEngineValve.java:74)
    at org.apache.catalina.connector.CoyoteAdapter.service(CoyoteAdapter.java:357)
    at org.apache.coyote.ajp.AjpProcessor.service(AjpProcessor.java:451)
    at org.apache.coyote.AbstractProcessorLight.process(AbstractProcessorLight.java:66)
    at org.apache.coyote.AbstractProtocol$ConnectionHandler.process(AbstractProtocol.java:853)
    at org.apache.tomcat.util.net.NioEndpoint$SocketProcessor.doRun(NioEndpoint.java:1587)
    at org.apache.tomcat.util.net.SocketProcessorBase.run(SocketProcessorBase.java:49)
    at java.base/java.util.concurrent.ThreadPoolExecutor.runWorker(ThreadPoolExecutor.java:1128)
    at java.base/java.util.concurrent.ThreadPoolExecutor$Worker.run(ThreadPoolExecutor.java:628)
    at org.apache.tomcat.util.threads.TaskThread$WrappingRunnable.run(TaskThread.java:61)
    at java.base/java.lang.Thread.run(Thread.java:834)

Answer 1

loc is an object and the code expects it will have a property named returnValue. The error is stating that the property with the name returnValue doesn't exist on the object.

Looking into the /wheels/events/onerror.cfm and then back to the /wheels/global/cfml.cfm file where $simpleLock is defined tells me there may be some underlying problem with configuration. Hard to nail it down. Safest bet is to restart the application. Generally done through URL parameters. If you can't figure that out, maybe just restart the ColdFusion instance and hope it fixes it.

At the end, ColdFusion is having a hard time invoking a component, but hard to tell which one without more error output.

Answer 2

Turns out the host of the site had made the public images folder unreadable and that was causing the problem. I thought I would post the solution in case anyone else experiences this problem.