Content Central seems hung up
When capture or workflow looks stalled: how to tell which one it is, restart the right service safely, read the event logs, and know exactly what to send support if it doesn't clear.
Before you begin
- Access to the Content Central server (to restart services and read Windows logs)
In fifteen minutes you'll know which part of the system is actually stalled, you'll have restarted it safely, and — if it doesn't clear — you'll have exactly the evidence support needs to find the cause instead of guessing.
"Hung up" almost always means one of two things: capture (new documents aren't coming in) or workflow (documents came in but aren't moving). They're separate background services with separate fixes, so figure out which one you have first.
First: which kind of stuck?
| What you're seeing | What's stalled | Start at |
|---|---|---|
| Scans, uploads, or emailed documents aren't appearing in the Coding Queue | Capture | The capture section below |
| Documents arrived fine but aren't routing — approvals not starting, queues not moving, notification emails not going out | Workflow | The workflow section below |
| Everything works but it's slow — pages spin, searches crawl | Neither — that's a performance issue | Content Central feels slow |
| One specific document is sitting in an approval queue | Probably configuration, not a stall | A document is stuck in — or skipped — approval |
Before you restart anything: take sixty seconds of notes
Restarting is safe — but it also erases the scene. If the stall recurs next week, these notes are what let support find the cause instead of shrugging with you.
- Note the current time, and roughly when things stopped (when did the last document arrive or move?)
- Note one specific example: a file name, a document, or a batch that should have processed and didn't
- Open Windows Event Viewer on the server (eventvwr from the Start menu), look in Windows Logs > Application around the time things stopped, and screenshot any errors or warnings from Content Central sources
- Check Admin > System Health inside Content Central and screenshot anything not green
If capture seems stalled
Check the simplest cause first: the oldest unprocessed item. Capture works oldest-first, so one unprocessable file at the front of the line silently holds everything behind it. A read-only file, a file locked by another program, or a corrupt file is the classic culprit — the hot-folder guide walks this in detail, and this one names the program doing the locking.
Open Windows Services on the server (services.msc from the Start menu) and find the Content Central services. If the capture service shows anything other than Running, that's your answer — start it.
If it shows Running but nothing is processing, restart it: right-click the capture service and choose Restart. Documents already in Content Central are untouched, and pending items resume processing when the service comes back up.
Give it a few minutes, then check the Coding Queue (or your capture destination).
What you should see: the backlog starts draining — oldest items first, so a large backlog may take a while to clear completely.
Still nothing? Send a fresh test document through (scan, drop a file in the hot folder, or email the capture address) and watch for it specifically. If the new item processes but old ones don't, the stall is those specific items — go back to step 1.
If workflow seems stalled
In Windows Services, find the workflow service. Same rule: not Running → start it; Running but nothing moving → right-click, Restart.
Test it with a fresh trigger: capture or update a test document that your workflow rule should match, and watch whether it routes.
What you should see: the test document moves within a few minutes. A working test with a stuck backlog usually means the backlog needs a nudge (or the old items never matched the rule at all).
If the test document doesn't move either, the "stall" is often configuration wearing a stall costume — a schedule that never matches, a date predicate that already passed, or an approval that never started. A scheduled workflow didn't run — or ran on everything and A document is stuck in — or skipped — approval cover both in ten minutes.
Restarting one Content Central service is safe, and so is restarting all of them (or the server, in a pinch). The real cost of restart-first isn't risk — it's that a recurring problem keeps recurring because the evidence kept getting erased. Take the sixty seconds of notes first and you get both: a working system today and a findable cause tomorrow.
If it keeps happening
A stall that clears on restart but comes back is a pattern, and patterns have causes — a nightly job, a specific document type, a mail failure that stops capture, a disk filling up. Don't settle into a restart routine: send support the evidence below with the times of each occurrence, and mention anything the stalls have in common.
Still stuck?
Send support this — it turns "the system is hung up" into a diagnosis:
- Which service you suspect (capture or workflow), and what you saw that made you think so
- When it stopped, when you restarted, and whether the restart helped
- Your one specific example (file name, document, or batch) with its timestamp
- Screenshots of the Windows Event Viewer > Application errors/warnings around the stall — and of anything not green in Admin > System Health
- Whether this is the first time or a repeat — and if it repeats, the dates and times you know about