How to resolve Sitecore 8 Default Page Error.

One of my colleagues was trying to run up a Sitecore 8 website locally. He’s working on the new Sagittarius Agency website which I can’t wait for you to see its going to be immense. But he gave me a ring saying that Sitecore was simply displaying a message which said. Default page

This contents comes from the default.aspx in the root of a Sitecore website (any Sitecore site not just version 8). I’ve seen it a few times in the past and usually simply “turn it off and on again” works. The typical fall back for anyone who has been in computing for a length of time.

In his case though it didn’t work, after some investigation it turns out. That the database it was trying to connect to wasn’t responding. It’s a curious issue because if Sitecore is running, usually you get a proper server side 500 error telling you “I can’t connect to the database”. But it appears that if the server it tries to connect to, simply doesn’t respond instead of the usual 500 error you get “Default Page”.

So if you get the above page I would first have a look at the database. It’s probably the answer you’re looking for.