My site is haunted!!

[Adam]

I seem to be hitting an intermittant issue with the osc site as I have implemented it. Since I have exhuasted my php/sql skills I can only surmise that their is a ghost in my machine!!

 

Alternatively, (and more accurately) my php skills aren't that hot and where I can ussually bludgeon my way through, this problem has got me vexxed.

 

The site is heavily updated with various mods, but before I try and detail it I wondered if anyone had come across the problem I seem to be having. The summary is - os release from about Aug29thish, IW's CCC and vouchers, many other useful contributions.

 

The issue is twofold, and possibly connected. If I log on to the site, come off and then go back on I don't get all of the page displayed, sometimes the bottom bar and one or more of the boxes seems to have gone awol. Now this may be to do with cahe/ sessions, I have the cache off and sessions enabled. If I click on a link such as 'checkout' the missing bits magically reassemble and they are there ongoing.

 

I have tried clearing cache on IE, etc and still get the problem.

 

A related issue is that if i send a customer an email with the link to their invoice often they simply get a blank page when they try to click on it. If they try a few times quite often they will get to it at the second or third attempt!

 

The site is : www.scalesexpress.com

[Sen]

Seems like a cache problem

[Adam]

Not really much help Sen, as I pointed out the cache setting in admin is off, and I have cleared my browsers cache before trying it.

[medisave]

Hi there,

 

I had this problem with my host - easyspace in the UK

 

Nearly made me discount using the program. However I tried it on another web host and everything worked fine. Have you got some free space that supports PHP and MYSQL ?

 

Graham

[Adam]

Thanks for that, we are hosting it on a dedicated raq 4, do you know of any linux/apache config issues that could cause the kind off problems from above? Anyone help please, got me vexxed. Ta

[Ian]

Can you post your version details.

 

mysql version

php version

apache version

 

also whether you use mysql based sessions or file based.

[Adam]

Thanks Ian

 

MySQL - 3.23.39

 

PHP - Version 4.1.2

 

The server is a raq4/ Redhat Linux 2.2

Apache version : Apache/1.3.20

 

Session support is enabled and file based.

 

Thanks Ian (humbled as usual) :shock:

 

(bye the bye the credit class/ coupons / gv are outrageously useful in practice)

[Ian]

Pity,

 

php 4.1x had problems with mysql sessions, but your not using them.

 

Are you sure that all php files were uploaded ascii.

[Adam]

Thanks Ian

 

Interesting point actually, we use anything from leechftp to dreamweaver mx to modify and upload pages.

 

I know that dw can be pretty useless at ftp non .html pages but we dont seem to have had any adverse effects.

 

If you think the way the pages are ftp'd might be a problem, could you shed some light for me, the problem seems intermittant, to me that suggests a deeper working issue. Sometimes the index will load up a beauty, sometimes Ill be missing the footer and part of column right. I originally thought some caching shenanigans was to blame as if I click on checkout i can usually get the missing elements to reappear.

 

Every now and again Ill click a link and generate a 404, but if I click straight back and click the same link no problems!

 

As I say the email generated invoice link, click on it once and no result -404, do it again and hey presto!!

 

mmmm, I still think its a ghost.

[Ian]

Just thinking about problems I've had in the past. I used to have a raq4 and had similar problems to you, that was caused by a badly uploaded file. It was intermitent.

 

Other time I've seen a similar problem was with some javascript in the footer. Although your site doesn't appear to have any JS.

 

I notice your site runs in a frame, any reason for this ?

 

Even when a page fully loads, the right hand column boxes appear to have a different look. Is this intentional.

 

Have you edited the stylesheet.css, I've just taken a look at it. Apart from being double-spaced, some of the tags are missing closing ;

 

A look at the apache error logs might help as well.

[Adam]

Thanks Ian,

 

I think you may have hit a nail somewhere close to its head.

 

The frame is purely aesthetic and will help with the search engine problems that people seem to gave had with Google, contrary to popular belief frames can be excellent for managing your search rankings. (The issue stil arises if you go straight to /catalog/)

 

The right hand column is different, I hacked the box class to allow functions to be passed a choice of css styles so that I could change the way boxes appear against each other.

 

As for the stylesheet, if its down to that I'm gonna kick my own ass bad!

 

Ill look at the error logs as well, and Im still looking at reuploading all the files in leech rather than DWMX.

 

Cheers Ian, I needed some ideas to investigate.

[Guest]

I'm getting the exact same problem and no I'm not using frames.

 

Apache/1.3.26

MySQL 3.23.36

PHP/4.1.1

 

I know for a fact it's not a caching problem and not the host since it's my own server. This is the php application it happens on.

 

I have noticed if I restart Apache the problem goes away for about five minutes then intermittently comes back.

 

Any suggestions?

[Guest]

Also it's not FTP/permissions/modes since I just un tarred the files directly on my server.

[Ian]

How are you storing sessions, mysql or file.

[Guest]

For some reason the footer.php in the /catalog/includes/footer.php is causing the problem. It's the class for adding the text in for the following code in the footer;

 

<?php echo $counter_now . ' ' . FOOTER_TEXT_REQUESTS_SINCE . ' ' . $counter_startdate_formatted; ?>

 

I replaced it with the following since I'm only using english and have no need for different languages.

 

<?php echo $counter_now . " requests since " . $counter_startdate_formatted; ?>

 

I tested it many times and it worked fine. Anyone know the reason why "FOOTER_TEXT_REQUESTS_SINCE" could be causing the problem? Is it permissions of some file?

 

Well at least we have a work around for now. :-)

 

Steve

[Guest]

Storing sessions in MySQL. If this is the problem, I don't mind switching to flat file.

[Guest]

I tried turning off sessions in MySQL in the configure.php (last line) since Ian brought up the questions and it resolved the problem.

 

Good call Ian. Now does anyone know why storing sessions in MySQL can cause the problem? Or maybe it's just a case of "it doesn't matter." :-)

 

Steve

[Ian]

Steve,

 

I remember reading on the bug reporter some time ago about bug with php 4.1.x when storing sessions in mysql.

 

However, it seems from previous post that you are fixed anyway.

 

If things still turn out to be flaky, then try switching to file sessions.

[Adam]

The original problems that I had included missing/ truncated elements on pages and also not being able to call invoice pages etc unless I tried 2 or three times.

 

Sad as it might sound (and mainly because I didn,t have the time to play around) I uninstalled php 4.1.2 and reinstalled 4.0.6 and the site has worked like a dream since, all, and i mean all, buggy issues hve dissapeared and there seem to be no adverse affects.

 

!! :roll: perplexed but fixed.