Deleted admin/includes Folder now error 500 on admin home

[Fjolsvith]

Hi,

I installed this crappy, no-working "Viral Social Media Buttons by UP" plugin and I hadn't had enough coffee this morning, so I wasn't thinking.

I had copied the admin/includes over to install the plugin, so I went in and deleted the admin/includes to uninstall <slaps forhead>. My last backup is about two weeks ago, so I tried copying that folder back in and still error 500. I even made sure the configure.php is right.

So, I tried copying the fresh admin/includes from the installation zip and still gets the same way. What do I need to do to make the admin part run again? The store side works fine.

[Fjolsvith]

chmod and chown on the folders doesn't have any effect.

[mc12345678]

Have you checked your logs directory off of the store? Might see a myDebug-adm file or more that contains both your admin's directory and some indication of what the issue is. Or perhaps your server log folder to identify what is causing the 500 issue.

Otherwise, would consider reviewing the file and folder permissions to ensure that they are supported by your host and set as necessary to operate. ZC recommends 777 for writeable directories though some hosts only allow up to 755. Files tend to be 644 unless locking them down. Not sure what is meant by chmod/chown not having an "effect". Does this mean that no matter what is done, the applicable item's status doesn't change, or is that once attempted the problem isn't solved?

[Fjolsvith]

It would be nice to know which folders should be writable and which ones are not. I used the following command

chown -R root admin/includes
chmod -R 0777 admin/includes

[Fjolsvith]

Okay, my Apache access.log is showing
"GET /store/admin/index.php HTTP/1.1" 500 366 "-"

The Apache error.log doesn't give any indication of a problem.

[lat9]

Have you checked the /logs folder to see if there's a PHP issue being reported?

[mc12345678]

It would be nice to know which folders should be writable and which ones are not. I used the following command

chown -R root admin/includes
chmod -R 0777 admin/includes

See section 5 of the ZC docs. There are multiple "sections" that address folder settings based on status of the site and current/future need.

[Fjolsvith]

Have you checked the /logs folder to see if there's a PHP issue being reported?

I have php 7.0 and cannot find where it puts its log.

[mc12345678]

I have php 7.0 and cannot find where it puts its log.

ZC puts logs (ZC php related) in the catalog/logs folder. It's "adjacent" to say your images, pub, includes, etc... folders.

[carlwhat]

fjolsvith,
couple of things. chown and chmod always have an effect. they may not have the DESIRED effect; but assuming the command runs without errors, they effect something, and specifically what you told them to do.

i'm guessing you are in a shared hosting environment. if you successfully changed the ownership of all your files to root, that would be a problem. whether that operation is permitted is another story; i tried it on my workstation and i was unsuccessful, but that does not mean your host does not allow it. if you are on a shared sever, i would never recommend you changing the ownership to root. i just can not see when you would ever need it. nor can i see why a hosting company on a shared server would allow a user to do that.... although i can see a hosting company allowing it due to not having the server properly configured.

with regards to the apache error log, we have some more interesting things to examine. first, apache is not serving up your admin page. that's a problem. it should get logged into the apache error log. if it does not, then there is a problem with the configuration of the error log, or more likely you are not looking in the right place. again, if you are on a shared host, it's tough to find a host that properly filters the error_log to only show you the errors related to your site(s).

in my experience with ZC, the ZC error logging function is an excellent tool to start your troubleshooting and getting a 500 error in general will provide a error_log in the logs directory, and that is always the first place i start. if there are no error logs, that could mean your problem is starting before the ZC error log function gets loaded. and then the troubleshooting gets more involved.

good luck.