URGENT: No product information displays in website & http:500 error at admin area

Hi all,

Yesterday I copied my back-up files from january this year into my file directory. I re-uploaded all the files. The version is 1.50 (I think)

I know that when re-uploading files you also need a fresh database copy, but I cannot import a new file in PhpMyAdmin (MySQL). I think this is the reason why the rest of the site and admin isn't working?

I have checked the configure files (both for admin area and includes), and they are all fine. However the charset is specified as utf_8 for the server connection, but when looking in the SQL backup files, it is set to the default (latin_swedish). But the previous version worked fine, and that was set to latin-swedish?

When I have tried to import a backup copy of the database, it displayed an error saying the database already exists, but I don't want to create a new one incase it messes up anything else.

Can someone please give me some suggestions as to what might be wrong and point me in the right direction? Thanks

500 errors are server-related.

You need to go into the server error log and see what is being reported.

For site restores, with the database, you can create a new (empty) database, import the backup into that, and then change the DB connection details in the two configure.php files to link to the new DB which has the imported backup.

Thank you for your reply.

The latest log doesn't display any "errors" but it does give me back some files after the command to GET information:-

includes/templates/classic/jscript/jscript_jquery-1.7.1.min.js HTTP/1.1" 304

and after my domain name there is this
/favicon.ico HTTP/1.1" 404 209 "-"

Is that what the error is?

I should also mention (though I think this is most likely all related) that at the bottom of my website home page, this appears

WARNING: An Error occurred, please refresh the page and try again.

Is there anything you could tell me about the problem here?

Thank you

terraGirl:

For site restores, with the database, you can create a new (empty) database, import the backup into that, and then change the DB connection details in the two configure.php files to link to the new DB which has the imported backup.

The thing is, I'm a bit reluctant to do that in case it messes something else up!

It's completely risk free - take a backup of your old configure files, and if it doesn't work, just switch back to using the other database. I'm not recommending to delete the old DB, just create a 2nd new one.

the 404 on the favicon just means your site doesn't have a favicon image, that's completely okay and won't stop your site from working

As for 304 , this is taken from the webmaster forum "The 304 error is somewhat misleading. The Apache Webserver logs it as an error, but it's really this. Someone visits your site today, and tomorrow, they go back to your site. When they do, their local system connects with your server, and then the server tells the local machine that the information (html files, images, etc) are already in the cache of that users system, and the information is shown from the cache rather than the server itself. Apache logs this as the 304 error because it hasn't been modified since the last time that the user has accessed that part of your site. "

A little update:

I looked up the includes/templates/classic/jscript/jscript_jquery-1.7.1.min.js in file manager, downloaded it and used file merge programme to see if it is any different to the origional file in my backup (since that file had not caused a problem before). They are identical except for the difference in carriage return types. So I looked it up to see if that would cause a problem, and according to this:-

https://www.vbulletin.com/forum/showthread.php/317432-Carriage-return-types

It shouldn't make a difference. :wacko:

Could there be any error with my jscript file?

terraGirl:

It's completely risk free - take a backup of your old configure files, and if it doesn't work, just switch back to using the other database. I'm not recommending to delete the old DB, just create a 2nd new one.

the 404 on the favicon just means your site doesn't have a favicon image, that's completely okay and won't stop your site from working

As for 304 , this is taken from the webmaster forum "The 304 error is somewhat misleading. The Apache Webserver logs it as an error, but it's really this. Someone visits your site today, and tomorrow, they go back to your site. When they do, their local system connects with your server, and then the server tells the local machine that the information (html files, images, etc) are already in the cache of that users system, and the information is shown from the cache rather than the server itself. Apache logs this as the 304 error because it hasn't been modified since the last time that the user has accessed that part of your site. "

Ah, thanks for the info about Apache logs. Makes sense!

Ok, I'll try making another database, but does that require you to have a second copy of files too? Not not changing configure files?

I'm thinking that I don't have the permission to create the database, or alter the older one, because every time I try to, I get the message that access to the database is denied. But this has never happened before......weird!

Unfortunately, the site is still not working properly, and the admin area is just a blank page.

:(

the admin area is just a blank page
See this tutorial on blank pages
http://www.zen-cart.com/content.php?124-i-am-getting-a-blank-page-%28or-blank-part-of-a-page%29

Check your /log folder for mydebug files

Thank you, but my cache files date only up to october! And the most recent log files from my hosting server do not display any errors, as such....

You posted as using ZenCart v1.5.0 - Look in your logs folder

kobra:

You posted as using ZenCart v1.5.0 - Look in your logs folder

I think it actually isn't V1.5.0, because I have a cache file, not a log. But anyways, I have looked in both the cache files from FTP and they only display errors from October.
The log files from my hosting server do not show any errors.

The website is working fine now - turns out there was an access denied error that was preventing me from re-populating my SQL database. But the admin area is still only a blank page!

Having a look through the cache files from september and october, I found these errors are most common:-

PHP Warning: include(): Failed opening 'includes/templates/template_default/common/tpl_footer_googleanalytics.php' for inclusion (include_path='.:/usr/share/php') in /customers/6/6/4/edenpetz.com/httpd.www/includes/templates/template_default/common/tpl_header.php on line 21

PHP Warning: set_time_limit(): Cannot set time limit due to system policy in /customers/6/6/4/edenpetz.com/httpd.www/includes/modules/pages/sitemapxml/header_php.php on line 52

Any ideas as to what I need to change in these files?

aish:

Having a look through the cache files from september and october, I found these errors are most common:-

PHP Warning: include(): Failed opening 'includes/templates/template_default/common/tpl_footer_googleanalytics.php' for inclusion (include_path='.:/usr/share/php') in /customers/6/6/4/edenpetz.com/httpd.www/includes/templates/template_default/common/tpl_header.php on line 21

PHP Warning: set_time_limit(): Cannot set time limit due to system policy in /customers/6/6/4/edenpetz.com/httpd.www/includes/modules/pages/sitemapxml/header_php.php on line 52

Any ideas as to what I need to change in these files?

If the timestamp (which you didn't quote here) on those errors is from september and october, but NOT from TODAY (or this month) then they're probably from features you're no longer using, and thus shouldn't be alarmed at.

aish:

at the bottom of my website home page, this appears

WARNING: An Error occurred, please refresh the page and try again.

Is there anything you could tell me about the problem here?
Sure. A quick search in the FAQs for "WARNING: An Error occurred, please refresh the page and try again." (HINT: by copying and pasting that message into the search box) brings up this: http://www.zen-cart.com/content.php?311-warning-an-error-occurred-please-refresh-the-page-and-try-again which directly addresses that matter.

Thanks so much for the link! I hadn't seen that thread before.

On further inspection of my files.....for the hundredth time.....I found a module called IH_INSTALL that contained 3 folders, but they were all empty. I tried deleting that, and it didn't work....Not sure what else there could be?

What's the MySQL error shown in your logs?
(if your logs folder isn't getting any new entries, then perhaps it's read-only and needs a permissions change)

Thank you for your replies.

After further checking of the files, I noticed there are some cache folders still, as opposed to log files. I suspect this is what is causing the problem, since we had an upgrade of Zen Cart not too long ago. Log files were only introduced from V1.5.0 onwards, am I right?