Dream portal help

[Kindred]

Solo,   You are behind in the thread...   Despite the title and the first post, this has nothing to do with dream portal...  It is yet another of the white page on package install problems.

so far, it looks like this is related to, in order
Chmod/Chown wit a secure host issues
Mod_security poorly configured
Some major issue with a file causing a total meltdown.
We are trying to figure out the commonality between the reports, because none of us with properly configured systems can replicate the issue.

[svendaniel]

But how do I fix this / I have not installed any mods

[SoLoGHoST]

Thanks for the update Kindred.

@svendaniel - Here's an old post on SMF that might be able to help with your mod_security issue if that is the case:  http://www.simplemachines.org/community/index.php?topic=34270.0

[svendaniel]

I have asked my host and they said they do not have mod_security? Is there not reached otherwise

[Kindred]

if the file permissions are correct, and you have not made any tweaks, mods or other changes to the base installtion, and your host is not running mod_security, then I have no idea...



Just to confirm - this is a BASIC installation of SMF?
Did you install SMF via an auto-installed like fantastico or did you install it yourself using the full installation packeg from our downloads section?
You have made NO modifications to the installation?

[svendaniel]

Can it be the database ? i find a file with the namne add_settings.php ( echo '<b>Error:</b> Database modifications failed!'; )

[Kindred]

no this has nothing to do with the database or with the specific mod file...

this has to do with some setting on YOUR SERVER wchich is creating a critical failue when it tries to access the packages function.

[svendaniel]

Kindred I tried changing Packages chmod to 644 but it did not work


give up -.-

[SoLoGHoST]

Kindred I tried changing Packages chmod to 644 but it did not work


give up -.-

There are still these questions that need to be answered...

Just to confirm - this is a BASIC installation of SMF?
Did you install SMF via an auto-installed like fantastico or did you install it yourself using the full installation packeg from our downloads section?
You have made NO modifications to the installation?

How can we help you if you don't help us?  Help us to help you...

[svendaniel]

Did you install SMF via an auto-installed like fantastico or did you install it yourself using the full installation packeg from our downloads section?= I download it for my self
You have made NO modifications to the installation?= NO

[Kindred]

So, you downloaded the full install package, uploaded and ran the install yourself
and this is the first mod that you are trying to install?


Does your forum have any users or data yet?

If not, I may ask for your help with some experiments...   No one who has a decently set up host (in other words, all of us who are experienced SMF users) has been able to replicate this issue.
If you don't mind, I would ask that you give me access to your site manager (cpanel?) and ftp and let me try some thing to see if I can replicate the specific conditions. This may enable us to determine if this is a software issue or a host issue...

[svendaniel]

i have download the full verison and that was the first thing i try to download (dont have any users)

[Kindred]

If not, I may ask for your help with some experiments...   No one who has a decently set up host (in other words, all of us who are experienced SMF users) has been able to replicate this issue.
If you don't mind, I would ask that you give me access to your site manager (cpanel?) and ftp and let me try some thing to see if I can replicate the specific conditions. This may enable us to determine if this is a software issue or a host issue...

specifically, if you could PM me a login.password for your site (cpanel) and an ftp account login/pw and an admin login/pw for your smf installation....    I'd like to try some experiments on your server (I promise not to do anything bad, just try some different configurations) so we can try to get to the bottom of this

[svendaniel]

okay i send my logins to hosting24 but remember I trust you will do anything stupid thanks for helping me so much.

[svendaniel]

dont do anything stupid *

[Kindred]

OK, thanks... I will be doing some stuff on your server in a few hours, once I get back to my main PC.

[MrPhil]

Kindred I tried changing Packages chmod to 644 but it did not work

Did you change the permissions on the directory (folder) to 644, or the files within it? A directory won't work with 644 -- it needs to be 755. It's the files within it that need to be 644.

[Kindred]

well, hell.

WTF is going on there?


Ok, let's start by saying that, with your account I can indeed duplicate the issue.  Now I am working on trying to debug it.

OK. Tried installing a very simple mod.
Get the white page of death.
This generates an error_log file in the forum root.

Code Select Expand


[22-Apr-2013 20:44:24 Etc/GMT+5] PHP Fatal error:  Allowed memory size of 33554432 bytes exhausted (tried to allocate 122880 bytes) in /......../Sources/Subs-Post.php on line 531


Now, I find that very interesting, since I could not imagine why Subs-Post.php is even being called during the package install process.
then, I looked it up, and lo-and-behold... it is called to try and parse the BBC used in the mod readme... (line 355)

Code Select Expand


if (!empty($action['parse_bbc']))
{
require_once($sourcedir . '/Subs-Post.php');
preparsecode($context['package_readme']);
$context['package_readme'] = parse_bbc($context['package_readme']);
}
else
$context['package_readme'] = nl2br($context['package_readme']);


So... I replaced the call with the same action as else...


AND IT WORKS, even if the readme is not ugly and shows bbc tags....
OK...   it does not really work, it just gets us past the "check install" screen....

[22-Apr-2013 20:59:27 Etc/GMT+5] PHP Fatal error:  Allowed memory size of 33554432 bytes exhausted (tried to allocate 133 bytes) in /......./Sources/Subs-Package.php on line 2756

So the next include causes it to crap out on the actual install

So...
This is not a bug in SMF...   this is a problem with some sites on shared servers who have limited the memory access...

[SoLoGHoST]

Looks like your php memory_limit is set to 32 MB.

You can try and use a .htaccess file to overwrite the memory limit, but if the server controls it (which is probably the case, since SMF, I believe tries to set it high enough using ini_set when installing a mod package), than it probably won't work, and you are stuck with the server php memory limit.  Creating a phpinfo.php file, will tell you your php memory limit.

Code Select Expand

<?php echo phpinfo(); ?>

Alternatively, you could try and up the ini_set value on the php memory_limit when installing packages in SMF (not sure what the current setting is for this), but that might also work, using the ini_set

Code Select Expand

ini_set('memory_limit','64M');

Ofcourse, this only works for the current operation, so just use it in the actual function that is causing the problem perhaps.

phpinfo() should also tell you if PHP runs in CGI mode or as an Apache module (mod_php).  If CGI mode htaccess won't work, if Apache module, use htaccess to set the php memory limit:

In .htaccess, you can try to add the following:

Code Select Expand

php_value memory_limit 64M

If you add this and get a 500 Internal Server Error, than you are running PHP in CGI Mode, and should ask the server to up the memory_limit in the php.ini file, or perhaps you can do this yourself.  But if you can't, ask the server to do this.

[SoLoGHoST]

@Kindred:

[22-Apr-2013 20:59:27 Etc/GMT+5] PHP Fatal error:  Allowed memory size of 33554432 bytes exhausted (tried to allocate 133 bytes) in /......./Sources/Subs-Package.php on line 2756

Try in that function of Subs-Package.php, to set the php memory_limit to 64M using ini_set, just before the operation that happens on line 2756 of that file:

Code Select Expand

ini_set('memory_limit','64M');

And if you really want to push it even further, since there are more than just the php memory_limit that could cause problems with package uploads:

Code Select Expand


// Try and allow for 3 hours, lol
@set_time_limit(10800);

@ini_set('memory_limit', '64M');
@ini_set('upload_max_filesize', '64M');
@ini_set('post_max_size', '100M');
@ini_set('session.gc_maxlifetime', '10800');  // Allows for up to 3 hours
@ini_set('max_input_time', '10800');  // Allows for up to 3 hours
@ini_set('max_execution_time', '10800'); // Allows for up to 3 hours