Thread

While trying to get captchas working, I changed the server path to the captcha folder in my system preferences. When I hit “update” I got a server error message. Since then, I cannot load any pages, including the control panel.

Sometimes, I get this message:

Sbox Error
The sbox program encountered an error while processing this request.

  exec of /htdocs/www/index.php failed (No such file or directory)

However, index.php is on the server in the “www” folder. It hasn’t been edited.

My ISP just asked me to check the php error log. I enabled error logging, but since I haven’t been able to load any pages, the log remains a 0 KB folder.

Just before the trouble, I had also enabled a couple PHP extensions on the ISP control panel for my site, but I put everything back to be identical to another site I run on the same server and which is still working.

I don’t know what to, and I don’t know much about PHP or server side software. I’m an English major, darn it.

I believe the site is running version 1.6.0 and I’m considering doing the updates to see whether that overwrites whatever is broken, though I’m a little nervous about doing any more before I figure out what happened.

Hee- sociology degree here- the liberal arts shouldn’t pose a problem for EE 😉.

Is this showing up on both the backend and the frontend- just that same identical Sbox error?  An update wouldn’t be a bad idea, just to clean the dust out.  But- it is just flat weird.  I’m almost suspecting one of the extensions- do you remember which ones they are?

Both the frontend and the backend are working now, though both were down.

I don’t have a message from my ISP so I’m thinking it was a server-side hiccup of some sort. Actually, it probably was triggered by enabling those PHP extensions. For the record, I believe they were:

PDF   Adobe Portable Document Format functions
Ming   SWF (Flash) functions

I’ll just hope the trouble is finished.

Thanks, Robin.

And in reality I do think EE makes more sense than Foucault and Derrida, which is what English majors these days are supposed to process.

So is it OK to close the thread, then?

I guess the trouble isn’t over. Though I can browse the site and I upgraded to the latest version, I’ve learned that when most other people try to browse the site, they get this message:

Forbidden
You don’t have permission to access / on this server.

Apache/1.3.34 Server at www. . . . Port 80

The error log is a long string of these messages:

09:10:46 2008] [error] [client 98.227.121.103] client denied by server configuration: /htdocs/forum

I’m wondering about index.php. I have two EE sites running on servers from the same ISP. In one of them, my index.php has a 2008 copyright at the top, and in the one that’s misbehaving the index.php file starts with a copyright statement “2003-04.”

Could the above trouble be caused by the wrong index.php file? Can I use the newer index.php on the site that’s not working, or does it have site specific info in it?

I wouldn’t think that’s it, but index.php was updated pretty recently- which is rare.  Try putting the fresh copy on the goofing site- though keep the current one as a backup.

Also- you running any htaccess?  And can you link to the site so I can see it in action- or pm if it’s private.

Okay, I got a message from my ISP. They put an htaccess file on the site because of a “bug” that was breaking the site, which seems to have begun when I enabled captchas. Their message is below. Since the trouble started, and when I thought the site was working because by IP address wasn’t restricted, I’ve done the upgrade from 1.6.0 to 1.6.4, so I don’t know whether that might have resolved the original problem.

In /htdocs/www/mpcp/core/core.functions.php there are two calls to the unlink() function, but both were preceded by the @ sign, which makes them suppress any errors that were encountered. I removed the @ signs.

Then, I started browsing the site, and clicked on a ‘comments’ link which led to http://www. . . ./comments/poetry_slams/

There, I received the following warning messages:

Warning: unlink(/etc) [function.unlink]: Is a directory in /htdocs/www/mpcp/core/core.functions.php on line 1769

Warning: unlink(/tmp) [function.unlink]: Is a directory in /htdocs/www/mpcp/core/core.functions.php on line 1769

Warning: unlink(/logs) [function.unlink]: Is a directory in /htdocs/www/mpcp/core/core.functions.php on line 1769

Warning: unlink(/.renv) [function.unlink]: Is a directory in /htdocs/www/mpcp/core/core.functions.php on line 1769

Warning: unlink(/sitebin) [function.unlink]: Is a directory in /htdocs/www/mpcp/core/core.functions.php on line 1769

Warning: unlink(/htdocs) [function.unlink]: Is a directory in /htdocs/www/mpcp/core/core.functions.php on line 1769

And now the site is non-functional.

This indicates that the ExpressionEngine software attempted to delete your entire account, and failed only because it attempted to delete files, not folders. So all files in / were removed. The system folders I’ve mentioned are actually softlinks, a type of file, and so when this occurs, these softlinks are removed and the account is consequently broken.

My guess is that this bug was triggered by your attempts to get CAPTCHA working. It seems to me that CAPTCHA image removal shuold target *.jpg files, not everything, and yu shuold probably get the configuration issue worked out so that the images are stored somewhere web-accessible (i.e., in /htdocs/www/ somewhere).

I’m going to repair the account again now, and restrict access to it so that only your Blackfoot ISP can visit it, since any visitor (includign GoogleBot, etc) can inadvertently disable the account. Hopefully you/ExpressionEngine can get this sorted out without having to repair the account again. When you are ready to open up access to the world again, just remove the /.htaccess file.

I’m a little at a loss.
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So, my thinking at the moment is that the trouble my IP describes might have been caused by my putting the wrong server path into the captcha preferences in the system configuration. That was what originally triggered the trouble.

Since I now have corrected the server path info in captcha preferences, this should fix the problem.

Does that seem likely?

Uh.  I don’t know what your host thinks they’re doing/seeing; but I am utterly and completely shocked.  ExpressionEngine doesn’t go around deleting random things and certainly would never attempt to delete your entire account.  that would be absolutely horrifying.  Furthermore, web-hosts should not go randomly modifying PHP code. 

Yes, putting the wrong path in can cause issues.  At this point, I would make sure to do a full build update and make sure there is a current, un-hacked version of all the files in your ExpressionEngine account.  Then, let us know if you are still experiencing any difficulties.

Echoing Lisa’s sentiments here, I would run, not walk, from a host that modified my code because they thought they knew better. Please do re-upload a fresh, original copy of EE and let us know if you require any further assistance.

I did an update of the EE files and removed the .htaccess file, and the site seems to be working correctly now. I hope.

Thanks.

Very good. I leave this thead open for another day or two, just in case. Let us know if it doesn’t work for some reason.

Closing. If anything else comes up, simply start a new thread, thanks.