Continued site problems...

I was having a problem yesterday with a "Fatal error: Allowed memory size of..." message which made my site unusable.

After trying in vain to find an answer to fix this, I eventually contacted my hosting support and whatever they did brought my site back up.

This morning, I'm getting this:

"The requested URL /Network/elgg-1.7.1/engine/handlers/pagehandler.php was not found on this server."

Having taken a look at this file, it states "pagehandler.php_Disabled_By_Arvixe" (my hosting)

They fixed one problem and created another, and it's no better because my users can't actually do anything!

Someone please help?

And a tip for you - Don't use Arvixe!!!

  • Thanks iionly,

    I took a look at PHP Configuration and it state:

    These PHP configuration settings are customizable by the server administrator. They are listed for reference only.

    memory_limit 256M

    Is this what is causing the problem with Allowed Memory?

    And is it embarasing to say I have no idea about RAM, where do I even find this info. Believe me I have explored every aspect of Arvixe cPanel and I can't find it.

    This makes me sound like such a complete n00b, but I have actualy created websites before through trial and error and they've worked fine. I don't know why I'm having so much hassle with Elgg and Arvixe!

    And now, just as I'm writing this, I'm now getting an Unable to connect page. And I've had an automated email stating:

    "httpd failed @ Sat Jul 24 17:35:40 2010. A restart was attempted automagically.

    Service Check Method:  [tcp connect]

     

    Failure Reason: Unable to connect to port 80"

    Seriously, has anyone in the history of Elgg usage had all these problems!?

  • Believe me, only two weeks ago before I moved to VPS I had not much knowledge either. I'd some bad luck with the move at first, too, as the server was not configured without some glitches (ffmpeg was not working, CPanel and WHM not installed properly and some other minor problems). I'd asked the support guys quite thorougly before the move, if they would configure everything properly and so I asked them to please set up everything when these problems occured. Maybe I was lucky, but they helped me each time!

    Luke, CPanel is mainly to maintain your site. You will know it from the shared server already. What's new on VPS is WHM. It's similar to CPanel (I think from the same company) and allows you to administrate your VPS (apache, mysql, DNS, mail server etc...). In Cpanel you only see the php settings, in WHM you can change them. You can log in to WHM also via browser, but most likely you will have a separate login for that (maybe username "root" and another password). Ask Arvixe about the login data.

    You might need some time to get an overview about WHM when you log in for the first time. Many, many options! But most things should be configured by Arvixe. If not... complain!

    In WHM there's the option "Server status >> Server Information" that shows the memory usage / available memory. Alternatively, you can log in via ssh on your server - if ssh is configured - and use for example the "top" command to see memory usage.

    memory_limit can be set to 64 MB. If you want to use for example the izap_videos plugin you might need to increase it depending on the size of the videos you want to allow. But other plugins shouldn't need more than 64 MB. The problem I had with 512 MB wasn't the php memory limit but the limited RAM as such. About at least 250 MB are already occupied by apache, mysql, spamd, kernel and other daemons. When you request a page in Elgg quite a few php processes will get started. And these processes needed more RAM than available - especially with several site visitors.

  • I've checked out the cPanel and found the WHM, everything seems fine in there. I've checked out a few likely options and nothing is throwing up a red flag at all.

    I've also been looking at php.ini and it states 512M

    What should I change this to and is there anything else I need to change?

     

  • Okay, I spoke to support again and they have said it is definitely an Elgg problem.

    They increased memory for me, and I'm still getting the Fatal Error and a 500 Internal Server Error.

    I don't know what to do next, I've tried everything I can find in Elgg assistance, and my hosting is saying it's elgg that is the problem.

    Surely I can't be the only elgg user to have this problem? And yet I just can't find proper information on it at all.

    What I've tried:

    Removing chat plugin.

    Disabling Tidypics (there are hundreds of images in there, without size limitations imposed).

    Increasing php.ini memory setting

    Replaced pagehandler.php (the one Arvixe disabled)

    I don't know what else to try. Nothing suggested is actually doing anything to fix these errors. Arvixe are adamant that it's elgg that is the problem and not their hosting.

    I really don't want to loose my community. I have about 1500 users on there and I have invested several months of work into building the site.

    I am considering deleting the entire community from the server and trying a fresh install.

     

     

    • How much RAM do you have now?
    • Did you restart Apache and MySQL after the memory was increased?
    • Do you notice at least an increase in speed for the pages that work?
    • Which pages result in the Internal server errors? Profile pages/dashboard, pages of plugins or is it seemingly by coincidence?
    • Check Apache and php error logs for failure messages that might explain the errors. Maybe something in the VPS installation is missing or not fully configured. Are there messages like *.so missing? Depending on your needs GD (must be installed) or maybe ImageMagick, PDO could be missing.
    • Increasing memory_limit in php.ini to more than normally necessary won't help. 64 MB should be enough already for most plugins.
    • Another possibility is that there's a faulty/incomplete entry in your database. I had the same problem this week with an izap_videos entity with missing metadata. This also resulted in a 500 Internal server error instead of listing the videos. I could identify this entity when I noticed that the profile page of just 1 user also didn't work. As I said, the pages that result in the server error might give some indication what might be the problem taking into consideration what requirements are needed to build up the content.
  • Thanks for all your help iionly, I've been leaving it to Arvixe to investigate as I am now completely out of my depth and cannot find any relevant info on either the CPU usage or Fatal Error for allowed memory problems.

    I asked support to assist and they have found that PHP wasn't working on the upgrade to VPS!?

    They've also said that there's something in the old database that won't allow a new install of Elgg to use it.

    I've replied that right now I just want to get an Elgg installation running without loosing the 1400 members already there, I don't care about losing user data (although I want it to be saved if at all possible). Surely this would be possible by just exporting each section of MySQL, creating new for the new Elgg install, and importing that data to the new one? If something then fails, we'll know which chunk of data is causing the problems and only that can be removed?

    This support guy has worked really hard to try to get the site up again, but if even he admits he's having problems, what can I do?

    I've now asked them to try to install a new Elgg with all existing users. I've decided that if he comes back to me today and says he can't migrate the users to a new Elgg install, I'm done with Elgg, and with Arvixe and the site I've been working hard on for several months is now dead. There's no other option for me, especially if an IT professional can't get it working.

    Thanks again for your help iionly. As a new member of this community I am impressed with the help offered by other members, if not with the factual and proven information provided by Elgg itself.

  • Hi Luke,

    I hope they can repair it. If it's only a php issue it must be possible to solve it. I guess they just haven't managed to configure your VPS properly yet. And Elgg surely has no exotic requirements. As long as size of RAM and CPU are okay and apache, mysql and php are configured it should work.

    As long as the Elgg data folder and the database are not getting damaged / vandalized by the hoster guys it should be possible to get your old installation running again. Don't give up!

  • I've taken this on myself now.

    I'm actually getting somewhere.

    I created a fresh Elgg install, and I'm moving Sql data from the old install to the new one. I'm just trying to move users first.

    But I'm having one problem which is curious.

    When I add the user data, they are not displaying in the Elgg users, it's still just me.

    But, when I create a new user in Elgg, it does appear in elgg_users_entity.

    Anyone have any ideas?

    Would this be a setting in read/write access, and if so how would I change that?

  • @ Luke have you finally found a way out of this situation? I'm having the same 500 Error problems with arvixe. I upgraded to business plan but they can't transfer the database.

    My site is down for a week now and the pagehandler processes seem to be increasing. I'm in the same frustrating situation as you were last year.