photos suddenly gone missing

Hi

I just refreshed my site in browser to see if there were any new members and all the images are gone! They were there earlier today and I haven't done anything on the site. When I say gone both profile and gallery images show default images.

I double checked the data path and that looks fine, the data directory is also on the server but I don't have permissions dig into any of the files.

Any suggestions on what might have happened and how I can fix it.

BTW running Elgg version 1.6.1 but nervous about upgrading.

 

  • Stuff doesn't disappear. Something had to change. Change any code, installing any plugins lately? Has anything changed on the server? Mess with the database lately?

    If you create a new test account and upload a profile photo, do you see it?

  • Hi thanks Cash but sill have the problem

    I Created a new account, changed the profile photo, got the message "your profile picture has successfully been uploaded" but the default remained.

    I haven't touched the site in months apart from viewing it in the browser. If I look on the server I can't see any recenly changed files either.

    Any other suggestions on how to get to the bottom of this?

     

  • If you cannot upload a new photo, that probably means the permissions changed - either your web server is running with different permissions or your data directory has different permissions.

  • Is your site hosted on a shared server?

  • Yes its a virtual/shared host.

    When I upload I get a success message, if the permissions were wrong wouldn't it give me an error "failed to upload" or something?

  • You would think so.

    I have the same issues on seperate occasions prior to moving my hosting - since moving hostng several months ago the problem has not re-occurred.....

    On a couple of occassions the host managed to recover the lost data, but on the last occassion everything was lost for good, from 2 very well developed elgg installs - very upsetting (though I should have backed up myself).

    As well as recovering the data I also had to replace the .htaccess file - hope this helps.

  • The lack of an error message may be a bug in Elgg. The lack of a profile photo is probably not.

  • OK thanks, guys, I will ask my hosts if they can check the images are still in the data files. It wouldn't be the first time the problem was their end, usualy database or mail related though.

    I will post a follow up if I sort it out.

  • I know you said you didn't do anything to the site, but I had the same problem when I renamed the tidypics folder to plug_tidypics, thinking it would be easier to manage plugins and themes. When I changed the name back, the pictures returned. Maybe the folder was renamed?