It might be a caching problem, maybe only due to one plugin on your site. I had the same issue on a test installation when I enabled all non-core plugins at the same time after the upgrade (I believe it was the Draggable widgets plugin that caused the strange look).

Does turn off caching restores the look of your site? Maybe you need to disable / re-enable the plugins, too. If your site looks alright again you should also be able to turn on caching again.

Thanx for the reply,
hmm just looked and I already had disabled the simplecache.

And it seems that I'm not able to disable/enable plugins in the admin panel anymore... hmmm this is getting stranger by the minute. (getting a green succes-notification, but nothing really changes.

Could it be that the theme I'm using isn't compatible anymore with 1.7.3?
I think I'm better of placing a backup back...

Have you replaced the .htaccess file with the new version provided by Elgg 1.7.3? It might help to delete the simplecache folder from the data directory (get's created again when you enable simple cache again). Maybe the cached version of the pages is used even when it shows that simple cache is disabled. Also reload the pages in your browser in case it simple shows the pages cached by the browser.

Don't know about your theme - maybe disable / remove it for to see what happens. But I think it's maybe too early to give up yet and move to the backup.

Too late ;) I've backupped already ... but these hints will definitely help on my next upgrade attempt! thanks

I guess I was rushing it, not really checking if I've disabled all non core stuff etc.

Sounds like some bad code. Make sure you have good 1.7.3 code. Try disabling the 3rd party plugins if it reoccurs.

Hi Truong, I got the very same problem upgrading from Elgg 1.7.1 to 1.7.3, the dashboard and profile widgets showed the full site in each.

After much searching and fiddling, it turned out to be my mistake. Just use the htaccess file supplied with 1.7.3 to replace your current one and the problem disappears completely. You just need to rename your old file then rename the new one with the old one's name.

Note: if - like me - your Elgg site is a sub-directory within your domain, read inside the file for instrcutions on where to place the necessary setting. Good luck.

HI people,

Okay thanks fot all the extra input. I was just upgrading again to 1.7.3. and it all occured again... I'm going to try the .htaccess proposed thing. It seems like something about that, because I get blank pages all over the place when I navigate towards e.g. administrator panel. 

However when I click the complete mysite.com/pg/admin/statistics I get the full view again ...

I'll post the progress on the matter here.

Well people,

It's fixed! The site got hacked, so my index.php in the root and htaccess were totally messed up. I restored from backup en placed the new 1.7.4 core on the installation again. And placed some restriction in siteaccess plugin.

The site within site widget problem is like Bassam mentioned, use the htaccess_dist from the 1.7.4 version. Place any url-domain rewrites in here.

Well it has been fun :p till next time ;)