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Akeeba Backup for Joomla!

#14669 blank screens after restoring to a new site

Posted in ‘Akeeba Backup for Joomla! 4 & 5’
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Environment Information

Joomla! version
n/a
PHP version
n/a
Akeeba Backup version
n/a

Latest post by user71583 on Tuesday, 15 January 2013 09:49 CST

user71583

Mandatory information about my setup:

Have I read the related troubleshooter articles above before posting (which pages?)? troubleshooting restore
Have I searched the tickets before posting? yes
Have I read the documentation before posting (which pages?)? No
Joomla! version: (unknown) 2.5.8
PHP version: (unknown) 5.4
MySQL version: (unknown)
Host: (optional, but it helps us help you)
Akeeba Backup version: latest

Description of my issue:

I restored my backup to a new host from a different provider. And I am getting a blnk screen. I did make sure that cookies are blank and I cleared them and the cache from my browser. I get a blank screen from both the front end and admin pages.

nicholas
Akeeba Staff
Manager

A white page or a page with a 500 Internal Server Error is, in fact, either a .htaccess issue to a PHP fatal error in disguise.

First, let's see if it is a .htaccess issue. Try renaming the .htaccess file in your site's root to htaccess.bak If there is a .htaccess file in the site's administrator directory, try renaming it as well. If that solves the problem, the issue was with a directive in your .htaccess file. We'd like to recommend you to try removing directives from your .htaccess until you find the one which causes the problem.

If that doesn't help, the error you are receiving is in fact a PHP error in disguise. First, check your server's error logs (not the access logs) immediately after visiting the page which throws the error. There should be an exact description of the PHP fatal error which occurred. Sometimes you can find the error messages in files called error_log or error.log inside the site's root and/or administrator directories. If unsure about the error log location, please consult your host. Most likely the error logs are available in your site's cPanel, Plesk control panel or similar hosting account management facility.

If your host does not give you access to the error logs and you have access to the Joomla! administrator area, please log in to your site's back-end, go to Global Configuration, click on the Server tab and set the Error Reporting to Maximum (Joomla! 1.5) or Development (Joomla! 2.x and later). Try visiting the problem page again.

If you still get a blank page, edit your configuration.php file and put the following code right after the final closing curly brace ( this is what a curly brace looks like --> } ) but before the closing PHP tag (it looks like ?> that is a question mark and a greater-than sign):

ini_set( 'display_errors', true );
error_reporting( E_ALL ); 

Try visiting the problem page again.

If you still get a white page, please remote the two lines from your configuration.php file. Edit the .htaccess file in your site's root. If you don't have a file named .htaccess create a new one. Beware that htaccess.txt is a DIFFERENT FILE and will NOT work! Add the following to the end of the file:

php_flag display_errors On
php_value error_reporting 32767

and retry loading the problem page.

If you still get a white page, remove the two lines from your .htaccess file. Now, create a file called php.ini with the following content:

display_errors=on
error_reporting=E_ALL

and upload it into your site's root and your site's administrator directory. Retry loading the problem page.

If you still get a white page, delete the php.ini files your created and choose a different host. If your host doesn't allow you to debug any PHP-related issues there is no point paying them.

Please note that if you can not understand what the PHP error message means, just copy and paste it here verbatim so that we can take a look and point you to the right direction.

Nicholas K. Dionysopoulos

Lead Developer and Director

🇬🇷Greek: native 🇬🇧English: excellent 🇫🇷French: basic • 🕐 My time zone is Europe / Athens
Please keep in mind my timezone and cultural differences when reading my replies. Thank you!

user71583

So, I tried removing the .htaccess from my site, and it is empty in the public_html root as well. Still blank.

I am not getting any errors. You can see my PHPInfo here: http://ecbiz132.inmotionhosting.com/~nvpbik5/sparticus/phpinfo.php

the site I restored is here: http://ecbiz132.inmotionhosting.com/~nvpbik5/sparticus

 

so, the fact it can run the phpinfo.php script makes me think it is an error that is getting masked. But errors are not being generated (as far as I can tell)

nicholas
Akeeba Staff
Manager

If you don't get any errors I can't help you. Please contact your host and ask them for access to the PHP error log.

Nicholas K. Dionysopoulos

Lead Developer and Director

🇬🇷Greek: native 🇬🇧English: excellent 🇫🇷French: basic • 🕐 My time zone is Europe / Athens
Please keep in mind my timezone and cultural differences when reading my replies. Thank you!

user71583

See that's just it. If I insert an error into info.php (which just calls phpinfo();) then I see the error on the page, AND an error gets logged to my error_log.

But when I try to run either the front end or backend index.php I just get a blank screen and nothing in the error logs.

I would be more than happy to share the cpanel credentials with you if that would help.

But basically I am stumped and am not sure what I can do at this point...

 

Thanks for your help!

nicholas
Akeeba Staff
Manager

I think you need to contact your host. If this were a PHP error you'd see it in the error log, just like the error in your info.php file. If it were a .htaccess issue it would have gone away when you removed the .htaccess file. This only leaves something that your host alone can tell you what is.

Nicholas K. Dionysopoulos

Lead Developer and Director

🇬🇷Greek: native 🇬🇧English: excellent 🇫🇷French: basic • 🕐 My time zone is Europe / Athens
Please keep in mind my timezone and cultural differences when reading my replies. Thank you!

user71583

Yea, I've been working with them. But not sure what to look at if it is neither a PHP error not .htaccess. Thought you might have some other ideas...

nicholas
Akeeba Staff
Manager

99.9% of post restoration issues have to do with .htaccess or PHP issues. Even not covering the minimum PHP version requirement of an extension does generate an error in the log. .htaccess issues tend to not generate an error in the log, but removing the .htaccess files does the trick. Sometimes it's also php.ini issues, but if you did follow my instructions you have most likely verified the contents of any custom php.ini files you have in your site's root. If not, it's a good idea trying to rename them to, say, php.ini.bak and see if that helps.

To be honest, the only other thing I am suspecting is file permissions. I've seen hosts which require all folders and files to have 0755 permissions. The latest case was earlier today. But this is not something I'd blindly try on a site. I'd rather the host take a look at their logs and verify that this is what is required.

Nicholas K. Dionysopoulos

Lead Developer and Director

🇬🇷Greek: native 🇬🇧English: excellent 🇫🇷French: basic • 🕐 My time zone is Europe / Athens
Please keep in mind my timezone and cultural differences when reading my replies. Thank you!

user71583

Oh interesting... Files are 644. Checking with the host, it seems like the files are not getting executed at all. Let le look into file ownership/permissions.

thanks. I'll let you know where I get with the host.

 

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