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Site Restoration

#13106 Problem with templates on restored site

Posted in ‘Site restoration’
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Environment Information

PHP version
n/a
CMS Type
Other
CMS Version
n/a
Backup Tool Version
n/a
Kickstart version
n/a

Latest post by nicholas on Thursday, 02 August 2012 01:39 CDT

Wednesday, 01 August 2012 02:47 CDT

user66965
Mandatory information about my setup:

Have I read the related troubleshooter articles above before posting (which pages?)? Yes (The section "Troubleshooting issues after restoring your site")
Have I searched the tickets before posting? Yes
Have I read the documentation before posting (which pages?)? No
Joomla! version: 1.5.20
PHP version: 5
MySQL version: 5.5.23
Host: www.hostgator.com
Akeeba Backup version which took the backup: 3.3.b1
Kickstart version used to extract the backup: 3.5.2

Description of my issue:
I used Akeeba Backup to migrate my site to another host. The site has been restored successfully. However, I have some issues with the restored site. First of all, if Search Engine Friendly URLs is set to Yes in the site's global configuration, the templates work only for the front page. All other pages appear as if there is no template at all. I tried several different templates installed on the site, the result is always the same. Secondly, I cannot install any new template or other extension, I get an error message: "JFolder::create: Could not create directory. Warning! Failed to move file.".
I tried to move the site twice, first with Kickstart and second time using Site Transfer Wizard. Both times the result is the same.
The URL of the moved site is: http://gator608.hostgator.com/~syportal/
The original site is: http://www.sahajayogaportal.org/

Wednesday, 01 August 2012 03:03 CDT

nicholas
Hello Lev,

You are using a "temporary URL" to access your site, i.e. a URL in the format http://www.example.com/~username. This is incompatible with SEF URLs. It has nothing to do with Akeeba Backup, it's the way Apache (the web server) works. The only workaround is assigning a proper domain name to your site before you can use SEF URLs. This is a frequently asked question and put as item #7 in Kickstart's initial dialogue ("Things you should know about Kickstart"):
7. Trying to restore to the temporary URL of a cPanel host (e.g. http://1.2.3.4/~username) will lead to restoration failure and your site will appear to be not working. This is normal and it's just how your server and CMS software work.
There is also a ticket from last year where I detail what's going on and a possible workaround.

Regarding the installation problems, this is a permissions issue. You will have to check your temporary directory and enable Joomla!'s FTP feature. For more information please look under the "Checking your temporary directory" and "Enable FTP" headers of our generic installation troubleshooting page. Please note that even though the troubleshooting page talks about Akeeba Backup, the same troubleshooting steps apply for the installation of any extension written by any developer.

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!

Wednesday, 01 August 2012 06:39 CDT

user66965
Thank you, Nicholas. I've solved the second problem. As for the first one, when creating this site I was also using a temporary URL and did not encounter anything like that. I have also another site on Host Gator, which I was creating under a similar temporary URL and again did not encounter such a problem. I only had to set "Use Apache mod_rewrite" to No, but Search Engine Friendly URLs were working. Anyway, probably I'll have to change the DNS records and what will happen.

Wednesday, 01 August 2012 07:11 CDT

nicholas
Hm, just an idea: check that you have a .htaccess file. If not, copy Joomla!'s htaccess.txt to .htaccess and retry. If you already have a .htaccess file you will see a line like this:
#RewriteBase /
Change it to read 
RewriteBase /~syportal
It may or may not work; when using temporary URLs your mileage may seriously vary.

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!

Thursday, 02 August 2012 01:09 CDT

user66965
I've just tried, it did not work. The site did not open at all. So, the last chance seems to be to update DNS records. Hope that will solve the problem

Thursday, 02 August 2012 01:19 CDT

nicholas
When you say "the site did not open at all" what do you mean? Blank page? Error page? Something else?

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!

Thursday, 02 August 2012 01:34 CDT

user66965
Erro page. 404, "page not found".

Thursday, 02 August 2012 01:39 CDT

nicholas
All right, that's what I understood but I had to check. You definitely have to set up a domain name. When you do, change that line back to 
RewriteBase /
for the SEF URLs to work properly.

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!

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