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Site Restoration

#21988 Restore looping after pre-installation checklist

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
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Latest post by on Wednesday, 04 March 2015 17:20 CST

cpaschen
 I'm getting a VERY strange happening on restoring a site - never gotten before (in MANY restores using AkeebaRestore).

1. Initial screen is fine - click button to get started

2. Click the RUN THE INSTALLER and it runs fine
returns me to the ANGI - pre-installation check page with this url:
http://.../installation/index.php
everything is marked green

3. Click NEXT (top right)
I get the 'initialization' spinning wheel for a couple seconds
then returned to the same screen (pre-installation check) [see screen shot attached]
But the URL is:
http://.../installation/index.php?view=database

4. I click the START OVER button
I get the initialization spinning wheel for a couple seconds again
then get returned to the same 'pre-installaction' check page
but this time the url is:
http://.../installation/index.php?view=main&task=startover

There is a red '1' next to Database Restoration, but it is not clickable.

I've tried restoring using FTP mode and changed the maximum time to 10 seconds.
I've cleared cookies and cache and refreshed the screen with no changes.
I've also tried with several different browsers (and disabled all extensions in FF) (and tested with the 'basic' browser Midori). All return same results.

I've also checked the console window and no errors being reported.

I've tested this backup file on a different hosting account (Siteground) and it restores just fine.

I've heard of others having similar 'fun' on Bluehost servers - not sure if there is something that I need to do to make it work.

Any ideas about what might be causing this problem?

NOTE: Using Kickstart PRO 4.0.0 and Akeeba backup pro 4.1.1

tampe125
Akeeba Staff
Hello Chris,

I suspect there is an issue on saving session state, caused by wrong permissions.
Please change the permissions to installation/tmp folder to 0777 and try again.

Davide Tampellini

Developer and Support Staff

๐Ÿ‡ฎ๐Ÿ‡นItalian: native ๐Ÿ‡ฌ๐Ÿ‡งEnglish: good โ€ข ๐Ÿ• My time zone is Europe / Rome (UTC +1)
Please keep in mind my timezone and cultural differences when reading my replies. Thank you!

cpaschen
I changed permissions on the tmp folder (and everything in it) to 777, still not going anywhere.

Any other folders/files that should be 777?
(Or any other ideas?)

nicholas
Akeeba Staff
Manager
The URL you see in the address bar tells me that instead of Next you're clicking on Check Again. If that's not the case then your host is doing something really funky, such as either changing the URLs of the buttons on the HTML before delivering it to your browser OR routing one URL to another for no apparent reason.

Nicholas K. Dionysopoulos

Lead Developer and Director

๐Ÿ‡ฌ๐Ÿ‡ทGreek: native ๐Ÿ‡ฌ๐Ÿ‡งEnglish: excellent ๐Ÿ‡ซ๐Ÿ‡ทFrench: basic โ€ข ๐Ÿ• My time zone is Europe / Athens
Please keep in mind my timezone and cultural differences when reading my replies. Thank you!

cpaschen
The URL assigned to the buttons are:

Start over:
http://.../installation/index.php?view=main&task=startover

Check again:
http://.../installation/index.php#

Next:
http://.../installation/index.php?view=database

However, they all result in returning to the same page.

Here's the location so you can test and see what you get:
http://vibrantfaithathome.vibrantfaith.org/installation/index.php

I'm guessing that somehow it's a strange re-routing.

I've used akeeba backup/restore for years and never seen anything like this.
I'm hoping that maybe seeing it might make something more clear.
I'm definitely stumped (esp. considering it restores fine on Siteground servers).

nicholas
Akeeba Staff
Manager
Thank you for the URL, it now makes more sense. It seems that your server doesn't report the query parameters (the view=database) to ANGIE at all. You can verify this by visiting http://vibrantfaithathome.vibrantfaith.org/installation/index.php?view=notexists Normally you should see an error page. Instead, on your server, you get the main page a.k.a. what you get when there's no view parameter in the URL.

At this point I want to make it clear that ANGIE is using the same code as Joomla! 2.5 and later to get the values of URL query parameters. In other words, everything I am about to say apply to both ANGIE and Joomla! itself.

The observed result make me believe that you have a sever hosting issue here. The server seems to be misconfigured, not populating the $_REQUEST PHP variable with the contents of the query string parameters. This is against the standard, documented and only valid PHP behaviour. I've never seen that happening again but there's a first time for everything.

However, I'm not entirely sold to the idea that this is a server configuration error and I don't want to be the one crying wolf. I did observe that you are using a subdomain for your site. Is your subdomain's web root inside your main site's root? I mean something like this
(account root)
   |
   +-- public_html (your main site's root)
   |       |
   |       +-- vibrantfaithathome (your subdomain's root)
   |
   +-- some_other_folder
   |
   ....


In this case your main site's .htaccess file gets in the way of the subdomain. Incidentally, this wrong way of creating subdomains is the default way to create subdomains in cPanel which I understand is what BlueHost (like the majority of hosts out there) is using.

Instead, you need to delete your subdomain and create it afresh, this time putting its directory on the same level (but not inside) your main site's root. What I mean is this:
(account root)
   |
   +-- public_html (your main site's root)
   |
   +-- vibrantfaithathome (your subdomain's root, NOT inside public_html but next to it)
   |
   +-- some_other_folder
   |
   ....


If this still doesn't help then we have a server problem and you need to contact your host.

I hope this information helps!

Nicholas K. Dionysopoulos

Lead Developer and Director

๐Ÿ‡ฌ๐Ÿ‡ทGreek: native ๐Ÿ‡ฌ๐Ÿ‡งEnglish: excellent ๐Ÿ‡ซ๐Ÿ‡ทFrench: basic โ€ข ๐Ÿ• My time zone is Europe / Athens
Please keep in mind my timezone and cultural differences when reading my replies. Thank you!

cpaschen
I told the client to not use Bluehost :-), so I'd like to think that it is their fault with some strangeness.
However, I'm pretty sure that they probably do have this as a sub-directory under the main domain.

Sorry I didn't think of that - but THANKS for documenting the issue so clearly.

Unfortunately, I didn't set-up this server, so I have no idea how they configured it.

They are taking over this site with internal staff members, so I guess they get to take over the proper configuration of the server too :-)

Thanks again for the clear explanation.

I'll leave this open for a few days just in case it is a server issue and we need any more clarification about help variable - and host to possibly change it (if needed).

System Task
system
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