strange blank pages in FF and chrome since import

lex · May 30, 2009, 7:50am

hmm, I don’t seem to be able to crack this: a sudoko for beginners:

I’ve got three wordpress sites with very similar templates.

Two of them (all three were working), I imported into virtualmin. The third is just a translation of one of those two but has the same ‘theme’ etc.

The two imported ones: I can see them fine in IE7, but not in FF or Chrome. Some people report they don’t see them in IE7 either.

The not imported one is visible to all.

So where is the problem? I started disabling all plugins in wordpress: no difference. I then changed the theme to the default wordpress theme too: no difference.

What happens? I get a real blank page in FF and chrome. No error or page title, just a blank page. Somewhere, there must be an error, but where? I first suspected a wordpress thing, but why does it happen only to the imported websites… what could be the problems, something to do with the headers? The mod rewrite/htaccess?

Well, whatever I’ve tried, I haven’t been able to find it.

So if someone has an idea…

Not imported:
www.journalistinturkije.nl

Imported:
www.journalistinturkey.com (translated copy of the not imported one)
www.hollandsenieuwe.com

Another strange thing: the homepage of those sites is wordpress, dynamic. When I copied the source code of the presented page and save that as a static html file on domain, then that page could be seen by all browsers…

Who’s got an idea?

p.s. I wasn’t able to do these fresh, as they were already on the server when I installed virtualmin.

error log of one of them (last 20 lines):

[code:1]
[Tue May 26 12:22:32 2009] [error] [client 80.59.112.51] client denied by server configuration: /home/klanten/journalistinturkey.com/user/htdocs/wordpress/wp-content/plugins/wp-dbmanager/database-admin-css.css, referer: http://www.journalistinturkey.com/wordpress/wp-admin/admin.php?page=wp-dbmanager/database-manage.php
[Tue May 26 12:22:33 2009] [error] [client 80.59.112.51] client denied by server configuration: /home/klanten/journalistinturkey.com/user/htdocs/wordpress/wp-content/plugins/wp-dbmanager/images/database.png, referer: http://www.journalistinturkey.com/wordpress/wp-admin/admin.php?page=wp-dbmanager/database-manage.php
[Tue May 26 12:22:52 2009] [error] [client 80.59.112.51] client denied by server configuration: /home/klanten/journalistinturkey.com/user/htdocs/wordpress/wp-content/plugins/wp-dbmanager/database-admin-css.css, referer: http://www.journalistinturkey.com/wordpress/wp-admin/admin.php?page=wp-dbmanager/database-manage.php
[Tue May 26 12:22:53 2009] [error] [client 80.59.112.51] client denied by server configuration: /home/klanten/journalistinturkey.com/user/htdocs/wordpress/wp-content/plugins/wp-dbmanager/images/database.png, referer: http://www.journalistinturkey.com/wordpress/wp-admin/admin.php?page=wp-dbmanager/database-manage.php
[Tue May 26 12:27:56 2009] [error] [client 85.108.110.50] client denied by server configuration: /home/klanten/journalistinturkey.com/user/htdocs/wordpress/wp-content/plugins/wp-dbmanager/images/database.png, referer: http://www.journalistinturkey.com/wordpress/wp-admin/edit-comments.php
[Tue May 26 13:07:59 2009] [error] [client 85.108.110.50] client denied by server configuration: /home/klanten/journalistinturkey.com/user/htdocs/wordpress/wp-content/plugins/wp-dbmanager/images/database.png, referer: http://www.journalistinturkey.com/wordpress/wp-admin/edit-comments.php
[Tue May 26 13:08:18 2009] [error] [client 85.108.110.50] client denied by server configuration: /home/klanten/journalistinturkey.com/user/htdocs/wordpress/wp-content/plugins/wp-dbmanager/images/database.png, referer: http://www.journalistinturkey.com/wordpress/wp-admin/post-new.php
[Tue May 26 13:13:56 2009] [error] [client 85.108.110.50] client denied by server configuration: /home/klanten/journalistinturkey.com/user/htdocs/wordpress/wp-content/plugins/wp-dbmanager/images/database.png, referer: http://www.journalistinturkey.com/wordpress/wp-admin/post.php?action=edit&post=794&message=6
[Tue May 26 13:16:04 2009] [error] [client 85.108.110.50] client denied by server configuration: /home/klanten/journalistinturkey.com/user/htdocs/wordpress/wp-content/plugins/wp-dbmanager/images/database.png, referer: http://www.journalistinturkey.com/wordpress/wp-admin/post.php?action=edit&post=794
[Tue May 26 13:16:43 2009] [error] [client 85.108.110.50] client denied by server configuration: /home/klanten/journalistinturkey.com/user/htdocs/wordpress/wp-content/plugins/wp-dbmanager/images/database.png, referer: http://www.journalistinturkey.com/wordpress/wp-admin/post.php?action=edit&post=794&_wp_original_http_referer=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.journalistinturkey.com%2Fblogs%2Fone-million-books-plus-one_794%2F&message=1
[Tue May 26 13:19:56 2009] [error] [client 85.108.110.50] client denied by server configuration: /home/klanten/journalistinturkey.com/user/htdocs/wordpress/wp-content/plugins/wp-dbmanager/images/database.png, referer: http://www.journalistinturkey.com/wordpress/wp-admin/edit-comments.php
[Tue May 26 13:20:25 2009] [error] [client 85.108.110.50] client denied by server configuration: /home/klanten/journalistinturkey.com/user/htdocs/wordpress/wp-content/plugins/wp-dbmanager/images/database.png, referer: http://www.journalistinturkey.com/wordpress/wp-admin/index.php
[Tue May 26 13:21:33 2009] [error] [client 85.108.110.50] client denied by server configuration: /home/klanten/journalistinturkey.com/user/htdocs/wordpress/wp-content/plugins/wp-dbmanager/images/database.png, referer: http://www.journalistinturkey.com/wordpress/wp-admin/options-general.php?page=subscribe2/subscribe2.php
[Tue May 26 13:23:16 2009] [error] [client 85.108.110.50] client denied by server configuration: /home/klanten/journalistinturkey.com/user/htdocs/wordpress/wp-content/plugins/wp-dbmanager/images/database.png, referer: http://www.journalistinturkey.com/wordpress/wp-admin/options-general.php?page=subscribe2/subscribe2.php
[Tue May 26 16:20:20 2009] [error] [client 85.108.110.50] client denied by server configuration: /home/klanten/journalistinturkey.com/user/htdocs/wordpress/wp-content/plugins/wp-dbmanager/images/database.png, referer: http://www.journalistinturkey.com/wordpress/wp-admin/edit-comments.php
[Tue May 26 17:50:01 2009] [error] [client 85.108.110.50] client denied by server configuration: /home/klanten/journalistinturkey.com/user/htdocs/wordpress/wp-content/plugins/wp-dbmanager/images/database.png, referer: http://www.journalistinturkey.com/wordpress/wp-admin/edit-comments.php
[Wed May 27 07:10:02 2009] [error] [client 85.108.110.50] client denied by server configuration: /home/klanten/journalistinturkey.com/user/htdocs/wordpress/wp-content/plugins/wp-dbmanager/images/database.png, referer: http://www.journalistinturkey.com/wordpress/wp-admin/edit-comments.php
[Wed May 27 08:18:36 2009] [error] [client 88.31.224.107] client denied by server configuration: /home/klanten/journalistinturkey.com/user/htdocs/wordpress/wp-content/plugins/wp-dbmanager/images/database.png, referer: http://www.journalistinturkey.com/wordpress/wp-admin/plugins.php
[Sat May 30 11:55:21 2009] [error] [client 88.30.1.237] client denied by server configuration: /home/klanten/journalistinturkey.com/user/htdocs/wordpress/wp-content/plugins/wp-dbmanager/images/database.png, referer: http://www.journalistinturkey.com/wordpress/wp-admin/post-new.php
[Sat May 30 12:02:32 2009] [error] [client 88.30.1.237] client denied by server configuration: /home/klanten/journalistinturkey.com/user/htdocs/wordpress/wp-content/plugins/wp-dbmanager/images/database.png, referer: http://www.journalistinturkey.com/wordpress/wp-admin/post.php?action=edit&post=798&message=6
[/code:1]

error log of the other mal-functioning one (last "20" lines):

[code:1][Wed May 27 08:31:24 2009] [error] [client 65.55.105.120] WordPress database error Table ‘hn.wp_DLM_DOWNLOADS’ doesn’t exist for query SELECT * FROM wp_DLM_DOWNLOADS WHERE id=‘11’;
[Fri May 29 05:02:54 2009] [error] [client 65.55.105.123] WordPress database error Table ‘hn.wp_DLM_DOWNLOADS’ doesn’t exist for query SELECT * FROM wp_DLM_DOWNLOADS WHERE id=‘9’;
[/code:1]

Joe · May 30, 2009, 7:56am

So these error_log entries aren’t actually related to these specific requests? (They look mostly old. Try making a request while watching the error_log…if nothing appears then, Apache thinks everything is fine…so the problem will be with what’s actually being served out.)

I’m getting a zero-sized reply from journalistinturkey.com (when I hit it directly with telnet or wget). I can’t imagine how IE could possibly do anything different with a zero-sized reply.

Are you sure IE is going to the same address? Is it possibly serving you a cached version of the page?

lex · May 30, 2009, 8:03am

Joe wrote:

So these error_log entries aren't actually related to these specific requests? (They look mostly old. Try making a request while watching the error_log...if nothing appears then, Apache thinks everything is fine...so the problem will be with what's actually being served out.)

That’s what I hought looking at the log files. There’s nothing added to them when trying to see the sites.

I'm getting a zero-sized reply from journalistinturkey.com (when I hit it directly with telnet or wget). I can't imagine how IE could possibly do anything different with a zero-sized reply.

Are you sure IE is going to the same address? Is it possibly serving you a cached version of the page?

Yes I’m sure. In fact, in IE I can do everything with wordpress, add new blogs etc etc. Visitors are adding comments, but obviously not the ones who use firefox or chrome…

p.s. I’m happy I’m not the only one puzzled by this!

lex · May 30, 2009, 8:22am

p.s. what i’ve forgotten to mention:

I didn’t import just those two websites, I imported three. The third one, not a wordpress or php site, just static html is showing fine:

http://www.gran-canaria-info.com/

Well “fine”, there are a lot of errors and missing parts, but that’s because they are actually missing, I still have to repair this site.

So it seems as if the ‘being dynamic, php’ could have something to do with it. As I said before, the source of the (dynamic) home page copied and then saved on the domain as static html is visible, it’s this one:
http://www.hollandsenieuwe.com/probleem/index.html

ronald · May 30, 2009, 8:23am

when php scripts serve a blank page, often this is a corrupted file (not uploading in binary for example)

When checking the 2 problem sites in IE 8,
journalistinturkije.com says:
Cannot find server or DNS Error
Internet Explorer
Hollandsenieuwe.nl stays blank.

checking DNS says:
Looks like your nameservers do not agree on the SOA serial. Ths SOA records as reported by your nameservers:
88.208.232.11 -> 1
213.171.223.34 -> 2
This can cause some serious problems that is why you should fix this asap.

the serial ought to be in Date, like so: Serial #: 2008121500 which can be set in the module config of the BIND module under webmin.

Then I would check Document Options in the Apache module for that domain: Webmin-Apache Server-click the domain (Virtual Server Options) -Document Options and
Directory Indexing - Directory index files to make sure it has index.php, index.php4 and index.php5 in it.

I don’t know the sql errors. There could be other problems too like paths, permissions etc.

ronald · May 30, 2009, 8:41am

I typed the url’s manually and since im dutch too, i typed the wrong ones.
i did check of course:
www.journalistinturkije.nl
www.journalistinturkey.com
www.hollandsenieuwe.com

lex · May 30, 2009, 8:48am

when php scripts serve a blank page, often this is a corrupted file (not uploading in binary for example)

I hope you mean ascii otherwise that might be it…

When checking the 2 problem sites in IE 8,

journalistinturkije.com says:
Cannot find server or DNS Error

Internet Explorer
Hollandsenieuwe.nl stays blank.

I should have written www.hollandsenieuwe.com, so IE8 as well shows problems hey… I’ve got IE7 here, 7.0.5730.11

checking DNS says: Looks like your nameservers do not agree on the SOA serial. Ths SOA records as reported by your nameservers:

88.208.232.11 -> 1
213.171.223.34 -> 2

This can cause some serious problems that is why you should fix this asap. The serial ought to be in Date, like so: Serial #: 2008121500 which can be set in the module config of the BIND module under webmin.

Yes I’ve seen those, and have been investigating them. My problem is on the other server, which has the other nameserver pointed to it, I don’t see how I can change them yet. (They come with a ‘matrix’ control panel, something that comes with a dediated server at fasthosts.co.uk)

Then I would check Document Options in the Apache module for that domain: Webmin-Apache Server-click the domain (Virtual Server Options) -Document Options and Directory Indexing - Directory index files to make sure it has index.php, index.php4 and index.php5 in it.

I thought you had a “BINGO” there, as I had looked into this before, but in the system’s apache config file, not in webmin and when I followed your instructions, I saw the “Directory index files” field was empty.
So I copied the list into it (index.html index.htm index.php ndex.php4 index.php5) and checked for other differences compared to a default new domain/server (there were none) and hit ‘save’, followed by ‘apply changes’. But it still doesn’t show…

I’ll look more into this now, thanks for all the suggestions!

ronald · May 30, 2009, 9:10am

i did mean binary. php files should always be uploaded in binary to avoid possible corruption. You can upload in ascii and this often goes well, but you want to rule out errors. Even better would be to upload a zip and unpack it on the server. This can easily be done with webmins filemanager.

the problem of the serial is on both servers. RFC says you should have a date based number. At least the serial must be the same on both servers.

Also do check "Document Options" not only Directory Indexing through webmin to check the paths/user etc.
Do the dirs/files have correct permissions? 755/644

also verify your PHP configuration for those domains assuming each domain has its own php.ini file.
for example when Allow PHP scripts starting with <? ? is set to no and your script is starting with <? instead of <?php then there is a problem too

ronald · May 30, 2009, 9:24am

looking at the doc source…

journalistinturkey.com

<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN"> <HTML><HEAD> <META content="text/html; charset=utf-8" http-equiv=Content-Type></HEAD> <BODY></BODY></HTML>

journalistinturkije.nl

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd"> <html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" xml:lang="en" lang="en">

ronald · May 30, 2009, 9:28am

and some more clues for you

Fatal error: Call to undefined function wp_ozh_wsa() in /home/default/hollandsenieuwe.com/user/htdocs/wordpress/wp-content/themes/nautica-magazine/page.php on line 10

line 10 should hopefully reveal some mysteries

lex · May 30, 2009, 9:29am

Thanks, I’ll look into this.

When you write:

[quote]also verify your PHP configuration for those domains assuming each domain has its own php.ini file.

for example when Allow PHP scripts starting with <? ? is set to no and your script is starting with <? instead of <?php then there is a problem too quote]

I’ll check it, but if this would be somehow wrong, how then would I and (quite a lot of others) be able to see the site working well?

lex · May 30, 2009, 9:31am

hmm, that last line isn’t your quote but my text…

lex · May 30, 2009, 9:43am

Fatal error: Call to undefined function wp_ozh_wsa() in /home/default/hollandsenieuwe.com/user/htdocs/wordpress/wp-content/themes/nautica-magazine/page.php on line 10

yeah, I’d seen them and deleted them from the templates for the homepage etc. page.php is only used for wordpress “pages”, which doesn’t mean every page of the site. I’ve deleted it from there too, just to be sure, but no change yet.

lex · May 30, 2009, 9:46am

I’ve copied the journalistinturkije.nl headers into the hollandsenieuwe.com site (same theme etc.), nothing changes (yet).

ronald · May 30, 2009, 10:16am

the php config (<?) was just an example, but I would check all the settings for that domain, if your hosted domains all have their own php.ini files.
If you use a serverwide php.ini file then you don’t necessarily have to check it as other php sites are running on your server properly.

as a test you could copy the journalistinturkije.nl site to holandsenieuwe and then update/replace the paths/database to see if a working site would also work in that virtual server (since they are both wordpress).
Then you would have ruled out a server setting.

Re-uploading the files in binary would then be my first move.
Or even re-installing the wordpress and fill the database with a backup file

lex · May 30, 2009, 12:22pm

Here are the ‘document options’, are they ok like this?

http://www.hollandsenieuwe.com/temp/document-options.png

lex · May 30, 2009, 12:25pm

Ronals wrote:

as a test you could copy the journalistinturkije.nl site to holandsenieuwe and then update/replace the paths/database to see if a working site would also work in that virtual server (since they are both wordpress). Then you would have ruled out a server setting.

I’ll do so now

ronald · May 30, 2009, 3:10pm

the document options look okay to me, since you have a different path Im not sure the default path on user WWW directory and virtual server path should also be kept to default

still I think it has to do with the files and your database rather then the server settings

lex · May 31, 2009, 7:35am

Haven’t got any further yet, but just a remark:

when i do this:

webmin - apache webserver

the sites that were on the server before i installed webmin and virtualmin, some of them imported and others not, all show up twice in the list. If I change a setting of one of them, the setting of the second listing of that domain changes too. So it doesn’t seem to harm, but still…

The sites (virtual servers) that were created with virtualmin/webmin show up only once.

(is this normal?)

ronald · May 31, 2009, 7:56am

no it is not normal, but you have installed *min while websites were on the server. This is not recommended.

You could try to check the apache config and see if they are listed twice in there, if so comment out the double entries.
Else the double entries are listed somewhere in the webmin structure, which could be checked:
/etc/webmin/virtual-server/domains
the files are named with numbers so you’ll have to open them and if there are double domains you might want to try to rename the files to “124084313320568-old” or something

the latter I have no experience with and I don’t know if this would be correct to do.
You can however file a ticket at bug/support.

Oh and you are making backups of course…