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WordPress Site Live, Backend Inaccessible

by dialseo
26 replies
Hi Warriors,

I put together a site: abrahamlincolnbiography.org

The WordPress installation is at abrahamlincolnbiography.org/media/wp-admin in the media subfolder. My htaccess reflects the subfolder, as does the index.php file from WordPress placed in root. I don't think the issue is to do with the subfolder as I've setup dozens that way before.

Anyway, a week ago I got a 404 error, 'Nothing found for...' going to the administration. Before this point I had no problems getting to wp-admin.

I've also tried removing plugins and reinstalling WordPress to no avail.

Any ideas?
#backend #inaccessible #live #site #wordpress
  • Profile picture of the author Tradeout
    Have you tried accessing without the media/
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    • Profile picture of the author Eric Seiler
      That's a tough one. If it isn't the .htaccess file, I'm not sure what else would cause a 404 error, aside from the files just not being there.
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      • Profile picture of the author Earnie Boyd
        Originally Posted by Eric Seiler View Post

        That's a tough one. If it isn't the .htaccess file, I'm not sure what else would cause a 404 error, aside from the files just not being there.
        Could be browser cache, could be hacked, could be read permissions on the folder, could be ...

        Hard to diagnose without more information. Do you have access to the web error logs? Do they help point to the issue? Check the permissions on the folder, is it readable by the httpd process user?
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        • Profile picture of the author Eric Seiler
          Originally Posted by Earnie Boyd View Post

          Could be browser cache, could be hacked, could be read permissions on the folder, could be ...

          Hard to diagnose without more information. Do you have access to the web error logs? Do they help point to the issue? Check the permissions on the folder, is it readable by the httpd process user?
          • Browser cache - Considering that I visited the site only after seeing this thread, no.
          • Could be hacked - Well sure, but that seems like a stretch. If someone hacks a website they tend to change/deface something obvious or drop in something that is hard to find. This doesn't fit either characteristic. No need to cause an alarm unnecessarily.
          • Could be read permissions on the folder - No, in that case it wouldn't give a 404 error but another error code.

          My attempt was to confirm the most usual suspect, the .htaccess file, not send him on a wild goose chase. It is true that without access, it is hard if not impossible to diagnose however.
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  • Profile picture of the author dialseo
    Excellent advice guys, thanks so much.

    I like to keep my WordPress installations in a subfolder like I mentioned, this time being /media/wp-admin. At setup things were smooth sailing for weeks and I could get in no problem. Attempting to go to .org/wp-admin would not help in this case.

    I agree with Eric in that if it was hacked, it's likely to be defaced or at least have AdSense codes swapped, neither being the case.

    I'll check permissions and triple check the htaccess. Are there any other possibilites that would both prevent wp-admin access AND return a 500 internal server error with Google Webmaster tools?
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    • Profile picture of the author Eric Seiler
      This is something of a stretch, but some security plugins make alterations to files outside of their plugin folder, which aren't removed when they are deactivated. "500 internal server error" is an even more nebulous error code than 404, so that is something you'd really need to look at your server logs on as there should be a better description there.

      I don't want you to tell me what (if any) such plugins you have, as that would be a security risk in itself, but you could contact the plugin developer or see if they have any help resources.

      The last and most drastic step (and I totally don't recommend this if all other options have been explored), is deleting and uploading a fresh install of WordPress (at least partially), and in this case starting with the wp-admin then the wp-includes folder. If you have a corrupt file or permission set incorrectly this will remedy the problems on those specific folders. Since customizations are stored outside of these folders, it should keep any of your themes/plugins intact. Again, though...I don't recommended this unless you are willing to risk some downtime on the website.
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      • Profile picture of the author wizzard74
        Originally Posted by Eric Seiler View Post

        This is something of a stretch, but some security plugins make alterations to files outside of their plugin folder, which aren't removed when they are deactivated. "500 internal server error" is an even more nebulous error code than 404, so that is something you'd really need to look at your server logs on as there should be a better description there.

        I don't want you to tell me what (if any) such plugins you have, as that would be a security risk in itself, but you could contact the plugin developer or see if they have any help resources.

        The last and most drastic step (and I totally don't recommend this if all other options have been explored), is deleting and uploading a fresh install of WordPress (at least partially), and in this case starting with the wp-admin then the wp-includes folder. If you have a corrupt file or permission set incorrectly this will remedy the problems on those specific folders. Since customizations are stored outside of these folders, it should keep any of your themes/plugins intact. Again, though...I don't recommended this unless you are willing to risk some downtime on the website.
        In this case, he can't update his site because he cannot get into wp-admin, so what does a couple of hours of downtime really matter in the long run?

        Backup the database through your control panel and re-install wordpress, then restore the backup.
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        • Profile picture of the author Eric Seiler
          Originally Posted by wizzard74 View Post

          In this case, he can't update his site because he cannot get into wp-admin, so what does a couple of hours of downtime really matter in the long run?
          His site's frontend is still functional, which means it could be still generating revenue. Taking down a live website for an indeterminate amount of time can be pretty destructive to your search rankings and profitability (I mean, if this site is doing well in either, which I don't know). It should take more than a few hours for Google to ding your site for being offline, true, but fixes that are made without determining the cause are often only temporary. It is better to find the real problem and fix that than having to do this again.
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          • Profile picture of the author wizzard74
            Originally Posted by Eric Seiler View Post

            His frontend is still functional, which means it could be still generating revenue. Taking down a live website for an indeterminate amount of time can be pretty destructive to your search rankings and profitability (I mean, if this site is doing well in either, which I don't know). It should take more than a few hours for Google to ding your site for being offline, true, but fixes that are made without determining the cause are often only temporary. It is best to find the real problem and fix that than having to do this again.
            So what if the front end is still functional? He clearly wants to go into the admin panel on the site to do some work.

            You could spend hours trying to narrow down the cause. Better to bite the bullet, take a short term hit on the finances and re-install the site.

            If there are 500 errors then the course of action is to do a clean re-install.

            Put it this way, I'd rather back everything up and do a clean re-install than spending hours trying to troubleshoot where the issues lies.
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            • Profile picture of the author Eric Seiler
              Originally Posted by wizzard74 View Post

              So what if the front end is still functional? He clearly wants to go into the admin panel on the site to do some work.
              If he's comfortable with that, so am I, but I hesitate to make that recommendation without caveats.

              It still might not 'fix' the problem however (for example, if the options table data of the WordPress DB is screwed up). Then you really are talking about blowing everything up and starting from scratch.
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  • Profile picture of the author SteveJohnson
    OP, did you get this sorted out?

    You definitely have a plugin that is misbehaving - the rotating image widget. I doubt that it is the root cause of your problem, but stranger things have happened.

    Don't dump your site and start over, don't do anything drastic just yet.

    Do you have access to the database thru an admin interface (phpMyAdmin, etc.)?
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  • Profile picture of the author SteveJohnson
    P.S. If all else fails, you can simply remove the index file from the root dir, delete the htaccess file, and put the correct URLs in the wp-config.php file as constants. That would at least get you up and running, at least enough so you can determine what happened.
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  • Profile picture of the author dialseo
    Thanks for everyone's help!

    I definitely want to minimize downtime, and have tried fresh WordPress installs with the databased backed up. I'm going to try moving to a new host tonight and minimize plugins.

    Once I have a chance to try that I'll report back.
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  • Profile picture of the author thefundu
    The traffic might get affected while moving to a new host as the ip address of the site will change. You can try one more step before doing this. Disable all the plugins and check the access of site. You might have installed some plugin which encrypts the password and that can also be the cause of prob!!!
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    • Profile picture of the author Stuart Macfarlane
      You can actually do an almost seamless transfer to a different IP address.
      This is what I do all the time for clients:

      1) Change their DNS TTL record to be around 2-5mins.
      2) Wait 24-48hours for the DNS to be re-cached world-wide.
      3) Change the DNS to the new IP.

      Using the above 3 simple steps you can transfer your website to a different IP and have approx 2-5mins downtime world-wide!

      Some ISP's ignore TTL but the majority do use it and thus it's an easy way to pre-plan a website move with minimal if any downtime
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      • Profile picture of the author dialseo
        On abrahamlincolnbiography.org I've tried disabling all, then each individual plugin to no avail. Since the mention earlier of the problem with a image slider plugin, it has been removed too. I still cannot access /media, but have not tried moving hosts yet.

        Any other ideas in the mean time are appreciated!

        Originally Posted by Stuart Macfarlane View Post

        You can actually do an almost seamless transfer to a different IP address.
        This is what I do all the time for clients...
        That is an excellent idea! I'll be doing this in the future. Thanks for the idea!
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        • Profile picture of the author Stuart Macfarlane
          Originally Posted by dialseo View Post

          On abrahamlincolnbiography.org I've tried disabling all, then each individual plugin to no avail. Since the mention earlier of the problem with a image slider plugin, it has been removed too. I still cannot access /media, but have not tried moving hosts yet.

          Any other ideas in the mean time are appreciated!



          That is an excellent idea! I'll be doing this in the future. Thanks for the idea!
          You should have access to an error_log through your webhost. This will log most errors that are generated when you visit /media/.

          Paste the contents of that file and I'll look further into this for you.
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          • Profile picture of the author dialseo
            Originally Posted by Stuart Macfarlane View Post

            You should have access to an error_log through your webhost. This will log most errors that are generated when you visit /media/.

            Paste the contents of that file and I'll look further into this for you.
            Code:
            [06-Mar-2012 20:19:43] PHP Warning:  require(/home/abrahaml/public_html/media/wp-includes/load.php) [<a href='function.require'>function.require</a>]: failed to open stream: No such file or directory in /home/abrahaml/public_html/media/wp-settings.php on line 21
[06-Mar-2012 20:19:43] PHP Fatal error:  require() [<a href='function.require'>function.require</a>]: Failed opening required '/home/abrahaml/public_html/media/wp-includes/load.php' (include_path='.:/usr/lib/php:/usr/local/lib/php') in /home/abrahaml/public_html/media/wp-settings.php on line 21
[06-Mar-2012 20:20:44] PHP Warning:  require(/home/abrahaml/public_html/media/wp-includes/load.php) [<a href='function.require'>function.require</a>]: failed to open stream: No such file or directory in /home/abrahaml/public_html/media/wp-settings.php on line 21
[06-Mar-2012 20:20:44] PHP Fatal error:  require() [<a href='function.require'>function.require</a>]: Failed opening required '/home/abrahaml/public_html/media/wp-includes/load.php' (include_path='.:/usr/lib/php:/usr/local/lib/php') in /home/abrahaml/public_html/media/wp-settings.php on line 21
[06-Mar-2012 20:21:41] PHP Warning:  require(/home/abrahaml/public_html/media/wp-includes/load.php) [<a href='function.require'>function.require</a>]: failed to open stream: No such file or directory in /home/abrahaml/public_html/media/wp-settings.php on line 21
[06-Mar-2012 20:21:41] PHP Fatal error:  require() [<a href='function.require'>function.require</a>]: Failed opening required '/home/abrahaml/public_html/media/wp-includes/load.php' (include_path='.:/usr/lib/php:/usr/local/lib/php') in /home/abrahaml/public_html/media/wp-settings.php on line 21
[06-Mar-2012 20:21:41] PHP Warning:  require(/home/abrahaml/public_html/media/wp-includes/load.php) [<a href='function.require'>function.require</a>]: failed to open stream: No such file or directory in /home/abrahaml/public_html/media/wp-settings.php on line 21
[06-Mar-2012 20:21:41] PHP Fatal error:  require() [<a href='function.require'>function.require</a>]: Failed opening required '/home/abrahaml/public_html/media/wp-includes/load.php' (include_path='.:/usr/lib/php:/usr/local/lib/php') in /home/abrahaml/public_html/media/wp-settings.php on line 21
[06-Mar-2012 20:21:45] PHP Warning:  require(/home/abrahaml/public_html/media/wp-includes/load.php) [<a href='function.require'>function.require</a>]: failed to open stream: No such file or directory in /home/abrahaml/public_html/media/wp-settings.php on line 21
[06-Mar-2012 20:21:45] PHP Fatal error:  require() [<a href='function.require'>function.require</a>]: Failed opening required '/home/abrahaml/public_html/media/wp-includes/load.php' (include_path='.:/usr/lib/php:/usr/local/lib/php') in /home/abrahaml/public_html/media/wp-settings.php on line 21
            I browsed the wp-settings file. Here's line 21-24:
            Code:
            // Include files required for initialization.
require( ABSPATH . WPINC . '/load.php' );
require( ABSPATH . WPINC . '/default-constants.php' );
require( ABSPATH . WPINC . '/version.php' );
            Thank you so much for your time and assistance!
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  • Profile picture of the author WF99
    above which solution solve your problem ? i mean which one worked for you ?
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  • Profile picture of the author SteveJohnson
    You've said that you have 'reinstalled' WordPress a time or two - but have you actually deleted the files on the server before uploading the new ones? Occasionally you'll encounter errors overwriting files instead of deleting them first.

    The error log is telling you that a necessary WP file is missing, so you'll need to get it loaded up to your server.

    Here is what *I* recommend you do:
    #1 - on your server, delete the folders wp-admin and wp-includes. Then delete all of the wp-related php files in the site root except wp-config.php. You should be left with the wp-content folder and the wp-config.php file.

    #2 - download the latest and greatest WordPress. You can get the latest release version at http://wordpress.org/latest.zip

    #3 - unzip the files to your computer

    #4 - upload all but the new wp-content folder to your server.

    #5 - try getting into your dashboard again and post back here.
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  • Profile picture of the author dialseo
    I followed Steve's steps above. Now I'm getting a site-wide Internal Server error. I tried resetting the .htaccess and accessing the media folder to no avail.

    Any suggestions?
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  • Profile picture of the author SteveJohnson
    don't 'reset' the .htaccess. Delete it completely. In your media/ folder, you should have ONLY wp-content folder, and wp-config.php file.

    You should have been doing all of this IN the media folder.

    PM me if you want, this is an easy thing to fix.
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    The 2nd Amendment, 1789 - The Original Homeland Security.

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  • Profile picture of the author dialseo
    I moved hosts and am up again. The previous hosting company finally got back to me and apparently someone had gotten into my site remotely and planted malware.

    Thank you guys for your help!
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    • Profile picture of the author Earnie Boyd
      Originally Posted by dialseo View Post

      I moved hosts and am up again. The previous hosting company finally got back to me and apparently someone had gotten into my site remotely and planted malware.

      Thank you guys for your help!
      Make sure you've changed your passwords and if you have users they should change theirs as well.
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      Earnie Boyd
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      • Profile picture of the author WF99
        Originally Posted by dialseo View Post

        I moved hosts and am up again. The previous hosting company finally got back to me and apparently someone had gotten into my site remotely and planted malware.

        Thank you guys for your help!
        Originally Posted by Earnie Boyd View Post

        Make sure you've changed your passwords and if you have users they should change theirs as well.

        Congrts at last it solved .. and next time you should be aware in some cases ..
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  • Profile picture of the author JoshDylan
    Tip of advice- from my years working in the hosting industry, I have noticed that Wordpress is extremely vulnerable to malware and other sorts of hacks due to one key issue, the site web masters don't update the wordpress installation when new releases are out.

    Every time there is a new release, its for a reason, either new features or a security fix, that is all. So try to keep up on these things and im positive this wont happen again.
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