Blank white screen, Problems with forum software.

[rockedge]

I had to disable two extensions today to allow the site to work correctly. Today for unknown reasons the forum crashed and generated internal server error 500 and eventually after some stressful hours and trying a multitude of possible fixes eventually I manually deleted the contents of a cache which restored the site's functionality. I also disabled the two extensions: board announcements and collapse/expand the forum sections for now because they suddenly did not operate correctly and seemed to have polluted this particular important cache.

Forgot about the first rule with these complex web site code.......clear the caches first and usually this is the fix when faced with the a blank white browser screen.

Tried to consult the pros at the web host but they are server admins and don't have a clue about phpBB so more of a waste of time but did lead my thought process to the "delete the TWIG cache and test again" idea.

I took the time to upgrade the forum's software version to the very latest just released today.

[mikewalsh]

Heh. I DID wonder what was going-on; at exactly the same time, one of my other watering-holes, Linux.org, went down with a CloudFlare server error warning. Well, ya know what they say, don'tcha?

"It never rains but it pours...."

Lololol!!

Thanks for keeping things going, mate. I know we all appreciate the tireless hard work you put into all this; at least you're "active" & "hands-on". In JM's day, something like this would have put the site off the map for several weeks at a time until his Nibs paid one of his rare visits to see what was happening.

Can't complain. We've always had a forum of some sort, so.....at least the community has been able to exist and grow.

Mike.

[RSH]

Right now, after reading this topic, I went back to the overview of newest posts.
First there were at least ten entries.
Now ther'es only one.
I did not read all the other entries.

[rockedge]

@RSH the sessions in the cache keep track of the time for you to see the newest posts. I cleared the cache that has this information but you can see what you have not read by selecting unread posts instead of new posts

As we go on the new post list will repopulate.

[rockedge]

Enabled the collapsiblecategories extension again after examining the interaction on the latest updated version of the forum software. Seems to be working.