Site suddenly appearing garbled much of the time

GanstaZ · Post by **GanstaZ** » Sun Sep 25, 2022 11:15 pm

IainPurdie wrote: ↑Sun Sep 25, 2022 11:09 pm 3) uploaded and decompressed the phpBB zip file

Is safer to to extract files locally & then upload to server. + It may be caused by the program (ftp or file manager) you used for uploading.

IainPurdie · Post by **IainPurdie** » Sun Sep 25, 2022 11:30 pm

GanstaZ wrote: ↑Sun Sep 25, 2022 11:15 pm
IainPurdie wrote: ↑Sun Sep 25, 2022 11:09 pm 3) uploaded and decompressed the phpBB zip file
Is safer to to extract files locally & then upload to server. + It may be caused by the program (ftp or file manager) you used for uploading.

I genuinely don't believe this can be an issue (upload a ZIP file and decompress it in situ and, if it's been corrupted, an error will be generated), but regardless I have just decompressed the file on my PC and uploaded via command line FTP, overwriting the contents of the new folder.

Surprise (or not) - the issue remains. Opening up a dozen PHP files randomly on the server (and downloading a couple to check locally) shows no obvious corruption either.

Again, it's the "hit and miss" corruption of the published pages that baffles me. I could understand a permanent error or corruption, but why is it eventually working after multiple refreshes?

Post by **thecoalman** » Sun Sep 25, 2022 11:33 pm

GanstaZ wrote: ↑Sat Sep 24, 2022 3:25 pm 1 click installs that are offered by hosts, can not be supported as code may differ from original files (from phpBB site) + we do not know how the install/update process is done by that tool.

Pease do not state what support is or is not offered here. While volunteer phpBB staff or community members may decline to offer support by not responding you can usually get answers to questions with these installs.

Post by **thecoalman** » Sun Sep 25, 2022 11:40 pm

IainPurdie wrote: ↑Fri Sep 23, 2022 4:14 pm I have attached a screenshot of the "garbage" output.

I can't tell you what is causing it but I'm about 99.9% sure that is encoding issue. These can be difficult to track because there is multiple sources for corruption. Since you have gone through the effort of installing test forum it would suggest it's you server. The only other possibility I could think of is FTP transfer is borked, make sure you using binary for all files.

Quick question. The test forum before importing database had same issue?

IainPurdie · Post by **IainPurdie** » Sun Sep 25, 2022 11:47 pm

thecoalman wrote: ↑Sun Sep 25, 2022 11:40 pm Quick question. The test forum before importing database had same issue?

I have not imported any data into the test forum! That was actually going to be my next step, but the issue arose before I got that far. So I'm getting this garbled output from a completely fresh installation of pbpBB.

IainPurdie · Post by **IainPurdie** » Sun Sep 25, 2022 11:49 pm

thecoalman wrote: ↑Sun Sep 25, 2022 11:40 pm The only other possibility I could think of is FTP transfer is borked, make sure you using binary for all files.

And I can confirm that when I did the FTP transfer, I set "bin" before I "put", yes.

Post by **thecoalman** » Mon Sep 26, 2022 12:00 am

IainPurdie wrote: ↑Sat Sep 24, 2022 3:05 pm Surely if this was the case then the 3 websites also hosted on there would have a similar issue?

These are different acconts? Upload test forum to there.

IainPurdie · Post by **IainPurdie** » Mon Sep 26, 2022 12:04 am

thecoalman wrote: ↑Mon Sep 26, 2022 12:00 am These are different acconts? Upload test forum to there.

No, one account but with three domains hosted in the same webspace. They are WordPress installations.

The phpBB is on the same server / webspace, but separate from those.

IainPurdie · Post by **IainPurdie** » Mon Sep 26, 2022 8:19 am

Host has replied and said they reckon the problem is with Cloud Flare. If they access the site directly it works every time, go via CloudFlare and the issue returns.

Argh, will need to look into how to configure this as the BB is on a subdomain so not sure how to exclude it from CloudFlare. Still that original issue, though - I changed absolutely nothing on CloudFlare so why did the problem appear? The point thing I ever do on CloudFlare is clear the cache now and again. I've left the configuration very much well alone. Unless they've activated a "feature". Gah.

Post by **Mick** » Mon Sep 26, 2022 8:44 am

I wonder, did you install Cloudflare or did your host? If it was them I’d be on their case about it, otherwise you might find their support handy.

IainPurdie · Post by **IainPurdie** » Mon Sep 26, 2022 8:52 am

Mick wrote: ↑Mon Sep 26, 2022 8:44 am I wonder, did you install Cloudflare or did your host?

I installed it. I'll have a look later on when I can get to the computer, but I looked at their support and they say just to set a subsomain to DNS Only to avoid caching etc. Thing is, I'm pretty sure my subdomains are already set as DNS Only! Can't be sure to I look later though.

IainPurdie · Post by **IainPurdie** » Mon Sep 26, 2022 12:08 pm

Fingers crossed that seems to be it sorted. I changed the new subdomain (test installation) and the original to "DNS Only" on CloudFlare and both now seem to be working absolutely fine.

Still a mystery as to why this issue arose. Again, I'm the only one with access to CloudFlare settings and I 100% didn't make any DNS changes prior to the issue starting. I got it all working a year ago and deliberately didn't touch it afterwards in case I broke anything. I can only assume there's been some change in CloudFlare's features which have caused a problem. We don't need caching or anything, it's a small BB for crew use only, so performance was never an issue.

Still, worth posting this here in case anyone else has the same issue.

Post by **thecoalman** » Mon Sep 26, 2022 4:44 pm

By default Cloudflare only caches common type files that would be cached by browser anyway based on extension alone. .css, .jpg, .js etc. What is or is not cached is completely configurable. You can also enable development mode which will bypass any caching.

They will also compress files, go into the Cloudflare dashboard and you can disable compression. Perhaps they are incorrectly recompressing files or your server is not sending the correct header.

Something to clarify about Cloudflare, you don't "install" it. They operate one of the world's largest private networks. Think of it more along the lines as front end for your server. If you added this through the hosts control panel I'd suggest getting an account with Cloudflare and managing it directly through Cloudlfare panel instead. It is completely separate service from your host, the only involvement by the host is listing Cloudflare nameservers if you using your host for DNS.

IainPurdie · Post by **IainPurdie** » Mon Sep 26, 2022 5:13 pm

thecoalman wrote: ↑Mon Sep 26, 2022 4:44 pm Something to clarify about Cloudflare, you don't "install" it.

I'm aware of that, I was just using the phrasing of the poster I was responding to. I suspect they've "installed" it via some control panel from their host.

My CloudFlare is a separate account, the standard one that you mention at the end of your post. I could look through the options for compression and so on... but I think I'll just leave it. The phpBB is useful, simple, and low traffic so there's no real need for anything like that. What's important is that it works, which it does now