White screen after admin login

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edmarch
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White screen after admin login

Post by edmarch » Tue Feb 18, 2014 12:08 pm

I apologise if the solution to this problem has been provided elsewhere, but I've spent days trying various solutions, but none have worked.

My problem is: my joomla 1.5 website was hosted by a friend for free, he then stopped doing that and transferred it to godaddy for me. The front end of the website runs fine (as before) but when I try to log into the back end, it just gives a white screen after I enter the username and password.

I've tried loads of different methods to get an error message instead of a white screen but I still get nothing.

I can't get hold of my friend so I'm now trying to learn how to fix it myself, but have spent 3 days getting very frustrated. If I could get an error message I'd know where to look.

I've edited htacess and configuration.php in lots of different ways based on other forum posts but still nothing :(

Any help is greatly appreciated, I'm running out of ideas.

Thanks

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pe7er
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Re: White screen after admin login

Post by pe7er » Tue Feb 18, 2014 12:16 pm

Welcome to Joomla forum!

A complete blank page is an indication of a PHP error while PHP error reporting is switched off.
You can add the following code to .htaccess to override the server settings and show any PHP errors:

Code: Select all

php_flag display_errors on
php_value error_reporting -1
Kind Regards,
Peter Martin, Global Moderator
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The best website: https://the-best-website.com

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Re: White screen after admin login

Post by edmarch » Tue Feb 18, 2014 12:25 pm

I've inserted that like this

Code: Select all

########## End - Joomla! core SEF Section

php_flag display_errors on
php_value error_reporting -1

SetEnv DEFAULT_PHP_VERSION 5

DirectoryIndex index.cgi index.php
And now the front end now gives a 500 internal server error with "Apache Server at http://www.c90adventures.co.uk Port 80" at the bottom.

I've checked the error logs (there's 4) and there's quite a few entries, what should I be looking for?

*EDIT*
just checked the logs and when I refreshed 6 times with the 500 error and got this 6 times in the error log

Code: Select all

[Tue Feb 18 05:31:45 2014] [11775676] [core:alert] [client 2.24.211.43:2805] /var/chroot/home/content/76/11775676/html/.htaccess: Invalid command 'php_flag', perhaps misspelled or defined by a module not included in the server configuration

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cavo789
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Re: White screen after admin login

Post by cavo789 » Tue Feb 18, 2014 12:42 pm

php_flag is not supported by your hoster.

In your case, use this
<IfModule mod_php5.c>
php_flag display_errors on
</IfModule>

This will remove the error 500 since php_flag will be ignored.
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Re: White screen after admin login

Post by edmarch » Tue Feb 18, 2014 2:50 pm

I've inserted it like this in .htaccess:

Code: Select all

# RewriteBase /

<IfModule mod_php5.c>
php_flag display_errors on
</IfModule>

########## Begin - Joomla! core SEF Section
#
And have refreshed the "http://www.c90adventures.co.uk/administrator/index.php" screen 10 times but there is nothing showing in the 4 error logs (where all the errors in my first reply appeared).

It's just showing the white screen. Front end is working again now. Oh and I deleted the code first suggested. I'm running PHP 5.2 and have tried 5.3 and 5.4 but no change.

any suggestions are very welcome

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dpacadmin
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Re: White screen after admin login

Post by dpacadmin » Wed Feb 19, 2014 2:28 am

Try enabling error reporting in your site's configuration.php file, instructions here;
http://forum.joomla.org/viewtopic.php?f ... p#p2303205

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Re: White screen after admin login

Post by edmarch » Wed Feb 19, 2014 3:22 pm

When I insert it in configuration.php like this:

Code: Select all

var $MetaKeys = 'joomla, Joomla,';
	var $offline_message = 'Sorry for the delay, I'm working to get the website online 23/10/11';
    var $debug = '1';
}
?>
It turns every page (front and backend) white. Nothing appears in the server logs either. When I change
var $error_reporting = '-1'
to
var $error_reporting = '6143'
it make no difference to either the original setup or the white screen setup with debug enabled. Nothing appears in the error logs either.
I've tried IE, chrome and FF.

I'm getting rather confused and I'm supposed to be transfering hosting in the next few days :eek:

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Re: White screen after admin login

Post by dpacadmin » Wed Feb 19, 2014 6:39 pm

Have you tried deleting your browser's temp Internet files and any cookies for your domain? You could also try truncating the session table in your database, be sure to back it up first.

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Re: White screen after admin login

Post by edmarch » Wed Feb 19, 2014 7:01 pm

I've deleted the temporary internet files in all three browsers and tried incgonito mode too.

I'm not sure how to truncate the session table. I logged into myphp and selected every table in my site (from jos_banner down to jos_weblinks) and then clicked repair. (I also tried optimise a few days ago too). Is that the same thing?

Thanks

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Re: White screen after admin login

Post by dpacadmin » Wed Feb 19, 2014 10:46 pm

In phpMyAdmin select your site's database, then click on the SQL tab. Now enter this query;

Code: Select all

truncate jos_session
(replace jos_session with the name of your session table if the prefix is different) and hit Go. That will empty the table and if the problem is a bad session will fix your login.

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Re: White screen after admin login

Post by blastreach » Tue May 13, 2014 9:20 pm

Alright...I was having the same problem and for three days have been pulling my own hair out trying all the fixes. Here's what I finally deduced and it worked for me.

I would login, and get a white screen. But if I checked the page source there was data there, open/close head tags, and an open body tag, but no data after a couple lines down. Also, the database was truly showing me logging in and there were no errors in my error logs.

I was running the Rocket Them "Mission Control Admin Template" and a thought came to me. Maybe there is something wrong with my admin template.

So, I logged into phpMyAdmin clicked on:
prefix_template_styles
Clicked on my current template table "rt_missioncontrol"
Changed "Home" field from "1" to "0" > Saved (ensuring client_id was "1")
Clicked on "bluestork"
Changed "Home" field from "0" to "1" > Saved (ensuring client_id was "1")

Went back to my www.domain.com/administrator and logged right into my site!

In essence I believe the table for that template had corrupted somehow.

BACKUP BACKUP BACKUP guys!

I hope this was helpful to someone else.

Sean


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