Sniff. Sniff. Cautiously peeking out of the CogDogBlog that seems to be back in working operation after a broken period. The on switch is on, as if anyone noticed.
It was an extended period of seeing the trusty old blog respond with “Error Establishing Database Connection.” I started to write out all the steps I went through, but it was even boring me. The short version starts the incredibly human and thorough support of Chris at Reclaim Hosting
- I shedded old unsupported plugins
- My old database had issues of language sets / collation (?terminology) that came up as errors, and also I know was a long running into MAJOR problems in that commenters who used emojis saw them rendered as “??” My research on fixing made me dizzy at the prospect. Chris went in command line and fixed that old issue.
- I had not optimized my database in eons, in fact I had to learn the magic link to find PHPMyAdmin in Reclaim Cloud (find the ****.reclaim.cloud url for your site and apppend :8443 to it) (I did learn this other way to optimize/repair database directly in WP)
- Finally I found PHP errors that with some help from Mr Google (!) indicated I was getting hit by SQL Injections attempts, I think through the RESTAPI trying to send URLs that would trigger commands to reveal admin user details. It looked like they were crashing the database.
- I set up WordFence to firewall these, but they kept happening.
- Then the Home Simpson Doh! Moment where Chris noted I was a few decimals behind in WordPress upgrades. BING! It stopped
I can’t thank Chris and Reclaim Hosting enough, if you hang your web sites anywhere else, I pity you. I am counting on Reclaim to go far beyond another 13 years because I have a lot of posts to come.
And which has been slow. I see a bunch of fellow blog heads (Jim, Tim, Sarah) have kept up a daily Blaugust pace, and I am moved by how long that has gone on (never heard it til this year, but the internet is big), but I slothed off. Maybe I will pick it up my Blogtober, or just get the blog in motion again.
This thing is on, and seems to be staying on. It’s safe to charge out of that blog hole. The only thing that every alleviates the block is to blast something out.
Go!
Featured Image: Dog Snoop found on PikPik labeled as royalty free, but my research questions this. Oh well, attribution chasing is so much work, I’d rather be blogging.
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I was just thinking I’d not heard any barking lately. Glad to hear it again!
Now excuse me while I go check all my WP versions.
Alan, there are errors on my blog too, but I know the fix – I need to post more to my blog! What I appreciate most about this post are two things. One, you outline some steps to take to check all the possible causes of the dreaded 500. Two, you sing the praises of the Reclaim Hosting crew. Which in my opinion can never get enough praise. Cheers to all!!!