You cannot download or install new packages ...

[Nerd3D]

Ah, now the light comes on. All the files seem to be owned by "admin12" I seems it would be simple to chown them to whatever PHP is running as ... so how do I figure out what user PHP is running under?

[metallica48423]

you'd have to ask your host   Every configuration tends to be different

At least we have progress

[redone]

Yes we did exchange some pm's on this. It appears the user can upload mods via ftp and then they will install.

Does not appear to be an SMF issue from what I have seen thus far.

Generally speaking when you can upload mods and then they install it tends to point toward the server more than the install itself.

[Nerd3D]

Nope. I can't install mods at all. I'm doing things the old fashioned way. Modify the files on my local system then FTP them to the server. The mystery is why Redone could not log on to the FTP using the same creds that all my site moderators and I use.

[redone]

Nope. I can't install mods at all. I'm doing things the old fashioned way. Modify the files on my local system then FTP them to the server. The mystery is why Redone could not log on to the FTP using the same creds that all my site moderators and I use.

It's a mystery to me too. I could connect using the first FTP user you gave me but as I mentioned via PM that user did not have full FTP user access to your site (I could indeed connect using this user).

Your root user for me at least does not work. I have said to you via pm you can contact Blackmage and offer him the same info you gave to me and maybe he will have better luck than I.

[Sarge]

When you logon to FTP with your account and go to your forum directory, the FTP program should tell you the local path of the forum. What is it?

Open phpMyAdmin, select your forum database and browse the smf_settings table. What is the value for the package_path field?

Both are "/var/www/html/yabbse/"

Remove the trailing slash. If it doesn't work, try setting package_path to nothing (empty). If still no joy, try yabbse (no slashes before or after); if it still gives you grief, try html/yabbse, www/html/yabbse and var/www/html/yabbse.

[Sarge]

Any news on this?

[Nerd3D]

Code Select Expand

The package you are trying to download or install is either corrupt or not compatible with this version of SMF.
or

Code Select Expand

You cannot download or install new packages because the Packages directory or one of the files in it are not writable!

Tried about 10 variations of the path. No joy. If I do modify the path the FTP change the permissions thing can't find the install. (Path not found) so I think the path is correct.

[Sarge]

Upload repair_settings.php, click on every "Recommended" blue link in the Paths & URLs section and click on the Save button.

The fact that this problem occurs mostly with installs on /var/www/username/ is quite interesting... What are the operating system name and version on the server?

[Fiery]

Did you get repair_settings to fix it for you?

[Nerd3D]

I ran the repair settings I compared all the paths. The only difference was the Avatar path. What the heck It's broke any way. I let it do whatever it wanted. I did mess up a couple of setting (Default theme got changed no biggie)

Now I can install packages. I can't download them direct to the board. It always throws "... corrupt or incompatible ... " but if I FTP it into the Package folder it will actually install. At lease it did with the two avatar packs I tried. Haven't got brave enough to let loose a real mod yet.

I went over the setting several times I can't figure out what was changed. Save the avatar folder every thing looks exactly the same.

[Sarge]

Let us know if you can install mods. Also make sure that the Packages directory is also chmodded to 777.

[Nerd3D]

Nope, I spoke too soon Still not fixed, just broken differently now ...


Fatal error: main(): Failed opening required '/home/virtual/site12/fst/var/www/html/yabbse/Sources/ArcadeInstall.php' (include_path='.:/php/includes:/usr/share/php') in /home/virtual/site12/fst/var/www/html/yabbse/Packages/temp/package_install.php on line 25

[Sarge]

OK, send me temporary FTP and SMF Admin info and I will look into this.

[Nerd3D]

Oh and still getting the not writable error. It can't create the temp folder.

and yes, It's 777. I changed the whole fricken site to 777.

It's weird an "extract tree" works, creating a directory. Then another mod fails because it can't create the temp folder. How can one mod be allowed to create folders and another isn't.

[Sarge]

It sounds like a PHP bug. Link to your phpinfo.php?
What is a phpinfo() file?

Also, what operating system is installed on the server?

[Nerd3D]

Sent creds via PM

[Sarge]

The files you have uploaded via FTP are owned by your user, whereas files created by the webserver (including PHP) are owned by apache (the webserver's username in your server).

So I used fix_ownership.php (attached here) to fix, well, ownership issues. After I ran it, all files were owned by your user.

Package Manager needs all files that are going to be modified to be writable by PHP. Therefore, you need to chmod those files to 777 -- they're 644 by default.

I created the temp dir and chmodded it 777. Then I uploaded the No Temp Directory Removal mod. Since this mod modifies (only) Sources/Packages.php, I chmodded this file to 777 before installing the mod.

The temp directory is created and deleted by Package Manager every time a mod is installed. The mod makes the temp directory permanent, which helps with mod installations.

All you have to do is chmod all files in your forum to 777 via FTP, which uses your own account. You can chmod files and directories to 777 recursively (in your forum directory and all its contents, including subdirectories) by using a FTP client program like FileZilla 3.0 or SmartFTP, which offer this ability.

You cannot do that from SMF Admin > Packages > Options tab > Cleanup Permissions section, because PHP (under which SMF and Package Manager run) doesn't own your forum files (except those ending in ~, which are created by Apache/PHP) and therefore PHP cannot change their permissions. When PHP cannot change permissions, it cannot make files writable and write to them.

In Linux-based systems, only root and the owner can change permissions for a file or directory.

[Nerd3D]

Thank you for looking at this. The last time I tried chowning every thing to the user name it worked for 1 day. The next day the whole board was 403. I think it has something to do with the wonky Ensim version of Linux.

Thank you again, keeping my fingers crossed that Ensim doesn't freak out.

[Sarge]

I'm marking this topic as solved. If you experience the same issue, post here again.