Help w/New Server (Centos/Plesk)

[SMen]

I am moving my site to an unmanaged server with Centos 7 and Plesk.  I've already had the sever reloaded twice now to correct my learning curve problems.  Now, I have been googling until my eyes spin to correct the last issues.

I am only moving my dev server at present, until I feel I have good enough knowledge and control to move the production server.  Any help with the following would be greatly appreciated:

The above two errors were received attempting to update to the latest Beta edition.  The second prevented the update from continuing.  Both are related to the next image:

 

Curl is enabled.... not sure what to do.  I can find all kinds of info on how to turn ON the *compact* table type... but not prevent it??  I am guessing the ALTER TABLE error and the *row size too large* error are both related to this *compact* method?

That's it... really the two issues.... Database and PhP cURL.  There is so much info, but very specific to how, where, when, why.....  I find Plesk very limiting configuration wise, but I am sure there is likely an easy answer.

Lastly,  I have my dev server on PhP 8, while my production server is still on 7.4, due to compatibility issues.  What does PhP for IPS prefer to be run as in both 7.4 & 8?

 

Thank you!!!

 

Edited June 29, 2022 by SMen

[SMen]

1 hour ago, SMen said:

 I am guessing the ALTER TABLE error and the *row size too large* error are both related to this *compact* method?

Update.  Using this to change tables from compact to dynamic.  One issue from above solved.

SELECT CONCAT(
  'ALTER TABLE `', TABLE_SCHEMA, '`.`', TABLE_NAME, '` ',
  'ROW_FORMAT=DYNAMIC;'
) AS _alter
FROM INFORMATION_SCHEMA.TABLES
WHERE ENGINE='InnoDB' AND ROW_FORMAT <> 'DYNAMIC';

 

[Marc]

These are things you need to contact your hosting company about, rather than invision, as they are hosting issues unfortunately. Curl, as mentioned, is recommended to be updated in your case. Its not stating its not present

[SMen]

2 minutes ago, Marc Stridgen said:

These are things you need to contact your hosting company about, rather than invision, as they are hosting issues unfortunately. Curl, as mentioned, is recommended to be updated in your case. Its not stating its not present

I understand, and I appreciate that.  As mentioned above, this is an unmanaged server.  The hosting company will not offer me any support.  Plesk, however, likely will.  THEY have been very helpful.

BUT, there are also incredibly talented individuals HERE that may have gone through the same experience and are willing to share their knowledge and experience.

... And I should say that only IPS can give information for what works best for their software.  Mostly, you won't even say that... so again, I put out the options my server offers for the experienced that *might* offer valuable experience.

My site is not a candidate for IPS's hosted solutions, so I do the best I can to offer the best experience I can for my users. 

[Marc]

Sorry, Im a little confused by your statement there. If you click "Fix this" it does indeed tell you exactly what works best with our software, as you were expecting here. 

I will move your ticket to our self hosted assistance forum where others may well have the answers for you, as you mention.

[militarytexan]

What errors have you not been able to resolve on your own?

[Randy Calvert]

Regarding curl… while curl itself may be installed, PHP has a module that is needed for it to be able to use it.  Since you mentioned using Plesk, they have a KB article on how to fix that:

https://www.plesk.com/kb/support/php-application-in-plesk-cannot-use-curl-curl-is-not-available-on-your-web-server/amp/

[SMen]

Thanks.  Curl is the biggest one now and I am waiting to have a moment to open a ticket with Plesk on it.  Plesk actually caused the second server reload, so have been hesitant to go back to them.  The site doesn't seem to be suffering from the cURL issue... only that I don't like having an error listed on the support page.

Marc, "Fix this" is great!  Sometimes it fixes it, sometimes it provides valuable info, sometimes not.  No problem with that...  I was referring more towards keeping up with the optimal environment for IPS as it moves forward based upon the last image I inserted.  Lots of reasons presently for using PHP 7 vs 8... but the CGI engine vs,  FPM would break the site in the past...  Now I have options of Apache, Nginx, dedicated or not, etc...  I was hoping for insight.   Similarly when I asked what the optimal version of PhP and Maria/MySql to use...  as I could not find it through searching.  IPS response was to "use the most current".... but that wasn't exactly correct...

Not trying to be argumentative, negative, or flippant here.... just hoping for community help.  IPS isn't a one size fits all.

[CheersnGears]

Are you sure you want an unmanaged server?  I roll my own and some of the questions you're asking are fairly basic server setup related.   Respectfully, while it may cost more, rolling your own with CPanel may be more your speed because it can handle a lot of this stuff for you.

[Randy Calvert]

IPS does not officially support nginx. You would want to use the latest stable Apache. With IPB 4.7, PHP 8.0.X is recommended. You can use 7.4, but it will eventually be deprecated.  I generally recommend using PHP-FPM for better memory management but either is fine really. Regarding MySQL, I would use MySQL 5.7. 8 generally works but I’ve seen a few gotchas so I would just stick with it since it’s known to be pretty rock solid. 

You can check if your environment meets IPS requirements with the following script:

If you are not comfortable being a system admin, you might not want to use an unmanaged host. Literally you’re responsible for it. IPS is not going to support you configuring your server. If it won’t work and it’s a server issue, they’re going to tell you to talk to your host. That means in an unmanaged scenario “good luck you’re on you’re own.”  

Edited June 29, 2022 by Randy Calvert

[SMen]

2 minutes ago, CheersnGears said:

Are you sure you want an unmanaged server?  I roll my own and some of the questions you're asking are fairly basic server setup related.   Respectfully, while it may cost more, rolling your own with CPanel may be more your speed because it can handle a lot of this stuff for you.

Thanks man for the smile 🙂. Yes, I am sure.  I have relied too much on WHM/CPanel, and the costs no longer viable.  Plesk is reasonable.  By unmanaged, I am saying that the host is not monitoring/managing the server....  But in reality, even my managed servers offered little assistance.  This change came from Hostgator having my server down for three days, while continually telling me down time would only be 5 to 30 minutes.  I had enough of them too... after 14 years of paying for a server with them.

[CheersnGears]

I mean, you could still do unmanaged with WHM/Cpanel. 

I'd also not build a new server on CentOS 7.  When I did a new server back in March, step 1 was upgrading Cent7 to Alma before Cpanel went on.  

I prefer cpanel simply for the convenience.

[SMen]

6 minutes ago, Randy Calvert said:

If you are not comfortable being a system admin, you might not want to use an unmanaged host. Literally you’re responsible for it. IPS is not going to support you configuring your server. If it won’t work and it’s a server issue, they’re going to tell you to talk to your host. That means in an unmanaged scenario “good luck you’re on you’re own.”  

Excellent advice.  I am getting my sea legs back.  After moving from the bench to management many, many years ago I stopped staying on top of things as well as I had.  But I am getting back there... discovering the changes along the way, so no fear it will work out in the end.

[militarytexan]

20 minutes ago, SMen said:

Thanks.  Curl is the biggest one now and I am waiting to have a moment to open a ticket with Plesk on it.  Plesk actually caused the second server reload, so have been hesitant to go back to them.  The site doesn't seem to be suffering from the cURL issue... only that I don't like having an error listed on the support page.

One thing to keep in mind is that while you appear to have functionality at this time, it is not recommended to use outdate versions of PHP Extensions, especially when you are on the Latest Stable Version of the 8.0.x branch

Just to try and figure out the versions we are dealing with here, what is the output that you get in the shell if you use the command 

php -i | grep -i curl

Which one once of my servers outputs the following:

sysadmin@mail:~$ php -i | grep -i curl
/etc/php/8.1/cli/conf.d/20-curl.ini,
curl
cURL support => enabled
cURL Information => 7.68.0
curl.cainfo => no value => no value

Just my 2 cents here.

[Randy Calvert]

Just now, SMen said:

Excellent advice.  I am getting my sea legs back.  After moving from the bench to management many, many years ago I stopped staying on top of things as well as I had.  But I am getting back there... discovering the changes along the way, so no fear it will work out in the end.

Doing what you’re doing now is what taught me to be a sysadmin. So it’s a great way to learn. Just make sure you understand the risk and the responsibility. 

You could incur longer downtime than you might like while dealing with a trial by fire. If this is a mission critical site, it might make you take on some losses. Otherwise if you’re OK with just working on it until you figure it out, that’s great. My journey started 15 years ago and fixing broken things helped me learn a ton. It’s a great skill to have so I won’t talk bad about it. Just make sure you understand what you’re getting into. 🙂 

[SMen]

3 minutes ago, militarytexan said:

php -i | grep -i curl

Which one once of my servers outputs the following:

sysadmin@mail:~$ php -i | grep -i curl
/etc/php/8.1/cli/conf.d/20-curl.ini,
curl
cURL support => enabled
cURL Information => 7.68.0

Yes, my curl is outdated at 7.29.0, even though I have the latest PhP 7.4 and 8 installed and both version report everything up-to-date.  I have not found the proper answer to update through search (and my own current lack of experience level).  But I will ask Plesk for assistance.

 

[militarytexan]

Having multiple PHP versions can make things a bit trickier for those who have things they've forgotten.

I am taking a shot in the dark here, but usually those applications such as Plesk and cPanel/WHM essentially restrict certain packages from being updated using the package manager (YUM or DNF depending on your setup since you are using CentOS), but they all provide a way to update key packages and if need be do force-reinstalls of said packages. If a newer version if cURL PHP Extension is not available, it could be as simple as the Repository that Plesk configures has not updated yet.