Help restoring Old forum

[kevin culver]

I had a site forum.example.com and the server ungracefully died, I have a backup of the entire machine, but I couldn't restore it. I have recreated the same database by pulling from the backup specifically the entire folder under /var/lib/mysql/forum. put that on the new server, created the same exact user that was in the conf_global.php from the old forum. created a new server and installed a fresh set of invision community on it. the new site is forumS.example.com, I made sure to change the url in the license, and the url in the conf_global.php file, however when I save that. it just gives me error code 500, I assume this is due to the url changing and I am missing some place. or maybe missing a file I need to go and yank from the backup, but I would like this forum backup ASAP, please help!

[Adlago]

What PHP version are you running on the new server and is it the same PHP version as the old server?

[kevin culver]

37 minutes ago, Adlago said:

What PHP version are you running on the new server and is it the same PHP version as the old server?

Honestly not sure exactly how to check, but the new server has 8.2 and 8.1 available, whereas the old server in the /opt/plesk/php folder had 8.0 and 8.2 available. I am not sure which file to look at to figure out what the forum was running.

[teraßyte]

8.2 is not supported. Also copying the /var/lib/mysql/forum folder won't really work well. Depending on the server's configuration, the folder might be different, and it also it might no work if the MySQL version is different.

 

The best option would be to restore a SQL backup if you have one, not copying the folder.

[Adlago]

4 minutes ago, kevin culver said:

Honestly not sure exactly how to check, but the new server has 8.2 and 8.1 available, whereas the old server in the /opt/plesk/php folder had 8.0 and 8.2 available. I am not sure which file to look at to figure out what the forum was running.

Provided that PHP 8.2 is not yet officially supported by IPS, you were most likely running 8.0 on your old server.
Check with your hosting company to enable PHP 8.0 for your account.

[kevin culver]

2 minutes ago, Adlago said:

Provided that PHP 8.2 is not yet officially supported by IPS, you were most likely running 8.0 on your old server.
Check with your hosting company to enable PHP 8.0 for your account.

ok I have installed and activated curl 8.0.30 and activated it on the site. it is still giving me an error code of 500. I know it is connecting to my db correctly at least, because I was getting an error of username earlier, got those corrected and now it is just error code 500.

[Adlago]

10 minutes ago, kevin culver said:

ok I have installed and activated curl 8.0.30 and activated it on the site. it is still giving me an error code of 500. I know it is connecting to my db correctly at least, because I was getting an error of username earlier, got those corrected and now it is just error code 500.

You write that you have installed a fresh set of invision community on it.

Don't have a backup of your files from the old server?

[Adlago]

PS. Try this:
1. Create an empty database with the name of your backup database.
2. Run a fresh install to an empty database.
If everything works correctly after installation, download a backup from this new database. Compare names of new database and your backup database. If necessary, rename the old backup database with the name of this new database
Upload old database to new database.
It might work.

[kevin culver]

1 hour ago, Adlago said:

PS. Try this:
1. Create an empty database with the name of your backup database.
2. Run a fresh install to an empty database.
If everything works correctly after installation, download a backup from this new database. Compare names of new database and your backup database. If necessary, rename the old backup database with the name of this new database
Upload old database to new database.
It might work.

that didn't work, something with the old db I guess.

[rnorth6920]

Do you have a control panel or are you adding the LAMP directly to the server?

If possible, export the database:

mysqldump -u MYSQLUSER -p MYSQLDATABASE > /db_backup.sql

then import it on the new server:

mysql -u MYSQLUSER -p MYSQLDATABASE < /db_backup.sql

[Gary]

Hi @kevin culver,

Have you run the Requirements Checker on the server yet? It will assist in diagnosing any common issues as a first step.

Some other things to check for after doing a search of this community for the same issue:

• Confirm you are using PHP 8.1 or PHP 8.0 (as mentioned already, PHP 8.2 is not supported yet)
• Ensure your MySQL connection details are correct in `conf_global.php` (including any prefixes such as `ipb` or `ipb_`)

Sometimes it's the simplest of things causing an issue.

[Marc Stridgen]

On 5/26/2024 at 9:41 PM, kevin culver said:

ok I have installed and activated curl 8.0.30 and activated it on the site. it is still giving me an error code of 500. I know it is connecting to my db correctly at least, because I was getting an error of username earlier, got those corrected and now it is just error code 500.

In addition to checking the above mentioned by Gary, please check your server error log. 500 is an internal server error which should be being logged in your server error logs.