Internal Server Error

[ghing]

I am experiencing an Internal Server Error for the past few days here in Bloggeries...Sometimes while browsing the forum..

I also notice that there are times that the forum slows down...

Is there anyone of you who is experiencing the same?

[Michigal]

Haven't seen an internal server error, but the site does hang at times when trying to click a forum link or post.

Maybe Bloggeries is getting too big and popular?

[ghing]

ahh.. maybe you are right Sue...

this past few days I am seeing lots of new sign-ups and also lots of spammers...

[rjleaman]

I'll bet that Sue is right!

This isn't about Bloggeries slowdown, but it is about Internal Server Errors:

Last night I was getting Internal Server Error on DomestikGoddess.com, my self-hosted Wordpress blog. So I thought I'd leave a note about it here, in case this might be of use to someone else experiencing the same problem on their blog...

I'd been going through and tagging a lot of posts that were written before WP enabled tagging, and I guess I was working too fast -- and didn't realize that the system would be trying to send out a ping whenever I made a new tag. So, it seems that the whole shebang got confused, starting going in a loop and not able to complete the do_ping cron job. That meant it kept trying over and over, several times a minute. All that activity meant it started bumping up the blog's demands on the server (Hostgator shared account - there's a limit of 25 processes, as I understand it, but in the normal run of things I shouldn't ever hit it). Hence the error messages.

But I didn't know all that at first.
All I knew was that my blog was messing up, big time!

So I checked my cPanel error log, and determined what files were causing the problem (index.php and wp-cron.php were showing up repeatedly in the error list, and it said "Premature end of script headers" every time). But of course there was no way to know what script was causing the problem. So I installed the WP-Crontrol plugin on my blog, and it showed me what processes were running and what the status was - and that's how I figured out it was the do_ping that was causing the problem (there were a couple of them, actually, not completed). When I deleted those, everything went back to normal almost immediately.

From sheer panic to happy dance in under an hour!
So, hopefully this information about my experience will help someone else in the same position...

[Michigal]

My question is, why isn't something like WP-Crontrol built into WordPress????

I wonder how many times these out of control cron jobs have caused people to be suspended? And how much easier it would be to fix things without having to install a plugin for it?

Just a rant here, glad you got your errors fixed. Excellent detective work, rjleaman. I wouldn't have thought to investigate it (of course I didn't know about WP-Crontrol until you mentioned it). So good find, also.

[Bloggeries]

I've been getting it all day here. Not sure what it is as I'm assuming the traffic here is quite light for a dedicated server.

Sent in a request we'll see what's up.

[mystikmedia]

Two things you need to think about... First thing, and very important...install a caching plugin for WP. The other is to consider upgrading the RAM on your server. I went through this very same just recently with one of my servers. Good luck!

[Bloggeries]

Originally Posted by mystikmedia

Two things you need to think about... First thing, and very important...install a caching plugin for WP. The other is to consider upgrading the RAM on your server. I went through this very same just recently with one of my servers. Good luck!

I am strongly considering the RAM. Not to sound ignorant but you mention caching plugin for WP... This runs vB and one of the gents on the support at one point did mention installing something along the lines of helping the system cache better. Whenever I see WP I assume wordpress so I'm slightly confused.

[mystikmedia]

Sorry about that. I did say WP, but meant to say vB. It's the same principle, though, in either case.

[Bloggeries]

Originally Posted by mystikmedia

Sorry about that. I did say WP, but meant to say vB. It's the same principle, though, in either case.

Thank you Sir. Time to talk to the hosting company soon and Loco.M.

Nothing is more depressing than getting a big surge and not being able to meet demand.