Internal Server 500 error

[remmo]

Hello All,

After having Actinic run flawlessly for the last several years I guess it was my turn for a bit of trouble.

I haven't changed anything but all of a sudden am getting 500 Internal Server Errors when I click on any of the cgi links in my site www.thehoneyfarm.com.au.

Now I've checked my cgi folder on the server has the following permission drwxr-xr-x. However the contents of this folder have this: -rwxr-xr-x.

Should these not be the same... or is there something else going on?

[Duncan Rounding]

These are the permissions you will need:
http://community.actinic.com/showthread.php?t=45173

Perhaps your host has updated your server and the permissions have been reset.

[remmo]

Hi Duncan,

Thanks for the reply. Both my permissions look like the ones listed on the page you linked to except that they both have a letter d in front of them.

Also do the pm files inside the cgi-folder have to have the exact same permissions as the folder?

The cgi folder has the permission drwxr-xr-x

Whilst the contents of the folder are -rwxr-xr-x

Do I need to drop the D in the folder permission?

[Duncan Rounding]

The 'd' just denotes a directory so it looks correct if that corresponds to the numeric permissions shown in the KB. The contents should be set by Actinic.

Try a purge and refresh and see if that helps.

Some nitty gritty here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File_system_permissions

[remmo]

Hi Duncan,

So it looks like my permissions are correct. I have done a web refresh, purge... you name it. I even went into the root folder on my server and deleted all the files. However I'm still having these cgi issues. All the pages seem to load up to the site however the cgi links are not working... any more ideas?

[Duncan Rounding]

Try running a network test in Actinic and see what errors are reported.

It looks likely your host has changed something though.

[remmo]

Thanks Duncan,

When I run Web|Network Settings|Test I get the following error message:

Actinic received a server error from the web server. The CGI scripts are not executing properly on the server. The error could be caused by several things. Check:
- the 'Path to the Perl shell'
- the 'CGI script extension'
- the 'Path to CGI-BIN'
- the 'CGI-BIN URL.
- the amount of web space left on your server
- if your server is configured to accept POSTs to CGI scripts
- the permissions on the server:

On Linux/Unix based servers the permissions should be:
cgi-bin (755) – drwxr-xr-x
Online Store Folder (777) – drwxrwxrwx
On Windows based servers (need to be checked with the hosting company):
IIS
cgi-bin = read/execute
Online Store Folder = read/write/execute
NTFS
cgi-bin = Catalog's FTP account needs 'Change' permissions on the directory
Online Store Folder = Catalog's FTP account needs 'Change' permissions on the directory AND the IUSR_<servername> account needs to have 'Change' permissions on the directory

Run Web | Configure Web Site Details... to review your web site configuration.

I haven't changed any settings so possibly it may be that my host has changed something for me to start getting these errors.

I have even loaded a 2 week old version of the site (my back up) and get the same error message.

My Network Settings are:

HTTPPROXYMODE 0
HTTPPROXYADDRESS
HTTPPROXYPORT 80
HTTPPROXYUSER
HTTPPROXYPASSWORD
FTPPROXYMODE 0
FTPPROXYADDRESS
FTPPROXYPORT 21
FTPPROXYUSER
FTPPROXYPASSWORD
SCRIPTID 1
SCRIPTEXT .pl
SMTPHOST localhost
WEBSITEURL http://www.thehoneyfarm.com.au
IGNOREPASSIVEERRORS true
USERELATIVECGIURLS false
PATHTOPERL /usr/bin/perl
USEENHANCEFTP true
FTPCLIENTTIMEOUT 15000
FTPRETRYDELAY 3000
FTPSILENT false
FTPMAXRETRIES 3
FTPCONNECTTIMEOUT 25000
SMTPAUTHREQUIRED false
SMTPUSERNAME **
SMTPPASSWORD **
SSLCATALOGURL https://www.thehoneyfarm.com.au/acatalog/
SSLCGIBINURL https://www.thehoneyfarm.com.au/cgi-bin/
SSLPATHFROMCGITOCATALOG ../acatalog/
SSLCODEBASE ./
SSLFTPHOST ftp.thehoneyfarm.com.au
SSLFTPUSERNAME **
SSLFTPPASSWORD **
SSLPATHTOCGIBIN cgi-bin/
SSLUSEPASSIVEFTP false
CATALOGURL http://www.thehoneyfarm.com.au/acatalog/
ONLINESTOREFOLDERNAME acatalog
CGIBINURL http://www.thehoneyfarm.com.au/cgi-bin/
PATHFROMCGITOCATALOG ../acatalog/
CODEBASE ./
FTPHOST ftp.thehoneyfarm.com.au
FTPUSERNAME **
FTPPASSWORD **
PATHTOCGIBIN cgi-bin/
USEPASSIVEFTP false
FTPPATHFROMCGITOCATALOG

[leehack]

Remove your passwords Remmo.

[Mike Hughes]

Remmo,

It sounds to me like your host has changed something. You really need to be talking to them to fix it.

Mike

[remmo]

Hi Mike,

Am in the process of talking to my host... problem is even though they have 24 hour support the administrators who need to look at this only work business hours... I guess my site will remain down for another 24 hours.

Out of interest - as there are no Actinic focussed hosts here in Australia are there any real down sides of having the site hosted in the UK - given our main market is Australia and we have a .com.au domain?

[leehack]

Speed of connection and SEO are the 2 big issues Remmo. I've seen some UK sites hosted on dirt cheap US servers and they run like absolute dogs. They are usually because of a false economy decision, not an operational one like yours might need to be. Have a word with Kevin @ Kombu Wholefoods, see what he does, you guys from Oz need to group together and share advice and info IMO, things over that way are pretty thin on the ground and i think it'd help you all.

[Mike Hughes]

I agree with Lee, a local server is always going to be much faster than one on the other side of the world. Large companies use geo-local caching to keep their sites fast worldwide but this is expensive so not practical for most of us.

There's definitely something strange going on as your email capture FormMail script looks as if it is running OK. This suggest that it's not all perl scripts that have the problem.

Mike

[remmo]

Hi Mike,

I've seen that the contact form appears to submit the query, however I don't receive any emails that are sent via the form

[Mike Hughes]

Hmm. It must be running though as there's no error 500 page and it does the redirect to the thanks page.

There's definitely something strange going on. It doesn't sound familiar to me and there's little than can be done without knowing if the hosts have been changing stuff or looking in the error logs.

Mike

[remmo]

st Odd...

Since I won't get to speak to my webhosts until the morning I thought I would try to do a Web|Cofigure Website Details with the confirm each setting box checked.

It all works fine until I reach the Mail Server screen when I get the following error message:

An error occurred while sending an http request to the web server. Perhaps your network is down or the web server is down. Try again or contact your network administrator or ISP to correct the situation.

Is there any way that I can check that I have not some how "broken" my software... I am running 9.0.2 after all... Does Actinic have a temporary place for me to upload to?