Attempted to load extension, entire forum has crashed.

darrendriven

The issue

I have a need for a topic with a two-character title, but I received an error saying that there was a minimum of three characters required. I searched the Flarum forum and came across a 'Title Length' extension topic. I went into my Extension Mgr and in the box to add a new extension I typed this: "datlechin/flarum-title-length"

Something happened, then a red error box popped up with a generic error message (I forgot exactly how it was worded). It referred me to the error log location at least. 🙂 After that happened, I get a 500 error that my forum isn't working.

ERROR LOG

Flarum information

I just installed Flarum a few days ago and it's been AWESOME! It's basically unmodified except for adding the /FoF/upload extension. I can't post any info because the forum is currently broken.

luceos

darrendriven what php version do you have? And can you try updating composer on your server using composer selfupdate then run composer install from the Flarum root.

darrendriven

I'm running PHP 8.2 (anything less and I got a Flarum error saying that 8.2 was required).

I have only every used FTP to install forums before (phpbb, smf) and I'm really scratching my head when Composer command line stuff keeps getting mentioned. I'm trying to figure it out, but even the download page from the official Composer site assumes that I know how/where to enter commands at the command line and doesn't explain it. Could I get a little help?

I DLed PuTTy, managed to SSH into my host and have navigated to my /forum subdir.
I typed "composer selfupdate" and I got an error message:

[Composer\Downloader\FilesystemException]
  Filesystem exception:
  Composer update failed: "/usr/local/bin/composer1.phar" could not be written.
  rename(/usr/local/bin/composer1.phar): Failed to open stream: Read-only file system

I typed "composer install" anyway to see what would happen. Results:

You are using Composer 1 which is deprecated. You should upgrade to Composer 2, see https://blog.packagist.com/deprecating-composer-1-support/
Loading composer repositories with package information
Installing dependencies (including require-dev) from lock file
Your requirements could not be resolved to an installable set of packages.

  Problem 1
    - Installation request for symfony/css-selector v7.0.3 -> satisfiable by symfony/css-selector[v7.0.3].
    - symfony/css-selector v7.0.3 requires php >=8.2 -> your PHP version (8.1.27) does not satisfy that requirement.
  Problem 2
    - tijsverkoyen/css-to-inline-styles v2.2.7 requires symfony/css-selector ^2.7 || ^3.0 || ^4.0 || ^5.0 || ^6.0 || ^7.0 -> satisfiable by symfony/css-selector[v7.0.3].
    - tijsverkoyen/css-to-inline-styles v2.2.7 requires symfony/css-selector ^2.7 || ^3.0 || ^4.0 || ^5.0 || ^6.0 || ^7.0 -> satisfiable by symfony/css-selector[v7.0.3].
    - symfony/css-selector v7.0.3 requires php >=8.2 -> your PHP version (8.1.27) does not satisfy that requirement.
    - Installation request for tijsverkoyen/css-to-inline-styles v2.2.7 -> satisfiable by tijsverkoyen/css-to-inline-styles[v2.2.7].

luceos

darrendriven I typed "composer selfupdate" and I got an error message:

Can you try running sudo composer selfupdate, if this is on a shared hosting provider, they will have to run this command on your behalf.

darrendriven I typed "composer install" anyway to see what would happen. Results:

Try running composer update --prefer-dist --no-dev -a -W. Sorry it's a lot of flag, but this should update the dependencies to match your php version 8.1. The errors you received were because composer installed extensions/dependencies for another php version and warns you the php version has changed since then (8.2 to 8.1).

darrendriven

I tried running sudo but got the error: -bash: sudo: command not found

I asked my host tech support to run it for me and the canned AI response was that I would need to upgrade my hosting account to a VPS so I can have root access. I opened a support ticket to ask a human to attempt the sudo command for me. I'll find out tomorrow.

I tried "composer update --prefer-dist --no-dev -a -W" and got this error:

[Symfony\Component\Console\Exception\RuntimeException]
  The "-W" option does not exist.

I am not sure why my PHP version was set to 8.1. Hostinger tech support was trying some things and I think they may have made that change without my knowledge. I changed it back to 8.2 and tried to run "composer selfupdate" again with this result:

  Filesystem exception:
  Composer update failed: "/usr/local/bin/composer1.phar" could not be written.
  rename(/usr/local/bin/composer1.phar): Failed to open stream: Read-only file system

Should I just uninstall the forum and start over from the beginning? I've spent more time troubleshooting and trying to fix it than I have playing with the forum itself. I'm a little worried that it might crash again in the future once I have users and content though.

darrendriven

My host tech support has responded to my request to have them run "sudo composer selfupdate" and this is what they had to say:

Could you let me know if you want to use composer 2?
If that's the case, instead of using a command such as composer require (just an example), 
can you please try to add the number "2" in front of the word composer, in order to use 
composer version 2.0 instead?
For example, composer2 require, instead of composer require.
Please let me know how it goes.

...then since I was asleep for the night, they closed the support ticket so I can't even respond. It doesn't appear that they even attempted to run the command. (sigh) I'm going to delete the entire forum and reinstall it from scratch. I'm VERY worried that in the future it will just glitch and crash again and I'll be back at square one, but there's only one way to know for sure.

clarkwinkelmann

darrendriven you definitely want to use Composer 2+, it's much more performant

darrendriven

clarkwinkelmann I'm five minutes into uninstalling everything and reinstalling. I appreciate your help!

I realize that between waiting for your advice and the lag time for my host's response, I could be working on this fix for days. In less than one hour I can have a fresh install ready to go.

I would really like to understand what went wrong in the first place, though. I still don't know if I did something wrong, if the forum code was glitchy or if there's an anomaly with my host that caused the issue.

luceos

darrendriven the key here, according to the instructions from your host, is that you need to run all composer command instructions with composer2 instead of just composer. That should fix it.

You should let them know that keeping two versions really doesn't do any good. In fact, it's is apparent that version 1 doesn't even work on newer php version. I doubt they will listen, but they will get more complaints about this anyway with more sites running php 8+.

darrendriven

luceos I think it's moot. The real problem here is that I used Flarum's extension manager to install an extension and everything fell apart. I'm assuming that it was some error with the extension. I am not going to attempt that extension again.

I'm very hesitant to add any new extensions in the future unless I've performed a total backup of everything, so that's what I'll do.