I know this is entirely my fault because I procrastinated for years, but my CE4 site suddenly stopped working yesterday. It was working fine the day before, and I haven’t made any changes to it in weeks. My ISP claims that nothing has changed on their end (I had specifically asked about PHP), so it’s plausible that something just changed at Turning Gate as presumably the sunset process has continued (since 2018!).
Anyway, I know I need to build a new site with Backlight (I had purchased a version for that purpose a few years back), but I’m wondering if there’s anything I can do to get it working for a week or two.
Here are the symptoms. My home page https://www.jshorephoto.com loads OK but there’s a slide show that does not display below the descriptive text (it did display the day before yesterday).
Similarly, thumbnails for the underlying galleries display correctly at http://www.jshorephoto.com/galleries/performance/ , but clicking on any of the gallery thumbnails throws an error. For example,clicking on the first gallery (The Revivalists at The Anthem) yields:
Use of undefined constant yes - assumed ‘yes’ (this will throw an Error in a future version of PHP)|#0 /services15/webpages/util/f/v/fv1lu4pjc0j1.site.aplus.net/jshorephoto.com/public/ttg-be/publisher/application/helpers/GateKeeper.php(38): ErrorHandler::handleError(2, ‘Use of undefine…’, ‘/services15/web…’, 38, Array) #1 /services15/webpages/util/f/v/fv1lu4pjc0j1.site.aplus.net/jshorephoto.com/public/ttg-be/publisher/application/helpers/GateKeeper.php(18): GateKeeper->gatherCredentials() #2 /services15/webpages/util/f/v/fv1lu4pjc0j1.site.aplus.net/jshorephoto.com/public/ttg-be/publisher/application/controllers/GalleryController.php(307): GateKeeper->__construct(Object(Album)) #3 /services15/webpages/util/f/v/fv1lu4pjc0j1.site.aplus.net/jshorephoto.com/public/ttg-be/framework/controllers/Controller.php(41): GalleryController->gallery(‘82414’, ‘index’, ‘’) #4 /services15/webpages/util/f/v/fv1lu4pjc0j1.site.aplus.net/jshorephoto.com/public/ttg-be/framework/Framework.php(124): Controller->dispatch(Array) #5 /services15/webpages/util/f/v/fv1lu4pjc0j1.site.aplus.net/jshorephoto.com/public/galleries/performance/20200229-the-revivalists-anthem/lib.php(48): Framework->route() #6 /services15/webpages/util/f/v/fv1lu4pjc0j1.site.aplus.net/jshorephoto.com/public/galleries/performance/20200229-the-revivalists-anthem/index.php(4): route(Array) #7 {main}|URL: /galleries/performance/20200229-the-revivalists-anthem/index.php
If anyone knows how I might get the site to work temporarily I’d be extremely grateful.
There is nothing that was done at TTG that would affect an existing site. CE4 sites rely only on what you upload, and not anything from a Turning Gate server.
Do you know what version of php your host is running?
If it’s a rather new version, you could try reverting to an older version.
Or, if you have access to the last version of CE4 but haven’t installed it, you could try that.
You may just need to start in with Backlight. Backlight has the ability to migrate your albums and album sets from CE4 control to Backlight control. Assuming that connection still works (what with the errors you’re running into) you could have a basic Backlight site up and running with all your albums relatively quickly. Then worry about design later.
Just to reiterate what’s been said above, your CE4 site is entirely siloed. There’s nothing we can do to kill it, or change it, or shut it down, even if we wanted to. It’s simply not possible.
So, unless you’ve been hacked, your website hasn’t changed. Not even a little bit. The only thing that could have changed is your server. And we do typically see this sort of thing happen when your host updates its server to run a newer version of PHP with which CE4 may not be compatible.
In such a case, then the appropriate meantime repair would be to access your cPanel or server config, and choose an older PHP version. The long-term solution, of course, is to migrate to Backlight, which the latest version is always maintained with the newest PHP version.
Thank you @rod_barbee, @Matthew, and Daniel (I’m only allowed to cite two members in a post) for your prompt and helpful responses. My ISP (so far) claims that there were no changes on their end, but I trust you more and will pursue as you advised.
High probability the representative you’re talking to is not the same person maintaining the servers. If you have a cPanel, you should be able to see for yourself which version is being run. For CE4, I think PHP 7 and 8 are no-fly zones, and you should be safe at a lower version.
If able to effect that change, though, you should view is as having bought yourself enough time to facilitate a change, and should not count on the site to persist as such forever.
Thanks @Matthew. I found the cPanel (thanks!), but it only lets me select 7.3 or 7.4. In my latest conversation with the ISP - while it’s a bit ambiguous - they appeared to admit that there was a PHP level change the same day my site broke. I’ve asked them to make an exception (for client of 10+ years!) and restore my account to a lower level, and right now it seems that they are considering it. Fingers crossed.
I hear you wrt buying time (and, ha, I’d literally buy it if I had to!).
When or if you need it, here are the instructions for upgrading from CE4 to Backlight. Seems to me that going back and forth with your host is eating a lot of time, so it might just be best to skip getting the existing site online again, and just start the migration. Give these a read, though, and make the best evaluation for your time.
Hi @Matthew - Thanks for taking the time to facilitate next steps. The ISP won’t allow a PHP downgrade, so that’s settled. But I’ve been coasting for years (lazy), and the site I’d build today is very different so I’m taking this opportunity to rethink wrt migration or start over. I suspect I’ll start over, and with Backlight. Regardless, the CE4 site served me well in many respects, so “hats off” and thank you for that!
Cheers. I’m glad CE4 served you well. I think you’ll find a lot of improvements to love in Backlight, though, so I’m all the more glad to hear you’ll be catching up.