In case you hadn’t noticed, the theme on here has changed…
I upgraded the blog software earlier today, and it looked like everything was working correctly… themes, plugins, polls, avatars etc.
I had just finished patting myself on the back for a job well done, and that’s when I noticed a formatting problem…
The results of the last round had decided to double space themselves? I refreshed the page and the results were good again?
Ahh… minor issue, nothing to worry about, right?
Nope! The next link I clicked on resulted in an IE error screen (something about loosing data connection)! Multiple refreshes, same result! After cursing at the computer loudly, the page suddenly appeared!
Time to check out the log files… locating the cause of the data connection losses is easy, the apache child threads are Seg Faulting (crashing)… but no indication of why?
So it’s time to do some fault finding… I begin the task of disabling various plugins and testing each combination to see if the problem goes away. Everytime I thought I had finally found the cause, it would reappear!
Time for a break… played with the kids, had some dinner, watched some TV, bathed the kids, put them to bed.
I sit down in front of the computer and it suddenly dawns on me… the theme!
Turn on the default widget enabled theme, and Voila! No more problems!
Reenabled all the other plugins, and I’m still unable to break it again!
So for now, I’m stuck with this blandish theme… I’ll go theme hunting this weekend.
However, if any of my numerous visitors 😛 experience any problems, please leave a comment.
Okay, I’m an impatient person!
There’s not too many themes available that have all of the features I want, but this one is on the shortlist.
Oh, and it doesn’t appear to crash apache either 😀
Looks good to me..!
Time for an update!
This website has still been breaking, just not as often.
Some recent googling has revealed that the problem I’ve been seeing is a little more widespread than what the WordPress gurus would like to admit.
Most solutions involve upgrading or downgrading PHP and/or MYSQL… one of the decisions I made before rebuilding this linux server was to stick to the current stable version of Debian, so the suggested solution isn’t my ideal solution.
I’ve been curious about the fact this problem only started when I upgraded to WordPress 2.1, and I think I’ve found a setting that may be the culprit.
The next step is to test my theory. I’ve changed the setting and will monitor the log files over the next week and see if it crashes!
Doh… time to toss that theory in the bin! 🙁
Back to the drawing board.
WordPress is now at 2.1.1!
I’ve got my fingers crossed, let’s see if the random crashes are gone!