When WordPress announced an automatic upgrade function to their 2.7 release, I was a tad bit excited. One of the annoyances of WordPress, and many open source applications, are the constant updates required in order to maintain the security of the installation. Having to constantly update multiple installations of WordPress is a time consuming process. The new “upgrade automatically” function would elevate these issues.
This afternoon I noticed an alert asking me to upgrade my WordPress installation. I was presented with two options. I could go down the manual route of downloading the new release, unzipping the zip, uploading the files to the server and then complete the installation by clicking on a few buttons.. Bah! I choose the second option to go automatically instead. (I’m an adventurous bastard!)
I get prompted to enter my FTP details and all the stuff.. and then it goes wrong…
I get presented with a really unhelpful error message. The above message states an issue copying admin-header.php (I also received messages about an inability to copy JS and .gif files during other attempts).
I don’t mind things not working “out of the box” first time. I don’t expect everything to simply “just work”. But when something goes wrong I like to be best equipped to solve that problem. The error message I received from WordPress is pretty useless.
“Installation Failed”
How hard could it be to prescribe possible solutions to resolve the issue? Do I need special permissions in certain folders? Do I need to set an absolute or a relative path to some directory in order to complete the upgrade? Is there an entry on the WordPress Codex providing possible solutions to the issue? (I couldn’t find anything).
What do I do next….?
Obviously I could manually complete the upgrade but that would be counter productive since I’m going to have to resolve this issue eventually if I wish to use the simpler approach of upgrading automatically.
I wonder if the number of support topics on the WordPress forum for issues relating to this upgrade could be aided by WordPress providing better error messages? That’s where I’m off to next to find out if someone else has the same issue as myself..
Couldn’t agree more – I have full access to my server and will make whatever permission changes are necessary … if I only knew what they were.
The WordPress support forums aren’t much use either, so, I’ve resorted to Google and that’s how I found your post, thanks for expressing the problem so well.
Couldn’t agree more – I have full access to my server and will make whatever permission changes are necessary … if I only knew what they were.
The WordPress support forums aren’t much use either, so, I’ve resorted to Google and that’s how I found your post, thanks for expressing the problem so well.
Hey Cormac,
No solution found then. I did have a look around the place last night after you mentioned it on Twitter, but haven’t found anything that definitely looks like it.
It sounds pretty strange. The error clearly isn’t with the overall concept of php running ftp commands, as your plugin update is working fine.
Permissions is the only thing I can think of. Out of interest, do you have ssh access to your server? Is it possible that some files are in the wrong user ownership, or group, or something.
Definitely put a bug report in if you can replicate it on a fresh install. You know, install version 2.7 in a test area, and without adding anything to the install, try out an upgrade. If the error persists than there’s something glitchy between WordPress and your particular server setup, and they could do with a bug report on this.
In the bug report you could also point out the lack of information provided and it will probably get looked at for the next version.
I’m not sure what else to suggest at the moment though.
A!
Hey Cormac,
No solution found then. I did have a look around the place last night after you mentioned it on Twitter, but haven’t found anything that definitely looks like it.
It sounds pretty strange. The error clearly isn’t with the overall concept of php running ftp commands, as your plugin update is working fine.
Permissions is the only thing I can think of. Out of interest, do you have ssh access to your server? Is it possible that some files are in the wrong user ownership, or group, or something.
Definitely put a bug report in if you can replicate it on a fresh install. You know, install version 2.7 in a test area, and without adding anything to the install, try out an upgrade. If the error persists than there’s something glitchy between WordPress and your particular server setup, and they could do with a bug report on this.
In the bug report you could also point out the lack of information provided and it will probably get looked at for the next version.
I’m not sure what else to suggest at the moment though.
A!
oops. forgot to subscribe to comments..
oops. forgot to subscribe to comments..
Had the exact same problem yesterday with our Windows based installations in work. Error message is of no use whatsoever.
Had the exact same problem yesterday with our Windows based installations in work. Error message is of no use whatsoever.
Still no official word from any of the WordPress.org team, the attitude seems to be “Oh well, I guess you can’t have this feature”.
Of course, no-one is obliged to address this problem, but it does strike me as a pity that we can’t be given some sort of hint of what is required.
Frustratingly, I’ve discovered that a Fantastico-installed WordPress, on the same server, does set the permissions correctly and automatic core updates works … but, ideally, I’d like to avoid using Fantastico; if I have to use an installer, I’d rather use the far better Installatron but, sadly, that doesn’t get the permissions right. Aaaargh!
Still no official word from any of the WordPress.org team, the attitude seems to be “Oh well, I guess you can’t have this feature”.
Of course, no-one is obliged to address this problem, but it does strike me as a pity that we can’t be given some sort of hint of what is required.
Frustratingly, I’ve discovered that a Fantastico-installed WordPress, on the same server, does set the permissions correctly and automatic core updates works … but, ideally, I’d like to avoid using Fantastico; if I have to use an installer, I’d rather use the far better Installatron but, sadly, that doesn’t get the permissions right. Aaaargh!
Nope, didn’t find a solution bar just overwriting the files via FTP.
Nope, didn’t find a solution bar just overwriting the files via FTP.
Hi, I had the same problem with version 2.7.1. However, my error message said something about a fatal error. So I just upgraded manually. And now my upload media icons have completely disappeared. I tried reinstalling 2.7.1 manually at least twice. But still no media upload icons. Does anyone know why that is?
Thanks.
Hi, I had the same problem with version 2.7.1. However, my error message said something about a fatal error. So I just upgraded manually. And now my upload media icons have completely disappeared. I tried reinstalling 2.7.1 manually at least twice. But still no media upload icons. Does anyone know why that is?
Thanks.
Try turning off your plugins.
Try turning off your plugins.
Just found this
http://tim.sodhis.net/2009/02/23/wordpress-automatic-upgrade-fails-solution/
Just found this
http://tim.sodhis.net/2009/02/23/wordpress-automatic-upgrade-fails-solution/
Thanks guys. I had a friend look into it for me. It turns out that one of my javascript files got corrupted in the upload process. He it might have happened as a result of the upload stopping mid way.
Thanks guys. I had a friend look into it for me. It turns out that one of my javascript files got corrupted in the upload process. He it might have happened as a result of the upload stopping mid way.
And this is why you can’t rely on anyone but yourself
I had the same problem, as soon as it started failing with all sorts of stupid messages (why did it fail on that particular file and not any others? Information is useful for solving problems!) I upgraded manually myself, and sure enough, it works first time every time
And this is why you can’t rely on anyone but yourself
I had the same problem, as soon as it started failing with all sorts of stupid messages (why did it fail on that particular file and not any others? Information is useful for solving problems!) I upgraded manually myself, and sure enough, it works first time every time
Alex, that’s a whole load of work! I’ll poke about with some stuff when I have a chance at the weekend.
Anthony, did you get further than I did? Any solutions pop up?
Alex, that’s a whole load of work! I’ll poke about with some stuff when I have a chance at the weekend.
Anthony, did you get further than I did? Any solutions pop up?