Ongoing backkup problem…

[William BallParticipant]

I purchased a premium package about a year ago and up to this point there have been no problems. However I have been fighting with the backup not completing on one of my sites. Backing up the database seems to work always. Backing up the rest of the site almost always times out with log errors referring to permissions. (it has supposedly succeeded once in the last month) To my knowledge I had changed nothing when this problem started. I will admit right up front that I am a WordPress neophyte so this could be something overly simple I’m just missing or not aware of. I have placed a copy of the latest failed backup log on a GOOGLE drive share at this link. https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/13vwzojUiyFQyuJTvc54bA_eUC7alMJYO?usp=sharing
Any help would be much appreciated,
Bill

[William BallParticipant]

This reply has been marked as moderator-only.

[Bryle CroduaModerator]

Hi,

The log shows:
“0020.122 (0) The attempt to close the zip file returned an error (Unknown: ZipArchive does not return error messages). List of files we were trying to add follows (check their permissions).”

UpdraftPlus uses the following functions:

fpassthru
dl
exec
proc_open
proc_close
curl_multi_exec

If these are disabled, the backups may be affected.

Please could you ask your host/server admin to enable proc_open function. Then run a new backup and send me the log.

And also could you try to reduce the backup archive split size. This will split the backup into smaller, more manageable files.

To do this, open the ‘expert settings’ section of the UpdraftPlus Settings tab, and find the ‘split backups every’ option. Set this to 25Mb save your settings and run a new process.

If the issue persists, please ask your hosts/server admin to investigate their PHP error logs. These logs should contain more information on the exact issue that is causing the backup process to halt.

Regards,
Bryle

[William BallParticipant]

As an update to this ongoing issue, I have copied below the two communications I’ve had with Yahoo Small Business Support. As you can see I explained and copied the information you (Updraft) provided and only received an email saying the issue was “resolved”. It was not resolved, backups still fail and I’ve posted the lasted log in the Google share listed in my first post. At this point I am again waiting for a response from them but wanted to make sure you guys know that I am still trying to get help from someone. I wish I could through Updraft and Yahoo support together in a room and lock the door until this if fixed instead of being the middle man.
Any help would be appreciated,
Bill Ball (southernthunderhog.com) admin and Updraft customer

>>>>> Support messages with Yahoo support <<<<<<

Southern Thunder Hog•Jul 13, 2020
I have been working with Updraft support over continuing failure of my backups. The support post link with Updraft is … https://updraftplus.com/forums/topic/ongoing-backkup-problem/#post-604617
They are saying the certain PHP functions are required and ask that the Yahoo server admins enable “proc_open”. Following that, I attempt another backup and send them the resulting log. If you are interested I have shared log files on a Google share at…. https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/13vwzojUiyFQyuJTvc54bA_eUC7alMJYO?usp=sharing
I have uninstalled/reinstalled the Updraft plugin with no better results. Backups continue to fail. This after successful backups for over a year.
Any help with this is very much appreciated.
Bill Ball (admin)
Southernthunderhog.com

Southern Thunder Hog•Jul 17, 2020
I received an email Monday the 13th where it says, and I quote “The situation you described has been resolved, and both these tools and account access are now working correctly. We apologize for any inconvenience this problem may have caused for you.”. Yesterday I re-ran the backup which failed just as before. The email declaring the situation I described as “resolved” didn’t say anything about what if anything had been done to fix the problem. The Updraft support message quoted below asks specifically if “proc_open” were enabled as well as in their post, linked in my previous message they asked about availability of several other functions. The response I received declaring the situation resolved mentioned nothing about those functions. I need backups to run correctly and as the customer of two companies, I feel like I’m stuck in the middle.
Bill Ball (SouthernThunderHOG.com) admin
Southern Thunder Hog

[Bryle CroduaModerator]

Hi William,

UpdraftPlus could not run if those functions are disabled on the server.
Do you have any other host where you can try UpraftPlus?

Regards,
Bryle

[William BallParticipant]

To: Bryle (Updraft)
To: Saheb (Yahoo Small Business

Bryle, to answer a previous question….I have my second seat of Updraft installed on another website NOT supported by Yahoo and it works fine. Up until a couple of months ago Updraft ran fine on the site that lives on Yahoo! I will past Yahoo supports most recent reply at the bottom of this post. Next, I am copying the exact same note to both support sites……

Updraft and Yahoo support, in the last response I received from Yahoo the implication is that Yahoo servers DO NOT support the “PROC_OPEN” and possibly other functions needed by Updraft.
Firstly, Updraft has ran fine for over a year only failing about 2 months ago. Did something change?
Secondly, Updraft DOES NOT fail if I select to only backup the database do not choose “Include your files in the backup (…)” (doesn’t this seem like a clue?)
Third, I don’t think I can be made to believe that NOT ONE OTHER PERSON using Yahoo services is using Updraft. So, what is different about my account?
Fourth, (directed at the Yahoo suggestion that I get a consultant…) I am a volunteer working for a NON-Profit organization… we CANNOT afford a consultant.

I AM GETTING EXTREMELY FRUSTRATED TRYING WITH THE RESPONSES HERE. BOTH SUPPORT GROUPS ARE POINTING AT EACH OTHER WITH ME IN THE MIDDLE!
I need more help than I’m getting from either of you.
What steps can I try? (Step by step)
What checks can I do? (Step by step)
What can I verify that would give us a direction to look? (Step by step)

Regards,
William Ball (southernthunderhog.com) admin

>>>>>>> Yahoo support’s most recent response. <<<<<<<
We are sorry to hear that you are facing trouble taking the backup of the Website “southernthunderhog.com”. We truly apologize for the inconvenience and delay that has caused.
We understand your concern and will certainly provide you with needed assistance.

We reviewed the account and website and figured out that you have a Web Hosting Plan with us. We also had a look on your Web hosting Control panel. However, we are really sorry to state that we don’t provide support for .ini files and the file “proc_open”.

In other words, The name .htaccess refers to the main configuration file for Apache, a popular server, as well as WordPress. The php.ini file is the default configuration file for running applications that require PHP. It is used to control variables such as upload sizes, file timeouts, and resource limits.

Yahoo Small Business Web Hosting is a shared web hosting service, which means that a number of customers’ websites are hosted from the same server. Due to our shared web hosting service, you will not be able to edit, upload, or use your own php.ini or .htaccess files.

Because Yahoo Small Business does not support editing the files, you won’t be able to enable the functions below.

The PHP community has identified certain PHP configurations and directives whose misuse can result in insecure code. To help protect all of our customers, the following options are disabled for all accounts:

register_globals
allow_url_fopen and its corollary, allow_url_include
file_get_contents

We would suggest you to have a consultation for the same.
To understand the given scenario more efficiently, please access the Help Article with the below mentioned link.

https://help.smallbusiness.yahoo.net/s/article/SLN20684

We hope that shared information would be helpful in resolving your concern. Please let us know in case you need further assistance with the mentioned procedure. We will be more than happy to assist you further.

Your understanding is appreciated in this regards.

Regards

Saheb
Yahoo Small Business

[Bryle CroduaModerator]

Hi Saheb,

I will ask my colleague on this and on what we can do.

Regards,
Bryle

[Dee NutbourneModerator]

Hi Saheb,

Apologies for the inconvenience.

Due to the PHP functions which are disabled, UpdraftPlus is unable to create the backup files using its preferred method.
As such, it has to switch to an alternative method.

The backups are now failing as the time taken to detect that something is wrong with the initial method plus the time to use the alternative method is causing the backups to be timed out repeatedly.

Please could you add the following to your wp-config.php file (just below the database credentials):

define(UPDRAFTPLUS_PREFERPCLZIP, true);

This will ensure that UpdraftPlus switches to the working method from the start.
I would also recommend keeping the smaller split size, as this method is less efficient overall.

Best Wishes,
Dee

[William BallParticipant]

Dee,
Firstly, I am your Updraft customer William Ball not Saheb. Saheb is the Yahoo customer service rep that sent the last communication from Yahoo Small Business support. His name was in my last post because I sent both groups the same message in an attempt to get everyone on the same page.
OK, from your previous suggestion I checked the wp-config.php file. Someone, I’m assuming from Yahoo support had already placed a version of that variable definition into the wp-config.php file. However, that line was much further down in the file below the “define(‘WP_DEBUG’, false);” line. In addition, the syntax that person used was different than you gave above. The line they inserted was define(‘UPDRAFTPLUS_PREFERPCLZIP’, true); notice the hyphens. So what I did was to remove the hyphens leaving the line located after the WP_DEBUG line. I tried a backup that again failed. I then moved the UPDRAFTPLUS definition to just below the /**#@+
* Authentication Unique Keys and Salts……. /**#@-*/ section and again ran a manual backup. This time the manual backup succeeded. I have since successfully created 2 additional manual backups and a 2 that failed but, all (4) attempts to run scheduled backups still fail. I have placed the log from the latest failed scheduled backup in the Google share here…. https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/13vwzojUiyFQyuJTvc54bA_eUC7alMJYO?usp=sharing
So, bottom line, I can now unreliably create manual backups but still have no success with scheduled backups. Anything else you can suggest? Why in the world has Updraaft ran reliably for a year and now all of a sudden things fell apart? Are you being approached by other Yahoo customers with the same problems? If not why not? I’m sure I can’t be the only Yahoo customer running Updraft.
Thank you so much for finally helping me make at least some headway.
Bill

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