Admin Options not available after upgrade to 1.3

PeteHelgren · Post by **PeteHelgren** » Tue Mar 25, 2008 12:22 am

This is similar to the post from March 10th but in this case I don't see any errors in the Apache logs indicating a problem. After logging in as admin, any option I take returns me to the login screen. The site is up and functional, I just cannot access any administrative functions.

This is hosted on one of our in house servers. Again, no errors but no access to admin functions either.

Suggestions? Upgrade was from 1.03

Post by **Don Chambers** » Tue Mar 25, 2008 1:50 am

The post I think you are referring to suggested that the user had to upload several times before s/he finally got a clean upload of all files.

Have you tried uploading again?

PeteHelgren · Post by **PeteHelgren** » Tue Mar 25, 2008 1:57 am

I uploaded again but I still had no change. I'll see if there is a magical "upload three times" option and perhaps it will work.

The last time I ran the update it indicated that it needed to update the database again, which failed, because the prior update had already updated the database.

I'll post again after I try uploading multiple times. BTW I am not using FTP, just a mapped network drive and unzipping it across the network (FWIW)

Post by **Don Chambers** » Tue Mar 25, 2008 2:06 am

Pete.... you can trick the entire update process into repeating itself.....

Edit the file serendipity_config_local.inc.php.... You should see something like this:

Code: Select all

	$serendipity['versionInstalled']  = '1.3';

Simply change that version to 1.2 and serendipity will presume you need to upgrade again. If you need add'l help, and want someone from the outside to help, shoot me a PM and I will see what I can do. I ain't the best, but I often manage to find a way to get the job done!!!

PeteHelgren · Post by **PeteHelgren** » Tue Mar 25, 2008 2:42 am

Thanks. Going back to the other post it looked like there were three different posts to the same problem. The OP and a second poster never responded but the drcole poster did and looked like it was the "three upload trick" that got him going.

I bounced the server just in case something was cached somewhere. I am going to delete all the logs and start fresh and see what I end up with.

Thanks for the pointer on the serendipity_config_local.inc.php file. I have been copying that over to the uploaded 1.3 installation so that would explain why the update triggers the database update (the old one was at 1.03) . Must be only looking at the version in that file rather than querying the tables to see if the updates have been run.

In my case, I have not been restoring the files in the database, I have just been re-running the update script and ignoring the DB errors.

I am uploading a third time right now and then I need to update .htaccess and serendipity_config_local.inc.php and I'll let you know how it goes.

Post by **Don Chambers** » Tue Mar 25, 2008 2:47 am

Keep me posted Pete - more than happy to do what I can to get you there, provided it is within my abilities to do so!!!

PeteHelgren · Post by **PeteHelgren** » Tue Mar 25, 2008 3:40 am

No joy on the multiple upload approach. Still get signed of as soon as I choose any admin options. Nothing in the PHP log and only two entries in the apache log:
10.0.10.2 - - [24/Mar/2008:20:09:52 -0600] "POST /petesblog/serendipity/serendipity_admin.php HTTP/1.1" 200 11369 "http://www.petesworkshop.com/petesblog/ ... _admin.php" "Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.8.1.12) Gecko/20080201 Firefox/2.0.0.12"
10.0.10.2 - - [24/Mar/2008:20:09:59 -0600] "GET /petesblog/serendipity/serendipity_admin.php?serendipity[adminModule]=configuration HTTP/1.1" 200 4228 "http://www.petesworkshop.com/petesblog/ ... _admin.php" "Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.8.1.12) Gecko/20080201 Firefox/2.0.0.12"

So I am stumped. I didn't get a good backup of the database but I may try backing up the database again then doing a "clean" install. Wipe the folder, install Serendipity from scratch. It doesn't make sense. No errors but unable to take any of the admin options after signing in.

PeteHelgren · Post by **PeteHelgren** » Tue Mar 25, 2008 4:12 am

I decided to try a few things and this is what I came up with:

1. Saved the new serendipity_admin.php and then restored the old one
This worked!

2. Restored the new file and commented out the new section on /* Check author token to insure session not hijacked */
This worked

So all I can assume is that there is some problem with the code here:

if (!isset($_SESSION['author_token']) || !isset($serendipity['COOKIE']['author_token']) ||
($_SESSION['author_token'] !== $serendipity['COOKIE']['author_token'])) {
$_SESSION['serendipityAuthedUser'] = false;
serendipity_session_destroy();

When the code is commend out I can run the options. When not commented out, it fails. Cookies are enabled so I don't know what the issue would be but I am up and running again.

Perhaps someone more familiar with the code can point me to a more permanent fix.

Post by **garvinhicking** » Tue Mar 25, 2008 9:27 am

Hi!

Please delete your cookies in your browser, restart the browser and try again.

This was necessary for people who upgraded from 1.0 to 1.1 - I believe it is also mentioned in the Ugrade FAQ pointers, that purging your cookies after an upgrade is recommendable...

HTH,
Garvin

PeteHelgren · Post by **PeteHelgren** » Tue Mar 25, 2008 4:44 pm

Thanks. I had read that in the installation instructions but something general like "delete your cookies" is not something I generally follow because of the negative impact that deleting all cookies could have on the functioning of other web apps.

Might I suggest that in the installation instructions is say something like:

You may want to delete the cookie specifically for your blog site that is found in your browser. Failing to do so might cause the following problems:

1. No access to admin options after logging in.
2. .........

Specific instructions are more likely to be followed than just "Delete all cookies".

Thanks again.

Post by **garvinhicking** » Tue Mar 25, 2008 5:45 pm

Hi!

Ah, I should have been more specific. All good browser allow you to selectively delete your cookies. You can then just remove those cookies that relate to your blog!

I'll try to work your wording suggestion into the s9y docs! If you find precise HTML pages where I should add that, this would spare me some digging

Regards,
Garvin

PeteHelgren · Post by **PeteHelgren** » Tue Mar 25, 2008 6:09 pm

Will do.

Thanks again