MyBB Community Forums

Before anyone gets frustrated with me for posting something that has been posted by many people in the past, please note that I have been reading as many forum posts I can find from different websites on this issue.

I have never worked with forum building before, and I just downloaded and installed MyBB 1.8.6. I followed the instructions and the installation went perfectly. I also can log in as an administrator (*mywebsite*.com/forum/admin) and edit the settings of the forum. (And I'm impressed with MyBB so far.)

The problem I'm having is when I go to *mywebsite*.com/forum (that's where I installed it, in a directory called "forum"), I get a 500 Internal Service Error. This confuses me how I am able to edit the forum as an admin, but the normal forum URL brings back an error. (I've also tried directly going to forum/index.php -- same result.)

From every post I've read so far, I've learned a 500 ISE can be just about anything, so most of those trying to help ask for the specific error message, which on my end reads: "The server encountered an internal error or misconfiguration and was unable to complete your request. Please contact the server administrator, and inform them of the time the error occurred, and anything you might have done that may have caused the error. More information about this error may be available in the server error log."

I'm using IPage, but I can't find an error log anywhere in my control panel, let alone would I have the knowledge to read and understand it. The posts on all the forums I've read so far have also said repeatedly that this is a server-side problem, so if no one is able to answer to my direct situation, at the very least, would someone be kind and patient enough to me to explain in very simple terms what I should be asking IPage to do in correcting this problem. (If it helps, I did verify that IPage is running PHP 5.2; that question also came up in other forum posts.) As many of you who understand tech support will know, most operators will simply claim it is a problem with MyBB to get you off the phone, so if anyone could prepare me with specifically simplistic information I could understand, I would be incredible grateful.

I'm sorry to have to bother you all with this, but I was unable to find any other options but to ask here.

Do you use a .htaccess file? If so, can you post the contents of it?

(2015-10-21, 10:42 PM)dragonexpert Wrote: [ -> ]Do you use a .htaccess file?  If so, can you post the contents of it?

No sir, I have the htaccess.txt, but not the .htaccess file. (I also forgot to mention, I have tried to open the forum in multiple browsers -- same result.)

If your host uses CPanel, scroll to where it says Visitor Stats. One of the items there should say Error Logs. Click that and it will post the most recent errors.

creationlibary
I have one of my forum on Ipage (for now,,,not for long), and this have happened to me to a few times. Go to Ipage and click the live chat functin, and tell them that you have this error.
I do not guess the one at support is able to help you, so he/her will make a ticket, and the problem will be fixed within 2-6 hours.
You will never know what the problem was, you will get an answer that the tech could not find the problem, and that it where a temporary problem............

And remember: Never be sorry for asking questions,,,,,, question is the first step for knowledge!!!

First, the Cpanel under Visitor Statistics did not have any error log.

Second, I did go ahead and contact IPage, and the solution I found I want to list here so hopefully, others who have a similar problem will be able to solve it. I uploaded the files on my FTP under the folder "forum," and the error was coming back because the directory in the index.php file was point to "/inc/init.php" instead of "/forum/inc/init.php" -- so if some of you are getting an error, it could be because you installed it in a separate folder, and you simply need to open up the index.php file and find the following line:

require_once dirname(dirname(__FILE__))."/inc/init.php";

And change it to nameofyourfolder, so it looks like:

require_once dirname(dirname(__FILE__))."/nameofyourfolder/inc/init.php";

-------------------------------------------

Now that's done, I have a new problem because when I go to my directory, it has a plain text login, and the text after login is also just a bunch of plain text. I suspect this is because there may be other directories (for images, divs, etc) in the code which require adding in the root folder. Is there anyone that may be able to help me with this? If so, let me know and I'll post what code I can upon request. Because the PHP is called "require_once" and changing any directories in the code after that function is called results in error, I do not believe that the problem lies in the index.php file (although I could be wrong, please double check me). I'm going to look through the files to see what I can find, but anyone with more experience in this area would be highly appreciated, thank you!

(Once logged in, and I click one of the links, it forces me to put in a username and password again, so that may help in locating the problem(s))

I had no response to my inquiries, so it appears that no one reading this knows the solution. In case anyone is searching the internet looking for an answer to this problem, I have one for you. Don't bother with MyBB and phpBB; they have the exact same coding problems concerning installing to a custom-name directory folder. I downloaded and installed Simple Machine Forums (SMF), and they had a very simple and easy-to-use instruction readme file that came with it. It works perfectly and redirects to the correct directory automatically, first time, no hassle. I wasted almost an entire week with MyBB and phpBB -- I hope I can save others some time and hassle.

The problem here is with IPage, not MyBB. The fact that you have issues with phpBB also proves that. MyBB has been installed hundreds of thousands of times, if it was an issue with MyBB there would be a lot more noise in the community.

Yea, chiming in with nathan here - I have my forum in a sub directory and it works fine. Blame the host - you get what you pay for.

However, as you have changed forum software I will close this support thread. Good luck with your forum.