Unexpected AbanteCart failure or error check list

[abantecart]

If your AbanteCart stopped functioning do not panic. AbanteCart application is running on the server operating system and many small things that can cause issues for all your web applications.

Follow below steps and identify problem you might have and quick resolution. DO NOT post new threads before you go though this list and understand what is happening.

NOTE: Majority of unexpected issues are happening due to hosting/server related issues/changes or code modifications.

Main objective to narrow down the problem and know the root cause of the problem and who to contact for help.

1. Start with looking at your AbanteCart error log.  http://forum.abantecart.com/index.php/topic,834.0.html
   - See what errors/warnings are last listed or appear more often.
   - Read message carefully, as some messages are self explanatory.
   - Search for the error message in the forum to see if this issue was addressed before.
This step can save you lots of time.

2. Remember if any updates or activity has been recently done on your server. Any updates of applications on your server?
You might have received email from hosting company with some updates notifications.

3. Was anyone recently working on your site and changed settings or code? Contact that person and ask what was done. Backups might be helpful here.

4. Do you have enough disk space or resources on your server? If you reach the limit in the disk space, applications on your server can stop functioning. Clean or add more space.

5. Very often cause of issues is file or directory permission change. Check that all directories and files are with correct permissions.
For example: All PHP/CSS/JS files should be 0644 and most of directories 0755
Some directories/files such as  ../system/cache ../image ../resources  ../download and their content should be 0777

6. Was your hosting account compromised or hacked? Check for unknown and new PHP files or other scripts.
You can contact your hosting company if you concerned that your account was hacked.

7. Was any file or directory accidentally deleted? This is rare, but it does happen, we are all human.   

8. Is your database accessible? You will see the message in #1 if connection can not be established. Your hosting provider can help you here.

9. In some rare occasion tables in the database can be corrupted. You can run repair command in your database to attempt to fix the table structure. You can check this with your hosting provider.

10. Look at your web server log for other system related errors. You can check this with your hosting provider for log location and errors reported.   

11. If you believe you encounter bug in AbanteCart, let us know. We will work on the solution and a fix

If you are busy and do not want to follow above steps, you will need to find yourself a technical support person or contact our team for paid support for your eCommerce.

[maxter]

Good check list. Thank you.