Support

Akeeba Solo

#25013 have to restore joomla site - can't connect to MySQL after user table import

Posted in ‘Akeeba Solo (standalone)’
This is a public ticket

Everybody will be able to see its contents. Do not include usernames, passwords or any other sensitive information.

Environment Information

PHP version
n/a
Akeeba Solo version
n/a

Latest post by on Thursday, 26 May 2016 17:20 CDT

pondball
 IMPORTANT! Please remember to ZIP and attach your backup log file. Without it we are unlikely to be able to help you with backup issues. Thank you! Not sure what you need right now but can get it if I know what and where to look.

On Friday I had just about finished developing my revised Joomla site using MAMP and only needed to update my users. I was told (elsewhere) that I should export my user table from my live site (with 60+ new users), rename my MAMP abcde_users table to old_abcde_users and then import the abcde_users. This appeared to work as i then had a full, current list of users. ** I had done an Akeeba Backup just prior to this process **

There was one notification next to each name in the user list in the site backend (MAMP) but further research said it was because of error reporting and not to worry. The site seemed to be functioning well.

I closed out of my (MAMP) backend and tried to log in again but had no success. (notice was: wrong username or password)... but I had not changed anything! Further search using phpmyadmin confirms all settings are as they were.

At least at that point I was getting a log in. The next time I tried to get to my site, either front end or back end I received the message;

"Error displaying the error page: Application Instantiation Error: Could not connect to MySQL."

I've spent the weekend trying to figure this one out... to no avail. Oddly my old live site is also showing this message and I have neither a live nor localhost site. I have a Siteground account with the intent of moving my new site there and closing my GoDaddy account.

Please: what are my best options for moving forward, given what I have explained above, and probably more importantly that I have a current Akeeba Backup in hand? Should I try and reinstall here locally? or, should I upload my Akeeba backup file and Kickstart to Siteground and go from there? Is there an easy fix for my connection to MySQL error problem, and what would have caused that in the first place? If there is an error log I can send please let me know where I can find it and I'll send it through.

nicholas
Akeeba Staff
Manager
The instructions you followed were misguided, written by someone who doesn't understand how Joomla! works the last 7 years. You need at least two different tables, #__users and #__user_usergroup_map, to have a working list of users. The former contains all of the user information including email address, password etc whereas the latter contains the link between users and user groups. Remember that User Groups are responsible for assigning the access privileges to users which define, among other things, if they are allowed to log in at all.

On top of that you seem to have done something with your configuration.php, losing all your database connection settings.

If your backup taken with Akeeba Backup is fully up to date I recommend wasting no time and just restore it on top of your (local) site (on MAMP). Some very important things to keep in mind when restoring:
  • If the Live Site URL is not empty it will act as a redirection. Please remember to empty that in the Site Configuration (second to last) step of the restoration.
  • If you had used Admin Tools' .htaccess Maker you may have set up a redirection there. Replace the contents of the .htaccess file on your site with the contents of Joomla!'s htaccess.txt. When you transfer the site back to the live server you can create a new .htaccess with Admin Tools.
  • If you had used the Administrator Password Protection feature of Admin Tools you will have a .htaccess and .htpasswd in your administrator directory which MAY not be compatible with your local server. Try deleting them if you cannot access /administrator no matter what you do.

Nicholas K. Dionysopoulos

Lead Developer and Director

πŸ‡¬πŸ‡·Greek: native πŸ‡¬πŸ‡§English: excellent πŸ‡«πŸ‡·French: basic β€’ πŸ• My time zone is Europe / Athens
Please keep in mind my timezone and cultural differences when reading my replies. Thank you!

pondball
Hi Nicholas
Thanks for the very prompt and informative reply.
I definitely was advised to only transfer the #_users table... nothing else... there were 4 tables that appeared to be associated with the #_users table and I wondered about them but not being familiar with MySQL didn't realize their ultimate importance.
I can't think of anything I did to the configuration.php file unless it was in one of the options I clicked (again, unwittingly as I was led to believe the export/import process would be a simple one - obviously not simple enough for this newb).
I'll go back over the videos and docs on using kickstart and restoration of the site before proceeding with restoring my site with my backup.
I'm not sure I understand fully what you mean with the first • point above ... ie... what am I actually emptying? and where?
Thankfully I have a Joomla htaccess.txt file that I can transfer to my .htaccess file... Should I do this prior to doing the restoring of my site with the akeeba backup / kickstart?
I don't believe have an .htpasswd file in my admin folder... but will check

After I go through that I hope to be smiling! Thanks for your help.

nicholas
Akeeba Staff
Manager
I'm not sure I understand fully what you mean with the first • point above ... ie... what am I actually emptying? and where?


OK, let me clarify that first point. They say a picture is a 1000 words, so:

This page appears when you are restoring your site, after you have restored your site's database. Look at the left hand column. The fourth item reads "Live Site URL". Make sure the box to its right is empty.

Thankfully I have a Joomla htaccess.txt file that I can transfer to my .htaccess file... Should I do this prior to doing the restoring of my site with the akeeba backup / kickstart?


No, you need to do that afterwards. If you do it before your file will be overwritten during the restoration.

Nicholas K. Dionysopoulos

Lead Developer and Director

πŸ‡¬πŸ‡·Greek: native πŸ‡¬πŸ‡§English: excellent πŸ‡«πŸ‡·French: basic β€’ πŸ• My time zone is Europe / Athens
Please keep in mind my timezone and cultural differences when reading my replies. Thank you!

pondball
yup... great picture! :)

thanks Nicholas... I'm much better with videos and pictures it seems. read through the docs several more times last night and also watched the restore video a couple more times... just to be absolutely clear as to the steps I need to take to restore my site.


On the second reading last night I came across this in the Extract Wizard section...

"When you are ready just click on Extract and the extraction takes place. You will see the Extraction Progress bar fill up as each file is being extracted. eXtract Wizard will let you know when the extraction is complete.



After the archive is extracted you end up with a bunch of files and folders. In order to proceed with your site's restoration you need to place them to your server's web root.



If you are using a local server (WAMPServer, XAMPP, MAMP, Zend Server, etc) just move those files in the subdirectory of the web root of your local server where you want your local copy of the site to exist using Windows Explorer (Windows), Finder (Mac OS X), Nautilus (Ubuntu Linux) and so on. Access the restoration script from your browser as http://localhost/your_directory/installation/index.php where your_directory is the name of the subdirectory of the web root where you copied the files. On some local servers you may want to replace localhost with something like localhost:8888 (default MAMP settings) or localhost:10088 (default Zend Server settings)."


I really do apologize for what must seem like very basic questions here... but:
• should I be using eXtract Wizard or Kickstart for restoring on my new, but broken, localhost site (lets call it abc1 for reference)?
• I am also unclear about where I place these files...
- a) if using Kickstart do I place both the .jpa backup file and kickstart in the htdocs folder or within abc1? when I then fill in the info as per the photo you included above do I fill in abc1 for my site name, and my old username and password in the SuperUser section below that?
- b) if using extract Wizard where do I extract those files specifically? It says in the docs "Extract to folder

Use the button to the right of the text box to open a directory selection dialog. Use it to locate the folder you want to extract the backup archive to and double click on it."
but is that, say on my desktop for extraction purposes initially, then... do I move the entire folder with my site (is that what it will be?) to htdocs so that it will overwrite abc1?

I guess those are my two main questions before proceeding with the restore.
thanks again for your assistance... Dan

nicholas
Akeeba Staff
Manager
• should I be using eXtract Wizard or Kickstart for restoring on my new, but broken, localhost site (lets call it abc1 for reference)?


Either will do. eXtract Wizard is a bit faster.

- a) if using Kickstart do I place both the .jpa backup file and kickstart in the htdocs folder or within abc1? when I then fill in the info as per the photo you included above do I fill in abc1 for my site name, and my old username and password in the SuperUser section below that?


Where is your broken site's index.php file? This is where you have to put them. That folder is called the "site root" because –you guessed it– it is the root folder for all the files and folders belonging to your site.

- b) if using extract Wizard where do I extract those files specifically? It says in the docs "Extract to folder


Same as point "a" above :)

Nicholas K. Dionysopoulos

Lead Developer and Director

πŸ‡¬πŸ‡·Greek: native πŸ‡¬πŸ‡§English: excellent πŸ‡«πŸ‡·French: basic β€’ πŸ• My time zone is Europe / Athens
Please keep in mind my timezone and cultural differences when reading my replies. Thank you!

System Task
system
This ticket has been automatically closed. All tickets which have been inactive for a long time are automatically closed. If you believe that this ticket was closed in error, please contact us.

Support Information

Working hours: We are open Monday to Friday, 9am to 7pm Cyprus timezone (EET / EEST). Support is provided by the same developers writing the software, all of which live in Europe. You can still file tickets outside of our working hours, but we cannot respond to them until we're back at the office.

Support policy: We would like to kindly inform you that when using our support you have already agreed to the Support Policy which is part of our Terms of Service. Thank you for your understanding and for helping us help you!