We are a marketing consultancy who manage a site we built for our client. Everything has been fine for the past year, no issues with updates etc until this morning.
We updated 6 plugins one of which was SiteOrigin widgets bundle. After the updates the slider on the home page had gone. We looked in the backend and although the template for the page was correct in as much as it is Front Page with Slider, the slides were no longer showing and there is no way of re-instating them as a lot of that particular panel is missing. It says you can add multiple sides to this page but without anyway of actually doing this.
We tried clearing the cache of both the site and the browser we also tried viewing it on other browsers where the history was completely cleared with not luck. In the end we tried re-instating from a backup with no luck. For a while we also lost the SiteOrigin widgets even though they were clearly showing as installed and activated. The home page had a few instances of missing plugin showing.
As a let resort we did a complete re-install from backup of everything (we had not restored the uploads on our previous attempt) we are now back to where we were, so no slider and no way of re-instating it.
The template is StructurePress Construction theme which has been fine and we haven’t done any recent updates as there haven’t been any available.
Our client is very unhappy and we haven’t a clue what to do…
Hi Zein Marketing,
This sounds like it could be a plugin conflict issue – it sounds like a plugin conflict was introduced in a recent plugin update. Can you try disabling all non-SiteOrigin plugins and see if this fixes the issue? You’ll need to clear all your caches after disabling your plugins.
If it does fix the issue, then try re-enabling your plugins one by one until the issue comes back. This procedure will help diagnose which plugin is causing the issue.
Once we know that, we’ll be able to look at what might be causing the conflict and either solve the problem or help you find an alternative plugin.
You should also try temporarily switching to one of the default WordPress themes to see if the issue is theme related.
If that doesn’t help, do you have a public URL where we can take a look at what’s going on? This is the best way for me to diagnose what’s going on and identify what’s going with your sliders.
Many thanks for replying.
It seems it was plugins for advanced custom fields, although we were unable to deactivate these so had to wait for them to be updated.
What we can’t work out is why when this happened rolling back to a complete previous backup did not fix it. The old plugin which related to Site Origin was the Widgets Bundle, and when we deactivated that it had no effect, the other updates related to Yoast and Woocommerce. We have Woocommerce installed but deactivated so it’s unlikely to be that.
When we installed the Widgets Bundle is when the issue occurred and deactivating it didn’t fix it.
Anyway it is fixed now but it would appear to be a timing issue when it comes to deploying plugin updates.
Alastair
Zein Marketing
Hi Alastair,
Great to hear you managed to work out what was causing this issue.
Can you please clarify what the specific plugin was? I’ll make a note about this plugin and run some tests to see if this issue is consistent with that plugin – if so, try and work out how to avoid it.
Regarding the rollback not working, did you clear all caches after rolling back? I ask as typically when a rollback doesn’t immediately work it’s as a result of certain assets or even the page itself being cached.
Hi Alex
The 2 plugins are:
Advanced Custom Fields
Advanced Custom Fields: Repeater Field
These are both by Elliot Condon and I’m not sure whether they came with the theme which is StructurePress PT by Proteus Themes, or SiteOrigin.
The odd thing is unlike other plugins I am not able to deactivate these plugins.
We always perform a backup prior to changes and delete the cache in WP Fastest Cache prior to re-installing. We then test on a clean version of Chrome (we don’t use this browser for anything else and delete the history and clear the cache prior to shutting it down for the next time.
As an aside, there was also an update for the theme which no matter how many times we perform the update (and it says it has been successful) it still doesn’t work.
All these issues have happened aft the recent plugin updates, we built the site well over 12 months ago and have been maintaining it by updating plugins etc up until now.
Alastair
Hi Alastair,
Thanks. Just to confirm, what is is adding the slider? (SiteOrigin Slider, Smart Slider 3, MetaSlider, etc)
That suggests the files aren’t able to be written correctly. I would manually remove the theme files and then install a fresh copy of the latest version.
Hi Alex
The honest answer is I’m not sure who provides the slider, I’ve attached a full page screenshot showing how it works so you might be able to work it out from there.
I’m a little concerned with removing the theme files manually, I assume you mean via FTP, as I have full back ups can I not get away with restoring just the theme from backup as this is supposed to overnight the files?
Alastair
Hi Zein Marketing,
Is it the slider that’s present in the StructurePress Demo? If so, the slider is added by your theme – I would reach out to ProteusThemes and report what happened.
If that’s not the slider, unfortunately, we’re unable to process attachments at this time. Can you please upload the screenshot to a third party image hosting site (like Imgur or vgy.me)? Sorry about this!
You might be able to, but that may not actually resolve the issue. Regardless, I would consider reaching out to ProteusThemes about this also as they may have more relevant instructions or know of a possible cause for the issue you’re facing.
I’ve sent the image via DropBox which hopefully you’ll be able to get at. If you have a problem let me know.
Alastair
This is a private message.
This is a private message.
Hi Zein,
Unfortunately, we haven’t received an email from Dropbox. Can you please upload the image to a third party image hosting site and directly link me the image? Sorry about this.