Bad to worse – from not getting most anything to work to totally disabled

“Firefox can’t establish a connection to the server at localhost:8888

That’s an issue with your local server – not WordPress.

“that’s an issue with your local server – not WordPress.”

OK, split hairs if you want – but they are alll locatd on the same head.

The use of “localhost”, the port number 8888 and login procedures using those semantics were a very specific part of the www.ads-software.com installation (part of the MAMP and the other stuff with it – things required to 1) install WP and 2) for it to run. As far as I know it’s not used ANYWHERE else.

That reply was akin to “your car won’t start because the gas pump is broken; the gas it pumps isn’t part of the car – run along now.”

but they are alll locatd on the same head

Sorry but they’re not. It’s like finding a major bug in your MS Word install and blaming a document rather than the application.

WordPress can’t deal with your local server problems and it looks like your server isn’t set up and/or running correctly.

To be blunt (because I’m really tired of the evasiveness that permeates much of this “support” forum):

Thank you for responding. Unfortunately I rate the quality and helpfulness of your point (if I stretch the imagination and pretend you MADE a point) a zero.

Installing WordPress is NOT a single process. It requires installation of the “engine” that allows it to run.

I’ll use a comparison again: Your statement: “WordPress can’t deal with your local server problems and it looks like your server isn’t set up and/or running correctly.”

1) IS an answer based on some imaginary operator changing my setup while I was gone (this possibility I interpret as actually saying “I don’t know what’s wrong, but I’ll tell you something’s wrong”. Very helpful.
or-
2) Is as logical as going to the ER with a broken arm and being told “your arm isn’t broken – it’s the stairs you fell down that are bad; fix the stairs and your arm won’t be broken – by the way, I don’t know a damned thing about fixing stairs, but thought I’d tell you something useless without a solution because I’m also more important than you.

Do me a favor, emsi – please ignore my posts. In two replies you have said it’s not a WordPress issue, not provided a single constructive suggestion to fix the problem nor taken the time to point me to resources so I CAN fix it.

I quite sure sure that you are not “sorry”. If you truly were…or as a moderator if you were actually both qualified and willing to assist users that are “stuck”…one would think you might offer specific things to look for, procedures to try, or SOMETHING.

But instead I get TWO replies easily paraphrased as “It’s not my problem”.

And comparing a Word doc problem to Word is a completely ludicrous statement – a document isn’t part of the “engine” that makes Word function. You apparently don’t know a chicken from an egg.

If anyone ELSE can provide constructive assistance to get this problem solved I’d really appreciate it (and I have gotten quite a bit of help through this forum from great folks). emsi’s posts were prime examples of some of the more useless stuff that gets posted. I’d say I’m surprised a moderator doesn’t jump into something like that to “fix” it…except emsi IS a moderator, which is more than a little distressing.

I’m really tired of the evasiveness that permeates much of this “support” forum

I didn’t see any evasiveness in your last topic. In fact, people seemed to be going out of their way to help you.

I rate the quality and helpfulness of your point (if I stretch the imagination and pretend you MADE a point) a zero.

You really are doing a very good job of ensuring that no one wants to help you. Asking for help in a volunteer-run forum and then being insulting about the help that you do receive isn’t going to be terribly productive longer term, now is it?

Installing WordPress is NOT a single process. It requires installation of the “engine” that allows it to run.

All dynamic pages – php asp etc etc require a web server. In this respect, WordPress is no different from Joomla or Drupal or Mambo. Or in fact any php page I might develop for a non-database driven site.

IS an answer based on some imaginary operator changing my setup while I was gone

No – it’s based on the error reported by your web browser – to whit, it cannot locate your web server. Your web server has collapsed. It’s not working.

Try restarting your local web services. The lack of connectivity at all means that something has stopped working, probably the web server crashed. Difficult to say. Restarting your computer may also fix it, but would depend if your MAMP system restarted.

ya’ll are way more patient than I
the flaming has got to stop

mrmist – thank you very much for your post. That was the problem; apparently “MAMP” or some piece of it (still not sure if it’s one or 3 things…or more…and if it is only for WordPress). I know what to watch for now.

Samuel, sorry if you were offended and my bit of “Sterno” (I really did not think those were “flaming” posts, and I own one and have moderated several sites) was more than “normal” for this site.

But it was very, very frustrating having a reply to a question (that clearly stated I’d only been at this for a couple of weeks, a fact verified by the other party via comments above about other threads) that had no useful information, with a followup just as unclear.

In all of my posts I try to clarify my experience level specifically to NOT get brief, technical responses that assume the WordPress “vocabulary” of an experienced user. It’s been my experience that not all “civilian” posters know what they are talking about, but moderators usually do.

However, I had no idea I was running a “webserver”, as the work I’m doing on the site doesn’t require a web connection. Several experienced users told me “MAMP” (which I don’t know if I need later, or if it was only for the WP installation and some of the initial work I’m doing) was a part of the whole package.

I’m just starting to understand that I’m not working on “pages” individually and can’t “run one” or send one to someone to look at – that there are apparently dozens of components. The MAMP parts, as far as I was aware (and still am) are part of those dozens of necessary pieces.

Others have told me privately that they understand my frustration, as WP is NOTHING like NVU, or Dreamweaver, or even iWeb, and that the term “pages” used in WP is totally different than “pages” as I understand them.

So my reaction was based on the fact I was offered no information that even hinted at what to do to fix it. After pointing that out (and the poster confirmed reading some earlier posts) this was part of the followup (and please try to think about this response from MY perspective as a new user):

“All dynamic pages – php asp etc etc require a web server. In this respect, WordPress is no different from Joomla or Drupal or Mambo. Or in fact any php page I might develop for a non-database driven site.”

I have NO idea what any of that means, nor do I have any idea if I NEED to know, and if I DO where I’d get the information necessary to decipher it.

The other thin I’m unsure of is the intent – if that was posted to explain something or to ensure I’d have to do mounds of research, not knowing if it was vital or irrelevant.

I’ll lay off the heat, but I certainly do wish there was a better system of locating information than the inconsistent Codex and a forum where experience levels aren’t apparent unless typed into the post.

With regard to WordPress and its Pages (note the capitalization when used specifically in the context of a WordPress Page, as opposed to a WordPress Post [and not when referring to a web page]), those are static, as opposed to WP Posts, which are linear. They evolve, change, age, march across time, new stuff floats to the top, pushing older posts down. Pages .. are there to stay, until you delete them. WP doesn’t touch them in the scheme of things. They are meant to contain fairly static, unchanging content. (You can edit them of course and change your content at will, just as you would an HTML page.)

But they do behave differently in context with Posts and you must understand this in order to get the full benefit of WP, to appreciate its flexibility and power, and to understand its templating system.

And the fact that you were running a MAMP server, and weren’t even aware of it, I’m pretty speechless. It’s like waking up at the bottom of a canyon and not realizing you were driving a car off a cliff.

And blaming WP for the failure of your web server is wrong headed; it’s not WP’s fault about that. Once you get up and running, I am sure your impression of it will change. Cheers.

Here are a few helpful resources to start with. As with anything, reading is often the first step, and the following three documents are geared (mostly) towards beginners:

https://codex.www.ads-software.com/New_To_WordPress_-_Where_to_Start

https://codex.www.ads-software.com/Installing_WordPress_Locally_on_Your_Mac_With_MAMP

https://codex.www.ads-software.com/First_Steps_With_WordPress

If you continue to have trouble with MAMP (not WordPress), then you should contact the MAMP support forum:

https://forum.mamp.info/index.php?c=1

joni – your comments are enveloped in the context of one who has had to have some sort of auxiliary-internet world running in order to work on sites. It a case of not trying to understand my stated needs – instead how to force WP to be the solution…when it may not be. This comment:

“With regard to WordPress and its Pages (note the capitalization when used specifically in the context of a WordPress Page, as opposed to a WordPress Post [and not when referring to a web page]), those are static, as opposed to WP Posts, which are linear.”

…I’ve puzzled over for a week. The referenced capitalization means nothing to me, and the rest becomes even more baffling when the parentheses…and brackets…are removed (under the rules of grammar said extraction has to leave a complete sentence). Initially I could only respond to with a blank stare:

“With regard to WordPress and its Pages, those are static, as opposed to WP Posts, which are linear.”

Reading it again, perhaps “Would you repeat that?” would be a better response than none at all, but the issue is now pointless.

Amazingly, some of us have used software for quite some time where we create and edit pages, open them with Safari or Firefox, and if they work THEN we upload them to a server. No “pretend” environment needed. And James, I DID all the reading you suggested, but was told by WP veterans offline that all that mumbo jumbo was fluff – you can get a halfway decent site running in a couple of hours.

If some folks removed the blinders and realized the description of MAMP varies from something separate from WP to an essential part of WP they might realize that the Codex is neither current nor consistnt (read that again – “part of WP”, not something else that is, one discovers, completely unsupported here – even though it’s required.)

Regardless, I did not want to leave this thread, like so many others, open-ended with no answer. A newbie can search this forum for days and find what appears to be an infinite number of questions never fully answered.

However, I had a very astute gentleman read one of my posts, ask some relevant questions, and tell me that WP is really not the right package for my intended use (which had been clearly stated several times. I lost a couple of weeks attempting to force WP’s square peg into a round hole. I suppose the folks trying (in good faith) to help really believe WP is any shape *they* want it to be, despite evidence to the contrary.

Now I’ll be spending my time trying to be absolutely sure I’ve located all the correct fils to delete, hoping in the process WP hasn’t modified others.

It’s been real.