Excluding directories gives AJAX error

Another plugin installed on the site is causing a problem or your server is killing the script for some reason. Do you have any errors in your server log from when you press the button? If you do, please copy them here.

Hmmm… Any ideas what could be killing the script on the server side?

This is all the logs tell me (anonymized):

[Mon Sep 15 14:36:27 2014] [error] [client xx.xx.xx.x] client denied by server configuration: /home/<account>/public_html/wp-content/plugins/akeebabackupcore/app/backups/index.html, referer: https://mydomain.com/wp-admin/admin.php?page=akeebabackupcore/akeebabackupwp.php
[Mon Sep 15 14:36:27 2014] [error] [client xx.xx.xx.x] client denied by server configuration: /home/<account>/public_html/wp-content/plugins/akeebabackupcore/app/backups/index.html, referer: https://mydomain.com/wp-admin/admin.php?page=akeebabackupcore/akeebabackupwp.php
[Mon Sep 15 14:31:01 2014] [error] [client xx.xx.xx.x] client denied by server configuration: /home/<account>/public_html/wp-content/plugins/akeebabackupcore/app/backups/index.html, referer: https://mydomain.com/wp-admin/admin.php?page=akeebabackupcore/akeebabackupwp.php
[Mon Sep 15 14:31:00 2014] [error] [client xx.xx.xx.x] client denied by server configuration: /home/<account>/public_html/wp-content/plugins/akeebabackupcore/app/backups/index.html, referer: https://mydomain.com/wp-admin/admin.php?page=akeebabackupcore/akeebabackupwp.php
[Mon Sep 15 14:24:48 2014] [error] [client xx.xx.xx.x] client denied by server configuration: /home/<account>/public_html/wp-content/plugins/akeebabackupcore/app/backups/index.html, referer: https://mydomain.com/wp-admin/admin.php?page=akeebabackupcore/akeebabackupwp.php&view=main
[Mon Sep 15 14:24:47 2014] [error] [client xx.xx.xx.x] client denied by server configuration: /home/<account>/public_html/wp-content/plugins/akeebabackupcore/app/backups/index.html, referer: https://mydomain.com/wp-admin/admin.php?page=akeebabackupcore/akeebabackupwp.php&view=main

No, this doesn’t help at all. It merely tells you that Akeeba Backup checked if the backups directory is web accessible and found out that it’s not (which is a good thing, you don’t want any random bloke on the Internet accessing your full site backups). This check happens at the main page of the component as you can see from the referrer URL.

It still doesn’t give us a clue about what is going on when you are trying to exclude a folder. Are those lines the only ones containing akeebabackupwp.php in them? If they are you probably need to talk to your host. It’s possible that they have a mod_security2 rule which filters out whatever looks like a filesystem path in the request. Since we’re passing the path to the file to be excluded in the AJAX request that would explain why you get an AJAX error.

Yes, those are the only lines that contain akeebabackupwp.php. I got this from the standard cPanel error log. I just produced the error now and the exact same errors showed up in the error log instantly.

Is there another log file I should look at that may have more info in it? I’m going to open a ticket with my host to see if they can shed some light too. Thanks!

Frankly? I don’t know if there’s another log… because I’m not your host ?? That’s why I asked you to talk to your host. I can speculate and try to guess what’s wrong but two things I’ve learned in the 8 years I’ve been doing development and tech support of backup software is that my psychic skills are lousy and there’s no limit to the restrictions you’d never imagine (or thought would ever make sense) you can find among different hosts.

Thanks Nikosdion. I know I’m being vague, but there’s not a lot of info to go on here :/

I checked with my host. They looked into it and came up with nothing. I guess I’ll just keep digging. I’ll post anything I learn here. Thanks for the effort!

I’m going to bump this – I’m experiencing the same issue and cannot back up my website until I can exclude some large video files. Have you been able to figure this one out?

This is an issue we have not been able to reproduce on any of our sites, test or live. It would help if you could both provide the versions of your PHP and WordPress, as well as any third party plugins you have installed. I am pretty sure there’s another plugin interfering, but I can’t know which one without an indication in the server error log or complete lists of third party plugins I can put down side by side and start testing.

Here’s a list of what I have installed on the site I’m having the issue with. One plugin is deactivated, but I included it anyway.

PHP Version: 5.3.28
Wordpress Version: 3.9.2
Theme is custom based on the Underscores starter theme.

Plugins:
Akeeba Backup for WordPress
jQuery Lightbox (deactived)
Key4ce osTicket Bridge
NK Google Analytics
Recent Posts Widget Extended
Simple Featured Posts Widget
Smart FAQ
TablePress
Types – Complete Solution for Custom Fields and Types
WP Video Lightbox
WP Views

I think we may have found a potential problem. Do you have magic_quotes_gpc turned on? Can you please ask your host to set this option to Off or give you instructions on turning it off via a .user.ini or .htaccess file?

Even though I know better, magic_quotes was on. I disabled it in php config editor on my server and that fixed the problem! Now I can exclude directories! Thank you nikosdion!

Thank you for the confirmation! I can now try to apply a workaround should magic_quotes_gpc is enabled accidentally ??