boardboss

Thank you for your reply. It makes sense that you would follow the way WooCommerce handles single variations. I doubt Automattic is going to do anything about this, as clean and lean code does not seem to be their priority.

I read the instructions you provided. If there is only one single amount for all gift cards, why should a user have to jump through any hoops to select it as a default amount? Shouldn’t a single value be selected as default by, well, default? Or was that overlooked during the development process?

Greetings – Thank you for the reply. I normally am able to take some time and help troubleshoot issues I report. Unfortunately, in this case, I did not have the time as this was sort of a rush job. I had to uninstall your plugin and use a different solution. Sorry I could not be more help.

Per your response:

1. The memory allocated to WordPress on this server was above the minimum requirements, as it was on the temporary server I spun up to further test your plugin. I work with Elementor on at least hundreds of sites on countless servers, mostly VPNs. I have never encountered this specific error in the past.
2. Chrome version: Chrome is up to date Version 117.0.5938.132 (Official Build) (64-bit)
   Firefox: Firefox is up to date 118.0.1 (64-bit)
3. I tried clearing cache, as well as using incognito/private modes. The problem also appeared when I accessed the site from Chrome on Android, using the desktop version option in the browser. In EVERY the error disappeared when I deactivated your plugin.
4. I use the same antivirus/malware I have trusted and used for over 20 years. It has and always will be licensed and up to date.
5. Nothing in the error logs on either server pointed to any problems. Nothing recently logged on the original server I used, and nothing at all logged on the test server. Probably because I didn’t use too many plugins. ??
6. I mentioned this somewhere in one of these tickets. Both servers were running PHP 8.2.10
7. WordPress is always updated automatically on every install I work with. We use monitoring software to ensure updates occur as quickly as possible and are ready to roll back the update if problems arise. When I spun up the test server, it was already at the latest version 6.3.1.

Please don’t hesitate to let me know if you have any additional suggestions. Since I uninstalled your plugin, this matter is no longer important since it will not impact me. I am certain some issue remains since I could replicate the issue I reported on a different server in a different WordPress installation.

Understood. Maybe it would be a good idea to explain that a little better in the documentation. If China really were an issue for me, I would block them using Cloudflare or the .htaccess file and not a plugin.

Cheers.

Hi again. So, another interesting discovery. I installed the plugin you referenced and checked the ‘Show Errors’ tab. The message displayed indicates, “Your site has errors. Here are the last lines of the error log files.” Here is an image of this page: https://prnt.sc/TJddTqo2pOev

I checked the root of the WordPress installation and did not see any log files. I then enabled the logging option for this plugin, which I just installed. I also added the appropriate lines to the wp-config.php file, as explained here: https://www.wpbeginner.com/wp-tutorials/how-to-find-and-access-wordpress-error-logs-step-by-step/

The screenshot above remained the same. When I checked the error (not access) log on the server, I found a couple of entries like this: The access log request has been truncated.’, referer: https://REDACTED/wp-admin/options-general.php?page=objectcache; however, they were not really recent.

No other error logs were written anywhere that I can see. I checked for the file debug.log in the folder ‘wp-content’ and found no such file. I have no idea why any process would think the site has errors if the suspected errors are not going to be displayed for me, and honestly, troubleshooting that non-issue is of little importance to me right now.

As you mentioned, with your plugin uninstalled, the error notification goes away, and that is good enough for me.

Thanks for your time looking into this.

One more note. I checked the memory usage on the server. It has 2GB installed, and has averaged nearly 1.2GB free during the past 6 months. The lowest it ever got was around 1GB free, which happened 4 different times over the same period, and all were very brief instances.

If you are referring to WordPress memory allocation, I have never received any warning from the monitoring software on this server about that. I have on a couple of 1GB servers, but never a 2GB or higher server.

Cheers.

EDITED TO ADD MORE INFORMATION DISCOVERED BEFORE UNISTALLING THE WPTOOLS PLUGIN:

No Javascript errors found last 3000 entries of log_error file.

WordPress Memory Limit (*): 128 MB??? |???Your usage now:10 MB ???|???Total Php Server Memory: 256 MB???

Memory usage: 16%.

• This reply was modified 1 year, 5 months ago by boardboss.

Greetings Bill,

I reviewed your recently updated plugin file uninstall.php, and it appears you have now included all of the items shown in the screenshot I previously attached to this thread. Thanks for that.

Were you ever able to determine what was causing the site health issues flag to be triggered? It never seems to go away, even though WordPress indicated the site health was good and found no errors.

Best regards,
BB

• This reply was modified 1 year, 5 months ago by boardboss.

Allow me to clarify. Your uninstallation process DOES remove the plugin folder and files created during installation. That said, the process DOES NOT remove the entries created in the wp_options table by your plugin during uninstallation.

I can confirm the version 1.35 plugin you released earlier today removes the entry for “recaptcha_for_all_settings_china”. Thanks for that fix. Unfortunately, there are several other entries that remain in the wp_options table after installation.

Neither WordPress of a cleaner I tried seemed to recognize these entries as being orphaned or otherwise no longer needed, and completely ignored the entries during the cleaning process.

I would suggest you add the other values to the uninstallation process so that when users uninstall your plugin, everything it created is removed from the database. I have the skills to remove these entries manually. Many users would not. Thank you.

The IPv4 address in question is specifically 188.241.80.142. Kindly let me know the results of your investigation as to why this address is not blocked reaching the site. Both ARIN and RIPE report this as an IP address allocated to China.

I thought I understood enough about install/uninstall, although I wanted to be sure. I reached out independently to two different developers who have created several plugins for me in the past. Both told me almost exactly the same thing.

In the simplest possible terms, the plugin has code in its installation section that tells WordPress which database tables to create, etc. When uninstalling the plugin, the plugin must tell WordPress which tables to drop, and other specific data to delete from the database. Otherwise, WordPress would not ‘know’ how to delete the plugin.

To confirm this, I edited the file uninstall.php in your plugin package, then reinstalled the plugin. This time, when I deleted your plugin, the value value for “recaptcha_for_all_settings_china” was deleted from the database because I added “$wptools_option_name[] = ‘recaptcha_for_all_settings_china’;” to the file uninstall.php.

As I mentioned in my other ticket, your plugin DOES NOT completely uninstall itself from WordPress. Some plugins offer an option to remove all traces; however, yours does not.

To be clear, I spun up a new server running PHP 8.2.10, did a “clean” automated WordPress install, which is just WordPress, Akismet, and Hello Dolly. Akismet had an update, but I did not update it. I cannot fathom what you might think is wrong with that server; however, I cannot think of anything to check.

The site health notification came immediately after installing your plugin. I then deleted Akismet and Hello Dolly, since they were unpublished, yet the site health issues notification remained. What triggers that? Clearly the plugin ‘thinks’ something is wrong, even though WordPress indicates the site health is good.

I later installed Elementor, then Elementor Pro, and also the caching plugin Breeze trying to replicate the problem I reported in another ticket about not being able to edit with Elementor. I also added the theme Astra, but removed it and left only Twenty Twenty-Three in place since the editing with Elementor issue occurs with it as well.

Currently, the site has only that theme, Breeze, Elementor and your plugin installed. After deleting your plugin, this remains in the wp_options table: https://prnt.sc/giwaNcgF6mPw. WordPress does indeed handle the removal process; however, WordPress has to be told what to remove.

I thought I understood enough about install/uninstall, although I wanted to be sure. I reached out independently to two different developers who have created several plugins for me in the past. Both told me almost exactly the same thing.

In the simplest possible terms, the plugin has code in its installation section that tells WordPress which database tables to create, etc. When uninstalling the plugin, the plugin must tell WordPress which tables to drop, and other specific data to delete from the database. Otherwise, WordPress would not ‘know’ how to delete the plugin.

To confirm this, I edited the file uninstall.php in your plugin package, then reinstalled the plugin. This time, when I deleted your plugin, the value value for “recaptcha_for_all_settings_china” was deleted from the database because I added “$wptools_option_name[] = ‘recaptcha_for_all_settings_china’;” to the file uninstall.php.

As I mentioned in my other ticket, your plugin DOES NOT completely uninstall itself from WordPress. Some plugins offer an option to remove all traces; however, yours does not.

Since this domain name expires soon, and the server will also go away shortly, I would be happy to give you the WordPress admin credentials so you can investigate this issue, if I have a way to get them to you privately. Let me know if you want me to do that.

I installed Elementor free and tried to edit a page. I got the same message: “Sorry, the content area was not found in your page.” I then tried with Elementor Pro and got the same message. All this is on a net-new WordPress install.

It happened with the default template (2023) and Astra, which is used on the site from the original report. If I disable your plugin using the general settings or deactivate the plugin using the admin dashboard, I can immediately edit any page again.

I would be willing to install Elementor on the temporary site I spun up to test the other issue and test it there; however, there is no way I am going to put it on another site and take a chance of causing more trouble. I will let you know how it goes.

I spun up a new server, added WordPress (clean) via the automated install process, assigned the site a domain name expiring soon (), configured Cloudflare, and added your plugin. Initially, the site displayed nothing, as expected. After configuring your plugin and activating it, the site message appeared. Again, as expected. Then I disabled your plugin as shown here: https://prnt.sc/AsasgQLa44TX, saved the settings and then hit the site with Chrome (incognito mode) again. I still see the message. So I used Edge, which has never seen this site, and the message still appears. This is all with the plugin disabled within the plugin itself.

I then deactivated your plugin from the WordPress admin panel and checked again with Chrome (incognito) and Edge. message still appears: https://prnt.sc/4yJ3sGLtIrFR

This is the behaviour I reported the first time for an established site that has never had any problems up until I tried your plugin.

Interesting. I have examined several plugins before, and they all had at least some code to be used during the uninstallation process. I will spin up a new server right now with a bare minimum WordPress installation, then install only your plugin, activate it, uninstall it and let you know what happens.

For the record, this site has no file/folder permissions issues. I hit the site with a completely different device and browser after I uninstalled your plugin, and I still saw the challenge screen. That should no longer show if the plugin has been removed.