code191178

Okay – found the problem.

I had developed my WordPress site and Woocommerce store on a local server before making it live. When I imported the database and got the website live some of the products on the shop had slight errors in their names – some weird characters appeared, like something from the Wingdings font or similar.

I didn’t think this would make any difference to testing whether my shop was working or not. I actually used one of the items that had some of those weird symbols in the product name to test the checkout process and was getting an Error 525 message. Once I went and edited the product name and tried again everything worked.

I’m sure this fix won’t help everyone getting an Error 525 message, but just said I’d point out what worked in my case.

I have this same Error message : “Error 525: Unable to create order. Please try again.”

I’m using the WordPress Twenty Sixteen theme and Woocommerce.
The only plugins I have installed are Custom CSS and Weight Based Shipping. I tried deactivating the Custom CSS but this didn’t solve anything.

I also tried deactivating the Weight Based Shipping plugin but then I got an error saying “Invalid Shipping Method” instead.

I just upgraded the Weight Based Shipping plugin to the latest version, again this didn’t solve anything.
Also, there was a flag in the Woocommerce system status that my PHP version should be upgraded. It was 5.2.?? and I had my hosting company upgrade it. It’s currently at 5.4.45 but unfortunately this upgrade didn’t solve the problem either.

Here is a print out of the Woocommerce System Status…

### WordPress Environment ###

Home URL: https://www.subtleaudiorecordings.com
Site URL: https://www.subtleaudiorecordings.com
WC Version: 2.5.5
Log Directory Writable: ?
WP Version: 4.5.1
WP Multisite: –
WP Memory Limit: 256 MB
WP Debug Mode: –
Language: en_GB

### Server Environment ###

Server Info: Apache
PHP Version: 5.4.45
PHP Post Max Size: 8 MB
PHP Time Limit: 30
PHP Max Input Vars: 1000
SUHOSIN Installed: –
MySQL Version: 5.1.73
Max Upload Size: 2 MB
Default Timezone is UTC: ?
fsockopen/cURL: ?
SoapClient: ?
DOMDocument: ?
GZip: ?
Multibyte String: ?
Remote Post: ?
Remote Get: ?

### Database ###

WC Database Version: 2.5.5
:
woocommerce_sessions: ?
woocommerce_api_keys: ?
woocommerce_attribute_taxonomies: ?
woocommerce_termmeta: ?
woocommerce_downloadable_product_permissions: ?
woocommerce_order_items: ?
woocommerce_order_itemmeta: ?
woocommerce_tax_rates: ?
woocommerce_tax_rate_locations: ?

### Active Plugins (3) ###

Simple Custom CSS: by John Regan
Danny Van Kooten – 3.3

WooCommerce Weight Based Shipping: by dangoodman – 4.1.3
WooCommerce: by WooThemes – 2.5.5

### Settings ###

Force SSL: –
Currency: EUR (€)
Currency Position: left
Thousand Separator: ,
Decimal Separator: .
Number of Decimals: 2

### API ###

API Enabled: ?
API Version: 3.1.0

### WC Pages ###

Shop Base: #13 - /index.php/shop/
Basket: #14 - /index.php/cart/
Checkout: #15 - /index.php/checkout/
My Account: #16 - /index.php/my-account/

### Taxonomies ###

Product Types: external (external)
grouped (grouped)
simple (simple)
variable (variable)

### Theme ###

Name: Twenty Sixteen
Version: 1.2
Author URL: https://www.ads-software.com/
Child Theme: ? – If you're modifying WooCommerce on a parent theme you didn't build personally
then we recommend using a child theme. See: How to create a child theme

WooCommerce Support: ?

### Templates ###

Overrides: –

… Woah !

Just got it to work ??

Not exactly sure why it works now but here’s what I changed tonight.

I was reading this article – https://www.elegantthemes.com/blog/tips-tricks/how-to-install-wordpress-locally-on-a-windows-computer

^ in there it says to change the port number in the httpd.conf file in 2 places (I had changed it in 3 places).

So… originally I had changed 80 to 81 in these three lines within the httpd.conf file

#Listen 12.34.56.78:80
Listen 0.0.0.0:80
Listen [::0]:80

but this article recommended to only change 80 to 81 in these 2 lines

Listen 0.0.0.0:80
Listen [::0]:80

…

Even after that I could only get WAMP to work if I deleted my existing wp-config file and then entered the following on the WordPress page :

database name : sa-site-dev
username : root
password :
database host : localhost
table prefix : wp_

^ Entering localhost:81 DID NOT work

Props to Mikezgardan for the suggestion to enter localhost in that field instead of localhost:81 – you’re at least part of the reason I can now stop tearing my hair out ??

cheers!

… okay.. so I still haven’t had any luck with this.

Is there an alternative to WAMP I could try that might work ??

MAMP, EasyPHP, or something like that maybe ?

Best result I’m getting is when I start off with no wp-config.php file.

Then I type localhost:81/sa-site-dev in my browser window and that takes me to the WordPress install page.

At this point I copy a self-generated wp-config.php file into the C:\WAMP\www\sa-site-dev folder.

This wp-config file contains the following login details (same as in my 1st post above) :

database name : sa-site-dev
username : Code
password : ******** (the password!)
database host : localhost:81
table prefix : wp_

^ I then enter these details on the WordPress install page and click ‘Submit’ …

The page loads for ages but nothing happens.
I tried clicking on the url window in the browser to try again … and then eventually I’m taken to this link —> https://localhost:81/sa-site-dev/wp-admin/setup-config.php?step=2

Where it says :

‘ERROR: “Table Prefix” must not be empty.’

I have the option to ‘Try Again’

… so despite the change of browser, and despite turning off Windows Defender, I still seem to be at the same stage as I was when I originally posted this problem a few weeks ago.

Sorry, been away and then was busy with other stuff since I came back…

Anyway, got a chance to try out these suggestions today.

First of all I changed my default browser to Firefox and then I switched off Windows Defender.

@ Mikezgardan … I did try using ‘localhost’ instead of ‘localhost:81’ on the WP page, but I just a message saying “cannot make database connection” (or something similar).

@ SniffleValve … I had tried those settings on the WordPress page before and they didn’t work. Tried them again today seeing as I changed my default browser, but still nothing doing.

Arrrrgggggh…