sariee

Hi Philippe,

Many thanks for your reply. OK it is good to know that it is not normal behaviour, thanks! Especially as I like the plugin.
I will think through the things you mention. I can’t do anything this week but will be upgrading to WP5 next week, (I had to put it off for a while) so will wait till after that in case it fixes it. I don’t use a CDN, but our host does promote caching to make WP faster. I’ll email you once I’ve epxlored and experimented with when it happens, if I’m still having problems. Thanks.

Hi Jackie

It is a single site installation. (Our main website is not wordpress, but we do have two WPs in separate directories: our blog set up by someone else a long time ago, and then this new one)

Anyway I’m much happier today. Last night I did a manual backup of files & database. I’ve also installed Updraft and done a backup that way. I decided on doing both types of backups, having experienced not being able to get into the site at all.
Then I updated WordPress, updated our theme, updated all the plugins that needed it, including, nervously, the one that gave the horrible crash when I’d deactivated it.
Then I backed up again ??

And best of all I’ve just solved my original error with the sub-page!
Having experimented with other page & sub-page combinations I realised it was just one top level page that was the issue. Not really sure, but I think it must have been a conflict between a custom post type name or category name and the page slug name, because changing the slug made it work ok. If only I’d known it was that simple originally, sigh. Oh well, I’ve certainly learned a lot in the last couple of weeks and it was better to experience a crash at this early stage of development.

Many thanks again! It’s really good to know that there is support here. Though I’ll aim not to need it again for a while ??

Hello Jackie

Many thanks again for this, much appreciated. I’ve got a lot to learn and so clear, reliable info is good, thank you. I had a rough idea about the files, but now I have found and downloaded a backup of the database too. Think I will install a backup plugin next though, to get me into a routine.

I will start another topic later, thanks, as I realised that in my excitement at getting the site and permalinks back, my original error which kicked off the saga is still happening. But I’ve just got an avalanche of other work right now, so it will have to wait a bit.

Cheers
Sariee

It works! ?? permalinks are ok again.

I’d definitely had a confidence failure there, it just felt like anything I touched would break.

Thank you so much for your support!

OK, understand now about dedicated server, yes you are right, thank you. Helps to get my head around the terminology.

Thanks for number 2 also. I think I will find myself a freelancer I can turn to for techie stuff for a safety net. I just want to do the content really.

Right, now I’ll get a backup process in place and try and regain my confidence.

Thank you again, very much appreciated.

Hi Jackie

Thank you very much for your reply. My apologies for the delay in responding. Before I saw your reply I had followed other advice to deactivate plugins and doing that gave me a 500 error and I couldn’t access anything at all for the last week. I felt stupid. I used a freelancer to fix that but he only offered to fix that bit, not the permalinks issue. So now I have access to the dashboard again, but the permalinks are still wrong and basically I’m too nervous to touch anything without advice….
Here’s my answers:

1= Linux
2= dedicated I think (we use a hosting provider and have access to a cpanel)
3= have seen references to Apache, so assuming Apache
4= have cleared browser cache. Sorry I don’t really understand if we have site cache or how I would clear it. Could you advise…
5= there now doesn’t seem to be one under the sub-directory where this WP installation is. There is a blank file “htaccess_”

What is supposed to happen if you go to settings and change permalinks? Am I safe to try again? Do I need to do anything before I do that?

Do I have to set up redirects? I am not fussed about losing any existing external links into this site as there shouldn’t really be any yet and have discourage seo on currently.

Can anyone recommend a proper, easy, reliable backup method for when I have it fixed, please?

Thank you in advance