WordPress MU

The plugins link on the administration pages no longer works. We have not changed anything in the backend or the database or added any new plugins but suddenly, the plugins are no longer accessible.

When I click plugins in any blog, instead of loading http://myblogURL/wp-admin/plugins.php it tries to download the file. That is on firefox on a Mac. Firefox on a PC just loads a blank page. Safari gives the following error message

Safari can’t open the page “http://myblogURL/wp-admin/plugins.php” because the server unexpectedly dropped the connection. This sometimes occurs when the server is busy. Wait for a few minutes, and then try again.

Anybody have any ideas?

One of your plugins is having an error. Disable them one at a time to find which one.

I have done that. It only works if there are no plugins installed. And even then, the plugin-install.php page appears blank.

No new plugins have been added or anything changed in the backend for months and it just suddenly stopped working.

"suddenly stopped working" means something changed somewhere. If it wasn't you, then it's something on the server.

"And even then, the plugin-install.php page appears blank."

Blank screen = error. Find the error logs on your server and start reading.

I have read the error logs. they don't say anything about wordpress. the last error is from our Moodle installation which clearly can't affect wordpress.

i realize that "suddenly stopped working" means something changed. that's why I am asking here if anybody has any ideas what could have happened.

Without any more details, it's a stab in the dark.

look in the error logs for the last wordpress related error then. revisit the plugins page again to get it to write a new line if you have to.

Ok. I finally got some errors to log. This is what I get

Notice: get_settings is deprecated since version 0.0! Use get_option() instead. in /home/yufeweb/public_html/blogs/wp-includes/functions.php on line 2688

Warning: session_start() [function.session-start]: Cannot send session cache limiter - headers already sent (output started at /home/yufeweb/public_html/blogs/wp-includes/functions.php:2688) in /home/yufeweb/public_html/blogs/wp-content/mu-plugins/wpmu-signup-captcha.php on line 30

Notice: Undefined index: plugin in /home/yufeweb/public_html/blogs/wp-admin/includes/mu.php on line 1018

Notice: Undefined index: user in /home/yufeweb/public_html/blogs/wp-content/mu-plugins/LoginAs.php on line 17

Notice: Undefined index: anarchy_media/anarchy_media_player.php in /home/yufeweb/public_html/blogs/wp-admin/includes/mu.php on line 1072

Notice: Undefined index: page_tree.php in /home/yufeweb/public_html/blogs/wp-admin/includes/mu.php on line 1072

Notice: Undefined index: flickr-rss/flickrrss.php in /home/yufeweb/public_html/blogs/wp-admin/includes/mu.php on line 1072

Notice: Undefined index: wp-photo-album/wppa.php in /home/yufeweb/public_html/blogs/wp-admin/includes/mu.php on line 1072

do any of these mean anything to anybody?

Ignore the Notice messages - they're caused by your error reporting level being very high.

Have you got anything installed like eAccelerator? The reason I ask is that you say it asks if you want to download the php file which implies that Apache is not longer processing php files. So I'd expect to see something in your apache error log.

The warning from wpmu-signup-captcha.php doesn't look good. Can you remove it from the folder?

BTW - what version of WPMU are you using as functions.php doesn't include get_settings any more.

I do not have eAccelerator installed. All the other PHP pages are being processed. Just not plugins.php. Very strange.

Removing wpmu-signup-captcha.php didn't make a difference.

I am using 2.7.1 and I searched functions.php for get_settings and it is not there! the plot thickens.