10 Item Checklist For Troubleshooting WordPress

One of the best things my IT manager taught me is that when anything goes wrong, you should always have a list of basic things to check first. Go through them no matter how trivial or silly and eliminate them to narrow down the possibilities. I’m often surprised how elementary the solution can be. So what are these basics?

  • Is it the plugins? Disable all plugins, enable each one – check the problem. If not that one, enable the next plugin – check the problem and repeat.

    Image by Steve Woods

    Image by Steve Woods

  • Are you running out of disk space? You won’t believe how many times this got me.
  • Did your web host perform an upgrade, change server settings or applied a new software?
  • Did all the files get uploaded? Sometimes, even if we told the FTP program to upload everything on the server it could burp or miss a file here or there.
  • Were all the files uploaded in the correct mode? Most of the time your FTP program knows what to do. But maybe you could have changed the upload mode and forget to turn it back to auto? Maybe the plugin or some files must be uploaded in a mode other than it’s normal?
  • Are the file permissions correct? Check the plugin readme. It often tells you if any special permissions are required.
  • Could it be the theme? I’ve found themes that have a lot of built in features that allow you to edit from the dashboard vs editing theme files can conflict with the core. This is true especially after upgrade.
  • Check the .htaccess Usually, if you have trouble with your permalinks, 404 errors, this is the first place I’d check. htaccess files can be overwritten. I used to have a client whom I have to constantly fix her permalinks because she used Frontpage to publish into the folder WordPress is installed and Frontpage loves to replace the htaccess.
  • Are all your files there? Strange things happen. Or maybe sometimes it’s just us being forgetful. I’ve helped people whose site was down and turns out part of the file in a folder is missing. Not sure what happened or if it was indeed hacked or just someone deleted it without realizing what they were doing.
  • Check your database. Sometimes databases tend to wind themselves up into a tangle. Especially if the site is pretty old and large. Log in to phpMyAdmin to repair your database.

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24 Comments

  1. Kai on July 28, 2009 at 6:27 pm

    Hi Lynette – great post!
    I’d add a couple more – did you accidentally change any settings in the ‘general page’ for the URL?
    Have you been hacked because you haven’t updated in a long time?

    Those two are less common for most people but the reason I haven’t stopped working on blogs recently 🙁



    • Lynette on July 28, 2009 at 7:42 pm

      Thanks for the contribution Kai!



  2. Kai on July 28, 2009 at 2:27 pm

    Hi Lynette – great post!
    I’d add a couple more – did you accidentally change any settings in the ‘general page’ for the URL?
    Have you been hacked because you haven’t updated in a long time?

    Those two are less common for most people but the reason I haven’t stopped working on blogs recently 🙁



    • Lynette on July 28, 2009 at 3:42 pm

      Thanks for the contribution Kai!



  3. Guy R Cook on August 1, 2009 at 2:42 pm

    Good checklist, thanks for sharing.



    • Lynette on August 1, 2009 at 6:52 pm

      Hope you get tons of use from it Guy good to ‘see’ you again by the way.



  4. Guy R Cook on August 1, 2009 at 10:42 am

    Good checklist, thanks for sharing.



    • Lynette on August 1, 2009 at 2:52 pm

      Hope you get tons of use from it Guy good to ‘see’ you again by the way.



  5. Heather Robinson on August 1, 2009 at 4:03 pm

    Great list, Lynette.

    I love lists, especially for troubleshooting. It’s way to easy to miss something small if you don’t .
    As a virtual assistant, I have lists for everything from steps to follow for a new customer, to how to setup a WordPress site. Many of these items involve automated processes, but they all began as a list.

    Heather



    • Lynette on August 1, 2009 at 6:53 pm

      Hey Heather. Yes! It’s so easy to overlook the smaller stuff. So often we tend to look for the big issues. Good to hear you have got a smooth system going.



  6. Heather Robinson on August 1, 2009 at 12:03 pm

    Great list, Lynette.

    I love lists, especially for troubleshooting. It’s way to easy to miss something small if you don’t .
    As a virtual assistant, I have lists for everything from steps to follow for a new customer, to how to setup a WordPress site. Many of these items involve automated processes, but they all began as a list.

    Heather



    • Lynette on August 1, 2009 at 2:53 pm

      Hey Heather. Yes! It’s so easy to overlook the smaller stuff. So often we tend to look for the big issues. Good to hear you have got a smooth system going.



  7. Staci Jansma on August 2, 2009 at 4:45 pm

    Thank you for posting this list. Will be much needed to review if something doesn’t work for me down the road.



    • Lynette on August 5, 2009 at 2:55 pm

      Thanks for stopping by Staci



  8. Staci Jansma on August 2, 2009 at 12:45 pm

    Thank you for posting this list. Will be much needed to review if something doesn’t work for me down the road.



    • Lynette on August 5, 2009 at 10:55 am

      Thanks for stopping by Staci



  9. Elizabeth on August 3, 2009 at 1:28 pm

    Thanks Lynette, Checklists are very handy. Even when you think you know what problems can occur you inevitably forget things, so having a line item checklist that you can go through keeps you from wasting a ton of time. This is one I’ll be pasting on my wall 😉



    • Lynette on August 5, 2009 at 2:55 pm

      I agree! Also, I find my memory is not so good these days LOL so… checklists help jump start that old brain 😉



  10. Elizabeth on August 3, 2009 at 9:28 am

    Thanks Lynette, Checklists are very handy. Even when you think you know what problems can occur you inevitably forget things, so having a line item checklist that you can go through keeps you from wasting a ton of time. This is one I’ll be pasting on my wall 😉



    • Lynette on August 5, 2009 at 10:55 am

      I agree! Also, I find my memory is not so good these days LOL so… checklists help jump start that old brain 😉



  11. Mónica on August 21, 2009 at 5:32 am

    Thanks Lynette,

    How easy it is to forget to check the obvious first. I should have more checklists like this one for other tasks as well. Thanks!



    • Lynette on August 21, 2009 at 10:18 pm

      Glad it’s useful to you Monica. I have to constantly remind myself of the basics as well these checklists can be handy.



  12. Monica on August 21, 2009 at 1:32 am

    Thanks Lynette,

    How easy it is to forget to check the obvious first. I should have more checklists like this one for other tasks as well. Thanks!



    • Lynette on August 21, 2009 at 6:18 pm

      Glad it’s useful to you Monica. I have to constantly remind myself of the basics as well these checklists can be handy.