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How To Crash Your Website In One Easy Step

 INSECURE FILE

demons-in-flamesLast week I received an email from Themify. Unfortunately (for me) they had found an unsecure file in their iTheme2 package which I use used to use on this site.

To solve the problem they had given me, they gave me another problem. They emailed me a list of instructions written in geek-speak, which I could neither understand or follow. (If I was a techno-wiz I wouldn’t be using Word press!)

THE GEEK-GENE

Anyway, I reminded them that I am missing the geek-gene and need my technical support in plain English and in not more than three easy steps!

I also contacted Hostgator who host this site and told them problem. I have always found them helpful and they got on the case for me.

Some time later I received another mail from themify saying I just needed to upgrade to a new version of iTheme2 and this would delete the offending file. Sounds easy? Yes, it did to me too.

So I did it, but to my dismay and soon to be despair – this message came up: FATAL ERROR – GOBBLEDYGEEKGOBBLDYGEEK’

PRACTICAL CREATIVE WRITING CRASHED AND BURNED

Right before my sad eyes, Practical Creative Writing crashed and burned, and so did my plans to spend the weekend gardening, reading and taking it easy. Instead of mulching my vegetable beds I ended up having my brains mulched!

raised beds in a garden.

GEEK-SPEAK

After an entire weekend spent hunched over the computer, simmering with rage and suffering with techno-derangement of the mind, the problem was solved.

Not by me, and not by the Themify technical support person who thought the problem was down to the version of Word press I was using.  Really?  I mean really?

No, it was good old Hostgator and their backup service that saved the day and my site.

After this very frustrating weekend, any smug-self-help-guru worth their very expensive vitamin enriched salt might ask me ‘what lesson did you learn?’

I learned (yet again) not to trust a techie and that difficult though it is for me I need to get a new theme and start again.

Much as I liked using iTheme2 trust is gone. After all, it was their ‘upgrade/fix’ that crashed my site, and when trust is gone – I’m afraid it’s gone for good. I’m a once bitten- twice-shy kind of woman.

So, if you’ve been here before and you were wondering where the nice slider and images went – they’re out there in the virtual universe and I’m afraid that’s where they’ll stay.

Never mind – it’s still about the writing, and as far as I’m concerned, it will always be about the writing!

Be careful out there!

Grace

There is more from my diary here.

 

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4 Responses to How To Crash Your Website In One Easy Step

  1. Joab November 19, 2013 at 9:08 pm #

    Sorry to hear about your ruined weekend – that sucks. It’s interesting to me that you chose to use wordpress because you felt it was easy – I chose blogger over wordpress for the exact same reason. Anyway, I’m wondering, didn’t you have a back up copy of your blog?

    • Grace November 20, 2013 at 1:56 pm #

      Hi Joab
      Oh yes I did have a backup and it was restored! How do you find blogger? I must look into it – as I know nothing about it at all to be honest.
      Grace

  2. Kevin November 20, 2013 at 2:56 pm #

    I have never really liked Themify very much. They always seem to have some kind of bug in their themes. While I have never been to your site previously, its good to know that you were able to get it back up and running. I know how techie WordPress can get because I actually run a business helping people with it.

    My suggestion would be to check out studiopress themes at studiopress.com. They are pretty good and rarely have issues. Woothemes are good to. I would stay away from places like ThemeForest though. They have a lot of bad themes.

    • Grace November 20, 2013 at 3:17 pm #

      HI Kevin, I had no problems with the theme until this issue and I did like my slider but I will never take that risk again! I also bought elegant themes but several of the ones I liked (Memoir) and uploaded had no right hand side panel!!!
      Thanks for the suggestion. I will check those out.
      Must have a look at your site too – great to know there is help out there!
      Best wishes
      Grace

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