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I just switched my Dreamhost WordPress site on my VPS from PHP 5.2 Fast CGI to 5.3 CGI. Somehow WordPress now refuses to load and shows a white screen of death on all WordPress pages. PHP Info and static HTML load just fine

I discussed some possible solutions with a support staff at Dreamhost, but no results as of yet. I have done the following:

  • I have switched to the Twentyeleven default theme
  • I have disabled all plugins using PHPMyAdmin.
  • I also created a phprc like this to log PHP errors, but none are loaded there at the moment.

PHP is loaded as I did verify that using a phpinfo() and it also showed my phprc is loaded as additional ini

When I load home I get an HTTP 200 and a white screen of death, but no errors whatsoever. How can I debug this further to fix this issue?

Update

It was the caching plugin W3T Total Cache that was causing the issue. Once I removed some core files the site came back with the base theme and all plugins deactivated. Somehow the plugin was still causing major issue even when it was turned off. Perhaps there were still details left in the database

The reason why I did not see any PHP errors is not clear as of yet. I am still investigating this. Also got an XCache_get function error, but that is perhaps because the XCache is not part of the PHP 5.3 package.

rhand
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  • What's in your PHP error log? – Michael Hampton Mar 30 '13 at 05:30
  • After I removed some W3 Total Cache files I got my blog back. Now I only cannot reactivate W3T Cache and I get Fatal error: Call to undefined function xcache_get() in `/path-to-site/wp-content/plugins/w3-total-cache/lib/W3/Cache/Xcache.php on line 158` PHP Logs are stored in home folder as I indicated earlier with a iink. Could be that there is an issue with that. Not sure. How can I check? – rhand Mar 30 '13 at 05:32

2 Answers2

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We see from your error log that your WordPress plugin is trying to call a function from XCache, but your new version of PHP doesn't include XCache.

To resolve the issue, install XCache for the new version of PHP.

Michael Hampton
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So based on the update you can check for Varnish, you would have the best caching possible.

Webord
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  • Checking it now. Wonder why Varnish would be better than a WP caching plugin like W3T Cache or WP Super Cache Only other issue is the phprc. Perhaps you have some ideas why that is not working too? – rhand Mar 30 '13 at 09:33
  • So I think It might have something to do with permissions to write and change the cache files. About the Varnish solution, I really don't like Caching systems made within the application, breaks the purpose of the system; Think a little bit with me, the cache serves the purpose of not passing load to the application, if the application it self needs to be loaded as all the plugins require that the WordPress it self is loaded, then you have a concept problem. Varnish stands in-front of the Apache and cache stuff from a backend instead of just some tricks that you can do with static files. – Webord Mar 30 '13 at 11:57
  • This has virtually no relevance to the problem at hand. – Michael Hampton Mar 30 '13 at 13:38
  • Man, seriously? Do I have to answer the question only? It's like a test? I would rather point a better solution to a person having an issue rather than just resolving it... Give it a try later or @rhand, on Varnish. People here just seams to be worried about some sort of points or flaming my answer than trying to help... – Webord Mar 30 '13 at 14:27
  • Yes, recommending something better is fine. But merely installing Varnish *will not fix this problem.* – Michael Hampton Mar 31 '13 at 18:27
  • So he updated his question telling that he fixed the problem, so I just thought that would be a better solution. – Webord Apr 01 '13 at 17:30