[Vincent]

I’m currently trying to update my teacher’s site and we are trying to get it all set up on a test server to make sure it runs smoothly. The url to the test site is http://maclab.guhsd.net/blog2 and our issue is an Access Forbidden 403 Error that occurs when we try to update our permalinks to Numeric from his old Default links. We have to contact a man at the school district each time to remove a huge chunk of code from our access file that spawns every time we try to make a change like this. Any idea why this is happening? Happened when we tried to install and set up BuddyPress the first time.

[Vincent]

Also I forgot to mention this site has 10 years worth of links running all around the site, and I understand that changing the links from Default to Numeric will still work because WordPress recognizes a link to a pageid and redirects if the permalink structure was changed, it just doesn’t work the other way around (linking a numeric link to a page with a pageid link).

[mskocko]

If it matters, we’re running WordPress 3.3.1 (with the current version of BP) and the active site is at http://maclab.guhsd.net/blog/

District tech has verified permissions are set correctly. He suspects something odd is happening with the htaccess file. I’m more of a graphics guy than a coder so I’m unable to offer any insight into the issue. Thanks for any suggestions you might have.

Oh, and if the test site at http://maclab.guhsd.net/blog2/ becomes visible (once the guy at the district waves his magic wand), it will look horrible as we’ve not yet applied the new template.

-Mike

[Hugo Ashmore]

One of these aspects that’s not really buddypress related- it classically sounds like permissions issues as that is what 403 means so not sure why your tech says perms are ok, might be a case that file perms are ok but that the web server hasn’t got correct access (group or owner) to write to files ?

either way it’s going to be something that we will not be able to help with too any great extent, check your server access logs try and track down the issue there, also ask your techie to check that the web server does have correct perms to write to files – can you do stuff like media uploads ok?

[mskocko]

Hey Hugo. I upload media all the time. The Mac Lab (including the blog) houses a huge collection of resources (about 70 GB) that I’ve created and successfully uploaded over the past 10 years. We’re gamifying the curriculum and hoping to use BuddyPress in conjunction with some custom plugins to provide students with real-time feedback as they complete projects, earning XP and virtual currency.

Anyway, the techie set up a sandbox for us to test the kids’ themes and plugins (Vincent is a key player in this) but we ran into the 403 as soon as I activated BuddyPress. The techie is quite knowledgeable about WP but not BP. He’s got loads more on his plate than just my site so I’m trying to help locate relevant info.

He’s also duplicated the issue at his end. He fixes permissions then any change in BP settings triggers the 403. He said he commented out some of the htaccess file and BP rewrote it. (I have no idea just exactly what he commented out.)

Have to run. Thanks for any additional help or direction in where I might look next!

[Paul Wong-Gibbs]

BP doesn’t try to do anything when WordPress regenerates its permalinks. Does disabling BuddyPress “fix” the problem?

[mskocko]

Ah, good idea, Paul. Right now I’m locked out of blog2 (access denied) and can’t even login. Vincent suggested I change the name of the plugins folder on the server via Dreamweaver to deactivate BP but… permissions issues foiled that plan. Will try via the admin panel as soon as the techie resets permissions.

Will report back. Thanks.

[mskocko]

Disabling BP didn’t fix anything but the techie managed to solve whatever the permission problem was and we’ve moved ahead and begun configuring the site.

One big disappointment is that BP didn’t like that I’d (foolishly) stuck with the default Permalinks on my blog (over 300 posts and 1,500 pages). I’m thankful that WP is savvy enough to utilize symbolic links but am wary of unforeseen problems biting me in the future — like which plugins might not work? (Rhetorical question.)

Why BP requires users to change this setting is a mystery to me but my non-rhetorical question is: is there a workaround that will allow me to stick with the default Permalinks?

Thanks!
Mike