Topic

Hello Author of Smart Cleanup Tools,

I’m contacting you for support after using Smart Cleanup Tools to cleanup our site database. The current site database has around 700MB that can be cleanup. However, When I click Run CleanUp, it returns 404 Error.

I contact my VPS provider, which is Websynthesis, they told me to contact you to verify the problem if this plugin has database size restriction and if the plugin doesn’t require fopen or exec functions.

“You will want to verify with the plugin author that it does not require the exec() / exec.php or url_fopen functions, as both of those have been disabled on Synthesis hosting for security reasons.

We do support CURL as an alternative to url_fopen. Your plugin author should know if they are using these functions or not.”

Can you advise me what to do or implement to get your plugin working on my site?

Thanks,
Tony

Replies

Error 404, means that page is not found, I don’t see any specific error. Plugin is not using exec or url_fopen functions, all cleanup is done through the WordPress database object, nothing else.

Since no one else reported this, and I am using plugin every few days on different websites, I am 100% it is all OK, whatever is wrong on your end, I can help only if you provide me with PHP error that is causing the problem (server error log).

Hi Milan,
I finally got the plugin working on my end, however, I try to clean DATABASE Overhead itself (it takes me more than 4 hours) without stopping to clean the database. I even tried to re-clean it multiple times, the process keeps going forever (more than few hours every time I run the clean up. I’m not really sure what to do

And here is my VPS support states:
“Hi Tony,
Thanks for the screenshot!
The reason of the error is the plugin kills PHP everytime so you see the Nginx page as result of the process.

Unfortunately, we cannot provide high-level support for third-party plugins that we did not write and that our staff has little experience with. We are, of course, happy to install any approved configurations on the server.

My advice would be to contact the plugin developer. Especially if it is a premium plugin, part of what you paid for is the developer’s support. He or she will be able to provide much more succinct, effective advice than we will.

Come back with specific instructions for how we can assist you with the plugin, and we’ll be happy to!”

[b]To be honest with you, I’m not sure what I should do next to get this plugin working on my site
[/b], Could you advise me what to do next?
Thanks,
Tony

So far, the only reason for this to happen was the limitation on the hosting site that causes process to timeout. Some operations, in some cases might use more resources, so plugin attempts to increase PHP limit and timeout to make sure it works. But, some (less reputable, in my experience) hosting companies impose the hard limit to PHP memory, and if the plugin runs into that, it fails, and there is no errors logged, because, technically, it is not an error, it is hosting imposed limit. So far, I have seen such problems on some GoDaddy, HostGator and BlueHost shared hostings, and there is nothing I can do to remedy that, that is hosting imposed limit that there is no way getting around.

Hi Milan,
Here is the message I got from my VPS provider (Websynthesis.com), they said it’s not associated with PHP memory exhaustion. Can you advise me what to do next?

“Hi Tony,

We have checked your server error log and there’s no error associated with PHP memory exhaustion, so this not the cause of the issue you are experiencing. Also, your PHP memory limit is already set to 512Mb. If you are still unable to use this plugin, I would suggest you to install WP Optimize for database optimization.

Also, we would like to suggest you to enable a CDN like Cloudflare since your number of server requests per day is pretty high (~1.2 million server requests just today).

Number of accesses in NGINX and PHP logs:

Date NGINX PHP
========================================
16/Apr/2017 1162705 129011
16/Apr/2017 1959888 129015
15/Apr/2017 1870622 144030
14/Apr/2017 1498671 119199
13/Apr/2017 1482443 132369
12/Apr/2017 1499275 157657
11/Apr/2017 1578376 161369
10/Apr/2017 1586915 161899

https://www.cloudflare.com/

Please let us know if you need anything else.

Regards,”

Thanks,
Tony

Yeah, VPS usually doesn’t limit anything. But, the lack of errors points to some limit that is not logged as error.

In any case, if you can’t make it work, please open the refund request, and I will issue the refund.

Hi Milan,
I hope you could help me resolve the problem, and I don’t mean that I need the refund for the plugin.
Infact, I was able to get the plugin to work on my other sites, but http://vkool.com/.
Anyways, your plugin is worth the money paid.
I was able to get support by Websynthesis to repair and optimize the database in the server level.

I hope you can further improve the Smart Cleanup Tool plugin’s performance as well as your other plugins, so your tools can be extremely beneficial for WordPress websites.

Thanks for your support Milan,
Tony

It is very odd for plugin not to work, because it is used on hundreds of websites. But, I guess, it is hard to account for every type of server or configuration quirk that some servers might have.

Important thing is that you can use plugin on another server.

I plan to release new update in the early may with some improvements and some new cleanup tools.

Milan