For info on testing for conflicts and other troubleshooting tips, see: Self-Service Guide.

Installation

Download the Health Check plugin from the WordPress.org repository, and upload and install the .zip file to your WordPress/WooCommerce site.

Or use the WordPress Dashboard:

1. Log in to your WordPress/WooCommerce site.
2. Go to: Plugins > Add New.
3. Search for Health Check & Troubleshooting.
4. Select Install Now, and then Activate.

Usage

Backup

Before troubleshooting, it’s best practice to make a backup of your site as a failsafe. More info at: Backing Up WordPress Content.

Overview

Health Check includes a good, general overview of your WordPress installation. In comparison, the WooCommerce System Status Log is more in-depth.

To access the Health Check overview, go to: Tools > Site Health:

Troubleshooting

Health Check’s true power is its troubleshooting mode, allowing you to switch the theme and test plugins without impacting visitors to your site.

To troubleshoot, go to Tools > Site Health > Troubleshooting and then select Enable Troubleshooting Mode.

Once in Troubleshooting Mode, you can control which theme and plugins are enabled in the troubleshooting session. Initially, all plugins are disabled.

To test WooCommerce, go to Plugins, and click Enable while Troubleshooting

When viewing your site, you’ll see your own specific session where the theme and plugins are set by Health Check. When visitors view your site, it appears normal.

At this point, perform any necessary tests. If necessary, you can enable further plugins while troubleshooting, from the Plugins page.

Note that Troubleshooting Mode does not put a payment gateway into sandbox mode, so if you place an order while in troubleshooting mode, live payment will be taken.

To disable Troubleshooting Mode at any time, selecting Disable Troubleshooting Mode on your site’s Dashboard or via the Admin bar.

The post Troubleshooting using Health Check first appeared on CODIBU.

A conflict is an error or malfunction caused by two parts of code giving conflicting signals. For example, plugin A gives the signal to put the order in “Completed” status and plugin B prevents this from happening.

Themes and plugins provide additional functionality and features — it also means more code is running on your website and the risk of incompatibility is higher. We strive to ensure compatibility with our own extensions, but third-party products made for WooCommerce are not guaranteed to work with our software. In this documentation page, we will explain how to test for plugin and theme conflicts.

How to do a conflict test

Testing is the only way to determine what is causing a conflict.

Backups and staging

We highly recommend making a backup of your site. Deactivating and reactivating plugins typically doesn’t cause issues, but having a good backup will save you a lot of time and energy on the rare occasion it does.

Most hosting providers offer a backup plan. If not, there are two options:

• Consider Jetpack Backup
• Use a Staging site – This is a clone of your production site — one that is processing orders and has visitors — where you can safely test conflicts without your live site being affected and potentially losing revenue. Most hosting providers can help with this. Or, on most hosting platforms, you can also use the WP Staging plugin to create a clone in your Dashboard.

Deactivation and testing

To troubleshoot theme and plugin conflicts:

1. Switch to a default WordPress theme, such as Twenty Nineteen to see if the issue persists.
   • If no, your theme is causing the issue. You can: a) change your theme; b) contact the author of the theme and ask them to fix it.
   • If yes, go to the next step.
2. Temporarily deactivate all plugins except WooCommerce and the WooCommerce extensions you’re experiencing issues with.
3. Test if the conflict still exists. How to test it, depends on what type of conflict you were experiencing.
   • If the conflict occurred while browsing your site or the Dashboard, go to the same location. Examples of this would be:
     • A feature not working on the product edit screen
     • A button not showing on the cart page
   • If the conflict only happens after a certain process, recreate and follow those identical steps. Examples of this would be:
     • An order is marked “On Hold” instead of “Completed” after product A is added and paid for.
     • An error displays while adding two products to the cart.
   • If the conflict no longer exists, it means that the theme or plugins/extensions you deactivated were causing the conflict. If the conflict still exists, see ‘Drop-Ins and Must-Use’ and ‘Unsuccessful Conflict Tests’ below.
4. Determine which plugin is causing the conflict by:
   • reactivating them one by one
   • testing again after each reactivation. For process-related conflicts, this means recreating the same process over and over again.

Helpful tools

• Health Check is useful for debugging and requires an official default WordPress theme such as Twenty Nineteen or our own Storefront. With a few clicks, it deactivates all plugins and changes the theme while you’re logged in to that session and normal visitors to your site are unaffected. More details at: Troubleshooting with Health Check.
• Meks Quick Plugin Disabler remembers what plugins you had active when you’re done testing.

Drop-ins and must-use

On some sites is a “Must-Use” and/or “Drop-ins” section in the plugins list. These cannot be deactivated by you directly, but they can be the cause of the conflict.

• Some of these plugins are installed by another plugin. The function as a “helper plugin”. While doing a conflict test, deactivating those other “parent” plugins will also deactivate these ones.
• Also, many hosting companies use drop-in and/or must-use plugins that they pre-install on your site because it helps with their server setup.

If the conflict persists in the latter case while doing the above tests, it might be caused by a drop-in installed by your host. For example, we’ve seen conflicts caused by drop-in caching plugins. In this case, you need to contact your hosting company for help with deactivation.

Unsuccessful conflict tests

Should nothing change/resolve with issues and/or errors you’re experiencing after testing for conflicts, it likely means there is another cause. Contact a WooCommerce.com Happiness Engineer via our Support Ticket. Please include a detailed description of:

• Steps which can be taken to replicate the issue
• Conflict tests you performed to exclude conflicts

The post How to Test for Plugin and Theme Conflicts first appeared on CODIBU.

The Understanding the WooCommerce System Status Report documentation page goes through the full report and related pages of the System Status.

Why check the system status?

It is important to know how to check your WooCommerce system status for a number of reasons, the following of which are outlined in the video tutorial below.

• How to check if you have the latest versions of the core WooCommerce plugin, the WooCommerce database, and your extensions.
• How to increase your PHP memory, if you have problems saving data (such as many variations).
• Payment Gateway transactions not logging aka logging is not writable.
• How to fix broken WooCommerce pages.
• How to rule out theme conflicts due to outdated theme template files.

The post Troubleshooting 101: Review WooCommerce System Status Report first appeared on CODIBU.

So with your precious data and content stored in different places, how should you safeguard it and keep it backed up?

Automatic backups

The most efficient and reliable approach is to use an automated site backup service for which we recommend Jetpack. Besides not having to rely on memory and manual procedures, you instantly benefit from:

• Unlimited storage space.
• Automated, regular backups of your entire site including database, content, media, plugins, themes, and settings.
• Instant restore service so that if something goes wrong you revert to an older version with one click.
• Direct access to 24/7 expert support.

Manual backups

If you wanted to do things the hard way, there are two parts to backing up your site content manually.

1. Go to Tools > Export – to export all of your site content. This contains all of your posts, pages, comments, etc. in a XML file.
2. To back up your theme files and plugin files, log into your site via FTP to find your files in the wp-content  folder. We strongly recommend making a backup of your theme files if you made any customizations.

Learn more

• WordPress backups at the WordPress Codex.
• Jetpack’s backup and security services.

We provide expert priority support for Jetpack customers but not third-party plugins.

The post Backing up WordPress Content first appeared on CODIBU.

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Prefer a written version of how to troubleshoot your site? No problem! Check out our Self Service Guide to Troubleshooting an Issue here.

The post Troubleshooting 101: Checking for Code Conflicts first appeared on CODIBU.

Pinpoint the Error

Here is an example of an fatal error similar to what you may see on your site:
 Fatal error: Call to a member function get_cart() on a non-object in .../html/wp-content/plugins/example-plugin-for-woocommerce/woo-integration/example-cart.php on line 2117  You will notice the message references /wp-content/plugins/example-plugin-for-woocommerce/ as the cause of the error. This means we need to either try updating that plugin or disable it to get around the error.

Log in to your site via FTP

Since you cannot log into your site via the WordPress Admin, accessing the folders containing these files via FTP is our only option.

If you are not familiar with how to connect to your website using FTP, it is best if you contact your hosting provider for further instructions.

Rename the conflicting plugin folder

Once you’ve logged into your site, navigate to the conflicting plugin folder.

By renaming the plugin folder you’ve effectively ‘disabled’ it, allowing you to once again access your WordPress Admin, which would then display the following error:

The plugin ‘does not exist’ because we renamed the folder.

Resolve the root of the issue

Many times we find customers contact us in support due to a conflict with an outdated third party extension or theme. If the plugin or theme was not developed and purchased directly from WooCommerce.com, we are not able to help troubleshoot this issue further. At this point, we would have to ask that you please contact the third party theme or plugin developer directly for assistance.

Updating is the most important step towards getting a quick resolution

Woo product causing error

If the theme or plugin causing the error is determined to be a Woo product, ensure that you have the latest version of the theme/plugin before contacting us.

To confirm you are running the latest version:

1. Log into WooCommerce.com and go to the My Downloads page.
2. Locate the product to confirm the version number matches the version number of the plugin on your site.

If updating the product does not help, you can open a new ticket and our Happiness Engineers would be happy to assist you.

Third-party product conflicts

When purchasing themes or extensions from third party developers, it can be helpful to ensure that the developer is reliable and responsive before you purchase or install the extension on your site.

If they do not stay up to date with WooCommerce API updates that are announced on woocommerce.wordpress.com, you run the risk of their files being outdated and possible conflict with new versions of the API.

The post Troubleshooting 101: Plugin Causing Fatal Error first appeared on CODIBU.

A common error in WordPress is an HTTP 500 error and will look something like the image below. This is not descriptive and will not help narrow down the cause of the issue. In production sites, it is best practice to show a generic error such as this one, but for the purposes of troubleshooting, we need more information.

Debugging

For most users getting more information is easy.

1. FTP into your website
2. Open the file named wp-config.php
3. Find the line where you see define('WP_DEBUG', false);
4. Change false to true and save the file

The next time you refresh the page you were getting an error on you should now see more descriptive error messages which will help in troubleshooting.

If the line is already set to true you may have another plugin or server configuration which is suppressing the error output.

The post Troubleshooting 101: More Info on Internal Server 500 Error first appeared on CODIBU.

Download the Invoice

If you need the invoice in PDF, you can get this from your WooCommerce.com account.

1/ Go to: WooCommerce.com > My account > Orders.

2/ Find the order you want the invoice for.

3/ Select either “View” or click on the order number.

4/ Below the list of products in the order, select “Download PDF Invoice”

The post Download a WooCommerce.com PDF Invoice first appeared on CODIBU.

Free trials are available for these extensions:

• Bookings
• Checkout Field Editor
• Deposits
• Follow-Ups
• Points And Rewards
• Pre-Orders
• Product Add-Ons
• Product CSV Import Suite
• Product Vendors
• Table Rate Shipping

More extensions may be added and the list will be updated, as necessary.

Requirements

• WordPress.com account

No domain name, hosting plan, or existing site/store is necessary.

How to Get Your 30-day Free Trial

This sets up a free test site with WooCommerce and the extension(s) installed and activated.

1/ Go to the product page of the extension you wish to test. You can click a link from the list above.

2/ Select the option Want to Test This Extension? on the right side.

3/ Select Create My Test Site when the pop-up displays.

4/ Select Log In to confirm that this is the correct WordPress.com account to connect with.

If this is the incorrect WordPress.com account, you can select Sign in as a different user or Get help connecting.

5/ View info on your newly created testwoo.com site/store, indicating:

• Number of days you have remaining in your 30-day trial
• Which extension you opted to test
• Where to get help, via our documentation to assist with setup and configuration

6/ Go to Plugins to view which extensions you’re testing. WooCommerce and the extension(s) are pre-installed and activated for you.

From this screen, it’s also possible to select Activate on other extensions to test at the same time, allowing you to understand how they work together.

Be aware that the 30-day trial starts from time of activation.

7/ Set up and configure the extension(s) using our documentation, and enjoy!

Once your 30-day trial is complete, the testwoo.com site will auto-delete.

FAQ

The extension I want to test is not on the list. When will you add it?

This is a new feature. Selection and schedule are unknown at this moment. This page will be updated as changes occur.

In the meantime, you can still ‘Buy and Try’ any extension you like at WooCommerce.com and receive Help Desk assistance, under our 30-day Money Back Guarantee.

I clicked the Support link on the plugin, and it doesn’t work.

See Questions and Support below.

The post Try WooCommerce.com Extensions first appeared on CODIBU.