invalid attachment problem

[Macsee]

Originally Posted by Lynne

If you look at the link for the attachment, somewhere it should say "attachmentid=xx". You may then look in the attachment table and see if there is a row where attachmentid equals xx. That will tell you if the attachment exists still. Now, in that same row, please note the filedataid for that attachment. I'll call that zz.

Does that link have anything in it like "thumb=yy" ?

The attachmentid=100 exists in the db table. There's also an entry for filedataid in that row but it has a different number.

The link is in the form of

[ATTACH=xx]

and there is no thumb= element to it.

[Lynne]

The thumb=yy I am talking about is in the source code of the page.

[Macsee]

The source code is in the form of

<a href="http://myforums.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=137"  title="Name:  
Views: 
Size:  ">Attachment 137</a><br />

This is driving me nuts

I've spent all morning trying various things. I've logged on as one of the users who has several times in the past used attachments in his posts which are now leading to the invalid attachment message. I've created posts using his ID and added attachments to those posts.

I then had a look in the database. A couple of his attachments have a long entry in the posthash column of the attachments table. Example: c894c3d7090186aab36092639773d91f. Any idea what that is about? (Those show up with attachmentIDs in the tables, but with contentID of "0").

At least one of his old attachments seems to have completely disappeared from the database (the relevant number isn't in the attachmentID column). How could an attachment disappear from the database? I think this is the biggest problem.

[Lynne]

If I recall correctly, the posthash column is used when the attachment is initially being attached. Once the post is actually posted (which includes posting the attachments), then that posthash should be removed. Any attachment with something in the posthash column should give an Invalid Attachment message (I am pretty sure) because the attachment was never actually posted validly (is that a word?!?!).

[Macsee]

Thanks, Lynne. Any idea why causes attachments to disappear from the database? It seems to be not just my forum, I've found a few threads on this both here and in vbulletin.com (some are complaints about attachments getting deleted, but some are the practical implications i.e. attachments in posts not working).

I'm aware of the time limit users have - once an attachment has been uploaded it needs to be inserted in a post with a certain time frame (I think it's an hour). The attachments that disappear seem to be ones that have been inserted and used in posts.

[Lynne]

I knew a guy who was having missing attachments, but only of certain types (not the .torrent files, only all others)! It was odd. I don't know if he ever figured it out. I had always figured someone was hacking him directly but never got server logs to look into it. But, it is something to consider.

[Macsee]

OK, someone has just posted an attachment in the last five minutes which lets me observe what's happening.

If I click on the attachment link I can see the attachment. But I know it's going to disappear (ALL this user's attachments disappear).

So I've quickly logged in to PMA to see what the table is showing at the current time. The unusual markers are 1) there is an entry in the posthash column and 2) the contentID column says 0. Also, for some reason, this isn't the last record. It's placed six places from the bottom and is followed by lower numbered attachments from last week.

--------------- Added [DATE]1342521303[/DATE] at [TIME]1342521303[/TIME] ---------------

And now the attachment is gone!

There is no entry in the database with that number!

Invalid Attachment specified. If you followed a valid link, please notify the administrator

Arrghh!!

[Lynne]

That all sounds very odd.

Have you tried totally disabling ALL your modifications and then having this user add an attachment and viewing what happens?

[Macsee]

Thanks for staying with me on this, Lynne.

I keep talking about this user, but I don't believe it's unique to him. It's just that he uses attachments sometimes and almost nobody else does!

I don't have many mods and just a very few pretty standard plugins - Thank You hack/GlowHost/Easy Forms. I did consider disabling all of those when I took over this user's account to do some testing last week, but there didn't seem any point turning off the plugins as the problem precedes the installation of the plugins.

BTW, I don't know if it's relevant, but the only attachments anyone ever makes at my forum are images (png, jpg, gif).

[Lynne]

Do you have a test site - a duplicate of your live site? It may be easier to do these sort of tests on a test site and be able to leave the live site alone.