./images/avatars directory not writable even though...

[kh99]

Yeah, I didn't answer that question the first time because we have a dedicated server with an admin guy, so I don't understand everything about how it's set up (that's the site I work on, not vbulletin.org - I have no idea about this site). Anyway, ours is set to 775, but I think that works because the web server user's group and the "group" of the file are the same (again I'm talking about the linux concept of a group and not vbulletin).

I think the vb help says to set it to 777 so that you don't have to figure out all that stuff. I think it's safe to use 777.

[Snowhog]

Thank you. chmod to 0777 on the ./images/avatars directory as well as the sub-directory thumbs but left the index.html file in both directories at 0644.

AdminCP > Maintenance > General Update Tools > Rebuild Custom Avatar Thumbnails and Rebuild Avatar Thumbnails no longer complains that it can't write there.

Still, even after that, and clearing the system cache, no one other than the Administrators has their avatars showing, nor their profile pictures.

--------------- Added [DATE]1353273912[/DATE] at [TIME]1353273912[/TIME] ---------------

Originally Posted by Stefan118

But this crossed my mind...
Do you save your images in your database or on the filesystem?
That could explain something.

Found it. Images are currently being served from the database

[kh99]

Looking at the html source on your site I don't see any code for the avatar on normal users, so it couldn't be a permission error (and write permissions would only affect uploading new ones). Or maybe I just happened to look at a user that had no avatar - can you link to a thread with a user you know should have an avatar?

Have you tried temporarily disabling hooks to see if there's a problem with a mod?

[Snowhog]

Here you go.

http://www.kubuntuforums.net/member....73-vinnywright

--------------- Added [DATE]1353274122[/DATE] at [TIME]1353274122[/TIME] ---------------

Originally Posted by kh99

Have you tried temporarily disabling hooks to see if there's a problem with a mod?

There haven't been any MODS added prior to this issue being reported.

[kh99]

I see no avatar code, so I guess the forum thinks that user has no avatar for some reason, or else there's a mod affecting it. (Edit: I couldn't see the user's profile since I'm not logged in. Does the avatar show up there?).

BTW, just noticed your forum is about linux, so sorry if I was explaining stuff that you probably know better than I do.

[Snowhog]

The only 'addition' to our forum was the installation of ZB BLOCK, but it operates totally within it's own directory -- it doesn't touch anything outside of that. And, it was installed seven days ago, and I do remember seeing everybody's avatars after that. This issue seems to have presented itself within the past few days.

Originally Posted by kh99
Have you tried temporarily disabling hooks to see if there's a problem with a mod?

How does one 'temporarily disable hooks'? On a MOD per MOD basis, or 'globally'?

[kh99]

Oh..check the usergroup manager, look at the "Can Upload Custom Avatars" setting. According to the code if the user has a custom avatar but that permission is set to "No", no avatar will display.

[Snowhog]

Can Upload Profile Pictures and Can Upload Custom Avatars are both set to Yes.

We are using the database to store these image files.

[kh99]

To answer the above question I missed - to disable hooks you can edit includes/config.php and put this somewhere in the file (after the <?php line at the top):

define('DISABLE_HOOKS', true);

But like you said, if you haven't added anything it probably won't be that. You might try disabling zbblock just to make sure, but I don't really see how that could cause this problem.

So that user has a custom avatar? And if you go to the user's profile, can you see it there? I'm kind of out of ideas.

[Snowhog]

I already disabled zbblock earlier -- it didn't make a difference, and I didn't believe it would. But it was an attempt to 'eliminate' zbblock as a possible cause.

The user 'had' a custom avatar. It isn't showing in his user profile now, as is the case with all our other members who had avatars. As I said, this issue is affecting everyone except for the members of the Administrators and Retired Administrators usergroups.

When I set the permissions on the ./images/avatars directory/sub-directory and ran the rebuild maintenance options, I saw lots of image files being updated -- in the database.

I guess I could execute the Move Items from Database into File System. I'll have to change the permissions on the ./customavatars and ./customprofilepics directories before doing so.