Blank screen on install.php - SOLVED

guyr · Post by **guyr** » 07 Aug 2005, 18:50

Mantis and PHP newbie. I'm attempting to set up Mantis 1.0.0rc1 using PHP 5.0.2 and Apache 2.0.54 on Mandrake 10.1 i586. phpinfo shows the following extensions loaded:

ctype
dbx
ftp
gettext
iconv
mysql
pcre
pgsql
posix
session
sysvsem
sysvshm
yp

The fact that phpinfo works I suppose means that Apache is talking with PHP5 correctly. However, when I try to bring up the admin/install.php page, I just get a blank page. View source shows only the HTML and BODY tags. If I run the admin/check.php page, it shows this:

Warning: preg_match: internal pcre_fullinfo() error -3 in /data/htdocs/pub/mantis/core/config_api.php on line 39

Warning: preg_match_all: internal pcre_fullinfo() error -3 in /data/htdocs/pub/mantis/core/config_api.php on line 393

Fatal error: Call to undefined function db_is_connected() in /data/htdocs/pub/mantis/core/config_api.php on line 47

My goal is to run Mantis on PostgreSQL, but I found a message in the mailing list archives that said a blank page is caused by the absence of the PHP5 MySQL module, so I added that even though I don't want it. Unfortunately, results remain the same.

All help greatly appreciated, thanks.

thraxisp · Post by **thraxisp** » 07 Aug 2005, 20:11

A quick google on this error message seems to indicate that php and/or apache were not compiled correctly (the pcre errors). With this failing, I would expect that many things won't work properly. (Ref. http://lists.debian.org/debian-apache/2 ... 00109.html ).

guyr · Post by **guyr** » 08 Aug 2005, 06:47

Thanks, I found this Apache bug report for the same thing: http://issues.apache.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=27550

I tried modifying my local Apache build to address this but apparently did not succeed - segfault. So then I tried the version of Apache 2 (2.0.50) that comes with Mandrake 10.1 - and it works! D'oh!

Now I bring up the admin/install.php page and fill in the blanks for my local PG database; I have the Print SQL checkbox checked so that I can see what it is going to do. Unfortunately, when I click Install/Upgrade Database, it appears to do nothing. Or perhaps it is generating a SQL file and I just don't know where?

BTW, at the top of install.php, both checks are good. If I run the admin/check.php page, everything is reported good except for the database connection. That's because it is attempting to use the default database name "bugtracker" with username root, which is not how my database is set up. I tried giving install.php both an existing database name and a new one, and neither appears to do anything.

Is the install page generating a log file anywhere that I can read to see what is wrong? Help is greatly appreciated.

thraxisp · Post by **thraxisp** » 08 Aug 2005, 21:16

Once you enter the database information, it should validate the information (printing about 10 lines) and then try to access the database. The button you checked should print the required SQL queries, rather than applying them to the database.

Are there any errors in your apache log?

guyr · Post by **guyr** » 09 Aug 2005, 00:22

Thanks for pointing out what I should see. On a lark, I tried switching browswers - and it worked ;(. Mozilla 1.7.2 (full version, not Firefox) is the one that does nothing. I just tried Galeon 1.3.17 and it produced the results you describe.

I notice one odd thing in the generated output: "POSSIBLE PROBLEM: cannot write /var/www/html/mantis/config_inc.php".

But that directory shows this:

drwxr-xr-x 11 root root 7872 Aug 8 06:07 mantis/

and all files in the directory are owned by root:root. The Apache process is running as root, so I don't know why it was unable to write the file. Not a big deal, as it shows the required contents, I can create it manually.

guyr · Post by **guyr** » 09 Aug 2005, 06:16

After doing this once with the Print SQL checked to see what it was going to do, I decided to try it again with it unchecked to see if it would work with PostgreSQL 8.0. It does - very nice. My appreciation goes out to the developers.

For others who may try this, I wanted to point out something that may not be obvious from the naming of the fields on the install.php page. PG 8 has tablespace support, so I like to create the database manually in its own tablespace, then create a userid and schema name to go with the application - "mantis" in this case. You use an administrator account to create the database and schema, then give that schema create permission in the tablespace. My first pass through install.php, thinking like a PG DBA, for "user to create database" I supplied the administrator account userid. This is the wrong thing to do. That results in the Mantis tables being created in the public schema. Instead, you should give the "mantis" userid and password in those fields (as well as in the other two - "userid to connect".)

Post by **vboctor** » 09 Aug 2005, 12:15

I published a post on my blog regarding the fact that Mantis 1.0.0rc1 is working with PostgreSQL. I have also quoted guyr's hint :)

http://www.futureware.biz/blog/index.ph ... =1#more132

Regards,
Victor
Subscribe to Mantis blog
http://www.futureware.biz/

guyr · Post by **guyr** » 10 Aug 2005, 03:43

Just to close the loop on my installation attempts, I tried again with both Firefox and a later version of Mozilla (1.7.10 vs 1.7.2) - both worked fine. So I guess there is some compatibility issue with the earlier version. I just tried again with 1.7.2 and it didn't generate any Javascript errors. Whatever, if you encounter a problem where clicking the button does nothing, try a later version.