Posts not scheduling, feed not burning

Have you tried:

– deactivating all plugins to see if this resolves the problem. If this works, re-activate the plugins one by one until you find the problematic plugin(s).

– switching to the Twenty Eleven theme to rule out any theme-specific problems.

– resetting the plugins folder by FTP or PhpMyAdmin. Sometimes, an apparently inactive plugin can still cause problems.

I haven’t tried any of those but I will. But why would it start to be a problem with the plugins or theme all of a sudden? it was working fine for months and nothing has been updated lately.

If nothing was updated for months, how did you manage to run WordPress 3.4.2?

Sorry for the confusion. I meant that I have not updated my theme or my plugins recently. I have updated WP as you noted.

However, I did try all three steps you noted above and the feed still is not working. I tried pinging from Feedburner after each of the plugins were deactivated and then each reactivated and it still didn’t work. I also pinged after adjusting the theme as well as after resetting the plugins folder and still no luck.

I’d welcome any other suggestions. Thanks!

FWIW, I also updated my cron files with backed up version from when it was working yesterday and still no change. I just tried sending another scheduled post and it still says “missed schedule”.

Again, I am assuming these problems are related but I can’t figure out what to do about either of them.

Can we see the site using the Twenty Eleven theme with all plugins deactivated?

Ok, here is a link to my duplicate development site. I deactivated all plugs ins and switched to the twenty Eleven theme. https://joyfullyjay.com/dev/

This site was created in the last two weeks to be an exact duplicate of my main site (one was just copied from the other). During that time, the feed and scheduling on my blog worked fine. The only thing that has changed on either site over that time is the upgrade to the latest version of WP which I made in both places. So this should reflect exactly what my main site has in terms of plugins, etc. The only difference is that the feed pulls from the main site.

If you need to see the other one, I can do that, but I’d really rather not switch it over during prime US daytime hours. Unfortunately twenty ten cuts out way too much of my design to be functional and if the theme is going to be down for any period, it needs to be a less heavily trafficked time. Or at least I would need to pick a short specific time to have it down for you to look at it.

THanks so much, I really appreciate your help! JJ

The feed appears to be working fine on that site. Are both sites on the same physical server?

Yep, my main site is joyfullyjay.com and this is joyfullyjay.com/dev. They just made a copy and posted it on the subsite but they are located on the same server. (FWIW, I did check with my host and they see no problems on their end).

How were you determining the feed was working there? I just realized that the structure of the sites are the same, but the posts are not. The main site has been updated since I built the dev site but this one has not, b/c I am not making posts here. So the dev site feed shows the latest post I made there, but obviously none of my recent posts.

The problem on my main site started some time after Sunday morning’s Coming Soon post. That is the latest post that shows on my feed no matter how many times I am pinging. Since then I have had five new posts. None of them went as scheduled (each said “Missed schedule” and I had to force the post). And none are showing up on the feed even though they are live.

FWIW, when I try to “resync” with Feedburner, I get two errors, one of which say “Null” and one that says There is an issue that must be addressed with your source feed for the feed “Joyfully Jay”” I have no idea what that means though. Do you know?

Thanks!

Just a few more notes. I looked at the dev site again and a post that had been scheduled to go live yesterday didn’t work there either (it was the only one out of the five that had been scheduled when I created the mirror site). So the problem with the scheduling is in both places, and again, nothing has changed recently in either site other than updating WP.

I just ran another test post on the dev site now that it has no plug ins activated and the twenty ten theme, and it didn’t post as scheduled either. So apparently whatever is causing the problem on the main site is also causing the problem on the mirror site and it doesn’t seem to be the plug ins or theme that is the culprit.

How were you determining the feed was working there?

I examined the feed file itself – both its content and its source markup.

a post that had been scheduled to go live yesterday didn’t work there either

The cron post scheduling works off visits to the site. And this is where it becoe difficult to confirm anything from a dev site as it is likely that the number of visits to the dev site have ranged from zero to hardly any at all.

Yeah my guess is the only people who have hit the dev site are you and I.

It sounds like other people who had this problem ( or something similar) had success editing their cron files. But the posts I found about it were all from at least a year ago and the changes dealt with an older version of WP. my instinct is that is the problem with the scheduling bc I found a plug in that fixed the problem – sort of. Basically it waits for the post to miss and then somehow figures out it and posts it about five minutes late. So obviously this is a bandaid, not a solution but I was desperate. But it seems to indicate the cron file is the problem. I just have no idea what to do to fix it.

Can you tell whether my main feed has any errors? As I said, it pings successfully but I get an error when I try to resync. Thanks!

The feed on the dev site is up-to-date and completely valid. Not sure wha tto suggest about wp-cron not firing. How much traffic does the main site get? Is any of its content limited in any way?

Nothing is limited, I get several hundred visitors a day so not tons.

Can you tell if the main feed is valid? Or any ideas what to do if it is not? This is just so frustrating bc it came out of nowhere and nothing I am trying is fixing it. The bandaid fix is at least handling the scheduling (altho it is ugly) but the feed problem is majorly affecting my traffic and I have no idea how to fix it. I just have no idea what to do from here.

Can you tell if the main feed is valid?

You haven’t provided a link to the live site.