database error – aagh!

Change the theme to the default un-modified theme and see if you still get the error.

Did you activate any new themes or plugins before the error, if so disable them?

Warning: Cannot modify header information
This is often theme or plugin related, whitespace, empty lines or a closing tag at the end of functions.php, or a whitespace or a missing closing php tag in a plugin or theme file.

The file functions.php is the only theme file where the file should not have a closing php tag ?>

Also whitespace, empty lines os missing closing php tag at the end of an edited file can cause this, if you have edited any files then check for whitespace, empty lines or missing closing php tags ?> at the end of the files, to do this in your editor select all and look at the end of the file.

HTH

David

Yeah, I can’t even log into to see anything to disable. I was playing about with a plugin and must have broken it. I ftp’d in and deleted the plugin directory but I fear it has jiggered something else up!

I did not touch any other files

I looked in the functions.php and see the missing ?> and left it.

Man I am freaking as we put a heap of work into this and am terrified it is lost

OK I went in and saw a space before the opening php in the wp-config file and fixed it. Then it came up with this . . .
One or more database tables are unavailable. The database may need to be repaired.

The word repaired was a link, so I clicked it and it said add a line to the wp-config file and reload the page.

define(‘WP_ALLOW_REPAIR’, true);

I did this and it ran through some stuff and it said all is good. So I reloaded the wp-admin page and now the error simply states in big black letters . . .
Error establishing a database connection

These are just suggestions, I am not that up on this part of WordPress, just what I would do.

If I have backend MSQL access check the database, check with my ISP if they can restore the whole website and database to a specified time from a last good backup, they should have incremental backups.

Other Options:
Check the MYSQL Connection strings in wp-config.php are correct.

Maybe save the wp-config.php as wp-config.old backup the database, and see if the setup runs again when I run the website, recreates the wp-config.php file for me, and if I can then connect to admin and the database.

HTH

David

Here’s what the “repair” page said . . .

The wp_users table is okay.

The wp_usermeta table is okay.

The wp_posts table is okay.

The wp_comments table is okay.

The wp_links table is okay.

The wp_options table is okay.

The wp_postmeta table is okay.

The wp_terms table is okay.

The wp_term_taxonomy table is okay.

The wp_term_relationships table is okay.

The wp_commentmeta table is okay.

Repairs complete. Please remove the following line from wp-config.php to prevent this page from being used by unauthorized users.
define(‘WP_ALLOW_REPAIR’, true);

So it says all is good, but when I remove the allow repair line in wp-config.php it throws the database error line.

Any clues?

It looks like it only checks the wp- tables, it could be the bad plugin added code to wp-config.php or to .htaccess, check these files.

Check the MYSQL Connection strings in wp-config.php are correct, and for any whitespace.

HTH

David

Thanks for your help Dave, I really appreciate it.
Will see if the host can restore the database

Just found out they did a total backup 10 hours ago, so I will just wipe it out and start again. sigh