Feed isn’t pulling any items

Hi @tcwaters,

Can you please check if the feeds are imported into your site?

You can check it by going to your WP-Admin > RSS Aggregator > Feed Items and see if you have some imported feed items there.

I do not have any imported items. I have a red error that says the feed URL is incorrect. However, if I plug the feed URL into Firefox, or Chrome, it works, so I am unclear what is not correct about the feed URL.

This is a multi-site install of WordPress using subdomains, and the feed is coming from one subdomain:

pages.pharmacy.pitt.edu/epittpharmacy

To be displayed on another subdomain:
pages.pharmacy.pitt.edu/pharmacogenetics

The feed is for a category on the source site.

Some more follow up:

1) I am certain I have the feed correct. I’ve checked it via Firefox, Chrome and IE. I can also click the “validate feed” link and it is a valid URL.

2) In the “Edit Feed” window, under the “Feed Preview” is where there is a red error message that says “Invalid Feed URL”

3) The URL that validates via https://validator.w3.org is https://www.pages.pharmacy.pitt.edu/epittpharmacy/category/pharmacogenetics/feed/

Hi @tcwaters,

We have tried to fetch your Feed URL https://pages.pharmacy.pitt.edu/epittpharmacy/category/pharmacogenetics/feed/ on our end and we’re able to import the posts.

Please see the result in the screenshot below:

Do you have another site on another server that you can try this on?

You can also test this on our Simple Feeds Bundle demo, if you’d like to.

If you can get this work on another site/server, then the issue might lie on your server setting.

Please contact your hosting provider and make sure that they fulfill all the requirements listed here.

OK,
Tested with your demo pack. Thanks for the link that is a very useful tool! The feed works just fine.

Tested on a different server and site here at Pitt, and I have the same problem as experienced on initial server.

All of our servers are running PHP 7.1.1, and WP Cron should be working. I’m going to use a cron testing plugin to see if that provides any data to help solve this.

Tested the plugin on a server where I have the plugin Advanced Cron Manager Pro installed. It provides the ability to run specific cron tasks and then review the log. According to this plugin, the cron tasks run, and the log captures no info except for a delay: Delay: 208.516 s

I have also tested a feed from an external site (my personal blog) and this feed is properly imported.

So, here is what I have
1) Feed from Pitt Server 1 imported to Pitt Server 2- receive an error
2) Feed from Pitt Server 2 imported to Pitt Server 1- receive an error
3) Feed from external site imported to Pitt server 1- success
4) Feed from Pitt server 1 imported to external site- success

I’m not sure how to interpret this to know what to ask the server admin to do. Can you offer any comments?

Hi @tcwaters,

Thank you for running that thorough tests!

Can you please running another test here:

5) Feed from external site imported to Pitt server 2
6) Feed from Pitt server 2 imported to external site

If the result of both 5) and 6) is an error, then it might conclude that the problem is with your Pitt server 2 site.

But if both 5) and 6) is also a success, then the problem might be occurring when you’re importing from the same host/server.

You also said before that you’d like to import from one subdomain to another subdomain. By default, that should be no issue with our plugins, at least nothing that we ever heard for.

But you might also want to check your multisite installation, if there might be a problem that can prevent the import between your subdomains.

We also still recommend speaking with your hosting provider, if they can provide more info from their logs that might give you a hint for this problem.

Eric,

First test 6:
This succeeds. Just like test 4.

Now, test 5 (and also test 3)

I wasn’t totally clear enough the other day in my message. When I am on the “edit feed source” page, feed items appear in the “Feed Preview” box. BUT, if I add the shortcode to a WP page and publish, the page says “no feed items found”

Hi @tcwaters,

The appearing of the feed items in the “Feed Preview” box doesn’t mean those items are really imported to your site.

While doing test 3) and test 5), please check if you have the items actually imported to your site or not. You can do this by going to your WP-Admin > RSS Aggregator > Feed Items and see if you have your feed items there.

If from test 3) and test 5) you have failed in importing the feeds, then it would conclude that both your Pitt server 1 and 2 are blocking the incoming feeds for the way WP RSS Aggregator import them.

Please let your hosting provider know the result of your testing here and see what they come up with.

Eric,
In test 3 and 5, the feed items are not automatically imported. However, if I use the plugin “cron manager” to execute the associated cron jobs, the feed items do get imported.

Does the fact that the items appear in the Feed Preview, but are not automatically imported– does that offer any info to help identify what is causing the problem?

I have been sharing all of this with the server administrator, but he has no idea what is causing the problem.

Our web servers are Windows virtual servers, if that offers any clue too.

So, I’m back to tests 1 and 2. Using Cron Manager to execute the cron tasks (above), does not import the feed items for these feeds from the internal servers.

Eric,
Also, in the “Feed Sources” screen, when you click on Fetch Items” under the feed name– what is this supposed to do? In my testing on Pitt servers 1 and 2, I get a little turning arrow, but no items are imported.

However, triggering the cron tasks in the Advanced Cron Manager plugin, imports items from the external server

In the plugin “Advanced Cron Manager” it lists cron tasks, and there are thee or more tasks, all with the event name of “wprss_fetch_single_feed_hook” This is not the case on my external server. On it, there is on;y one task called “wprss_fetch_single_feed_hook”

Hi @tcwaters,

Thanks for following up with the result of your test.

So far, it might seem that the problem is with your WP-Cron or any cron system used on your site server.

WP RSS Aggregator requires WP Cron to work in order to function correctly. Even for a manual fetching (by hitting the Fetch Items), it still requires cron since the fetching job will be triggered by WP Cron.

If WP Cron is not working properly for any reason, WP RSS Aggregator cannot ensure that the feed source imports are run.

Your cron might have stuck whenever it tries to import or fetch your feeds. It could be due to many reasons. The simple one might be the limited resources you have on your site and you might need to increase it in order to get things work. But it could also be just some settings that need to be configured properly.

For this, you can try consulting with your hosting provider again as they should have known better about this.