GZIP Headers Issue

Hello @crackajax ,

I checked your site and I don’t see this errror. Can you check this article https://www.howtoforge.com/firefox-content-encoding-error-google-chrome-error-330-net-err_content_decoding_failed-unknown-error and see if this will help with the issue?

kind regards,
Kasia

Hi, I’m having the same issue. I have your plugin installed on about 120 websites.

I went to the article but it is way over my head. While I am using PLESK to manage the sites, I do not have the technical background to understand the article.

When I turn off Hummingbird, the sites come up. So for now when the sites go down, I’ve disabled your plugin.

Any other suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,
Daphne

Hello @daphnetalbot ,

Solution from the article is to

turn on zlib.output_compression in your php.ini.

zlib.output_compression = On

If you don’t know how to do that on your server please contact your hosting provider so they can direct you how to do it on your server.

kind regards,
Kasia

I was having the same problem on my website https://www.hesaidorshesaid.com/ and solved it by clearing the hummingbird cache. It’s certainly a bandaid solution, but might be better than completely deactivating the plugin until you can solve the problem on the server side.

Hope this is helpful!

@amcookie,

Do you have “Serve compressed versions of cached files” option enabled in Page Caching?

Best regards,
Anton

Hi Anton,

Yes, I do. Do you think I should uncheck that option?

Best,
Ryne

@amcookie,

Yes, if your server is properly serving Gzip, that option will conflict with the server settings. It will be auto disabled on servers with gzip compression in the upcoming update.

Best regards,
Anton

@vanyukov

Great! Thanks for the tip!

I continue to be haunted by this issue. I keep getting reports from customers that my website is just a blank white page. I have followed all the advice given by the support entries here, including setting my PHP to zlib.output_compression = On.

Yes, a quick clear of cache fixes the issue until some time passes and it is back at a white screen. I have noticed that this is primarily a problem in Windows browsers as I usually do not see this on my Mac. Are there other solutions for this issue? Do you need more information from me or my site settings? Let me know if there is anything I can do to help as I would like to add this to all of my client sites, but am very hesitant with this issue.

Hello @crackajax

I trust you ate doing well!

The error Content Encoding Error happening when GZIP Compression is enabled. Please go to Hummingbird > Page Caching and deactivate “Serve compressed versions of cached files” option.

Please see this screenshot:
https://take.ms/zlXIg

This option should be active only when GZIP Compression is deactivated.

let us know how it went!

Kind regards,
Nastia

@wpmudev-support9 The option Serve compressed versions of cached files” was already disabled. Any other ideas?

Hi @crackajax

I’m wondering whether this actually is still the same issue. Is it a “totally blank page” or there’s still this error (or similar one) showing:

Error loading page: Content Encoding Error (net::ERR_CONTENT_DECODING_FAILED)

?

The blank page can actually be an issue of resources or cache (as in page cache) failing or even some completely different thing not necessarily related to Hummingbird. If you remove gzip compression rules from .htaccess does it still happen?

What if you keep the rules there but temporarily disable Hummingbird entirely and what if both rules are removed and Hummingbird disabled?

If you didn’t test it yet, would you give it a go to check it?

Best regards,
Adam

@wpmudev-support8 Hi Adam,

I went to Opera this time to test as I have not ben in that browser for some time. I am receiving a white screen, but in the developers tools I see it is reporting the ERR_CONTENT_DECODING_FAILED with a status of 200.

From there, I disabled Hummingbird, but still the same white page/error result. I then removed the GZIP from the .htaccess – still the same result.

Then, I disabled all plugins except ACF and still the same result. I then reactivated Hummingbird, still same result. But, I then cleared the cache in Hummingbird and viola! My page loaded again. I then reactivated all of my plugins and still good for the moment. But, this will happen again in a day or two (I have no idea how long it takes to do this again, but it gets reported by people trying to find my page fairly often.

I am really unsure of what to do, it does seem to be the Hummingbird caching. Any ideas from here?

Thanks,
Donnie

Hi @crackajax

Thank you for running this test and updating me.

You’re right, it does seem to be some sort of caching but… if Hummingbird plugin is disabled entire, it doesn’t serve anything from its cache. But if clearing cache after re-enabling Hummingbird helped, it suggests that there might be some additional cache involved in this.

I assume that since you disabled all the plugins, there’s no other caching plugin active. I don’t see the site going through the CloudFlare and don’t see any references there to any other caching plugins but what about some sort of server-side cache? Are you aware if there is any?

Kind regards,
Adam

Hi Adam,

I only got cache control headers set in my .htaccess, but no other caching going on.There are definitely no other caching plugins installed.

Thanks,
Donnie