Image insertion causing post to go blank

Try switching to the Twenty Ten theme to rule out any theme-specific problems.

Would that just be a five-minute test? Can I easily switch back again after checking? Could I lose any of my customisation in doing this? What I mean to say is… are there any risks, given that I’m a novice ??

Can I easily switch back again after checking?

Yes

Could I lose any of my customisation in doing this?

No.

Ok, thanks for the reassurance! However, I tried that. All my other photo essays were fine, but the Wadi el-Rayan one remained blank, just like before. So I guess it’s not a theme issue ??

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).

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

Hi,

It’s been a week since I’ve been able to work on this deeply troubling issue. I am revisiting it now, as I tried to do a small tweak to this post (where images that used to be next to each other have suddenly started appearing on top of each other) and found that this too made the whole post go blank. There seems to be no way to prevent this happening, aside from restoring my 11th May version of the post. I counted the images, and found there are 18. However, when I add the YouTube video and the two four-image galleries I have on the page, it comes to 21. One over the magic 20 mark. So I deduce that the issue seems to be related to media in general, not just images.

Anyway, I feel very nervous about disabling all my plugins. I will lose all my setting if I do that. Is there no alternative? I deleted all my deactivated plugins, but that didn’t solve the problem.

Warm wishes,

Robin

PS I deleted the final image in the photo essay referred to towards the top of this thread so that at least the rest of the photo essay could display, rather than having a thoroughly unprofessional blank post sitting there!

Most likely caused by an open <div>

https://validator.w3.org/check?verbose=1&uri=http%3a%2f%2fwww.robinwyatt.org%2fphotography%2fphoto-essays%2fwadi-el-rayan-egypt%2f

Hey,

Thanks, kmessinger. But I’m confused… I didn’t use <div> anywhere when I wrote the HTML for the page, and when I look at the HTML editor, I don’t see <div> anywhere. Yet following that URL you pasted in there shows <div> all over the place. The same goes for p elements. Any idea how to address this?!

Thanks again!

Everywhere you put an image a <div> is used. One problem is you have <div> inside <p> which is not allowed. Are you using the standard wp editor? It usually strips out <p>‘s.

There are 4 open <div> and you can try to chase them down or the easiest way might be to close them in the html view after your last image – just enter 4 </div>

Or add your 21st image and then close the <div> You may have to add 5 after adding an image.

Yes, it’s the standard WP editor. Is there an alternative? Anything that will show <div> and <p> wherever they should appear?

I don’t know how to chase down the open divs since I can’t see them, but I inserted the 21st image and tried inserting one, four and five closed divs at the very end of the post, but nothing worked. It’s currently blank now, so you can see what I mean.

What esmi said about the plugins is the best way to debug.

Ok, I was mistaken about the open divs – turned out that problem is caused by an unclosed

just below your copywrite, <div id="footer-widget-area"><ul>. You might want to try adding </ul> to the last post.

The editor is working fine. I can see the entry-content code and it is ok.

Umm… sorry, I got lost. Are you saying I should add this to the post? There is nothing in the post itself mentioning the footer widget area.

No. I meant for you to look in your footer widget to fix that. It was one of the validation errors.

Normally if you rename the plugin folder no settings are lost. Same with changing the theme. All of that is basic debug which solves about 99% of the problems. Since you tried the theme route, most likely the errors are being generated by a plugin that is not compatible with version 3.1. Also, an upgrade to the current wp might solve the problem.

Or just go back to the twenty photos but you will still have errors that will cause problems down the line for you or a viewer.

I’m delighted to say that I’ve FINALLY fixed this problem. I found the way after WordPress suddenly started displaying an ‘About’ box at the bottom of my photo essays. I searched to find a way to remove this, and found that the problem related to a page in my custom theme (based on TwentyTen) that must have been badly re-written from the original loop-single.php. I deleted the code that started “If a user has filled out their description, show a bio on their entries”, and the “About’ box stopped appearing. I then tried to put lots more photos into an essay than I’ve been doing till now, and the page didn’t go blank! I suppose that this isn’t a problem that others will experience, as it was caused by a slip up by my site designer. Still, I’m reporting here for the sake of closure! Thanks to all who tried to help.