[Plugin: Google XML Sitemaps] Can't build site map

I have the same problem – the files exist and are writeable (777) but still it complains. :o(

the problem is how to get it to try to create it again, once it found that problem it does not give you the option to create the stupid sitemap again. i tried deactivating it and activating it but it has the same message it did not give the the option to create the sitemap again.

It seems to have done something even though the error message is still showing. The sitemap files are no longer empty (I copied empty files to my server) but they aren’t correct either. What I have done, and this appears to have worked, is to generate the initial xml files elsewhere (I used https://www.xml-sitemaps.com/), upload these and then the plugin appears to work (and the error message goes away). I will check the files on a regular basis to ensure that they are getting updated correctly.

thats a weird problem for such a popular plugin..
got the same issue!

There is a link on plugin admin screen saying something like debug mode… At the end of generating page you may see the error description. Try this it may help to understand what’s going wrong.

I have the same problem. Both files are there with the right permissions, but when I look at them they are blank.

somewhere was a suggestion to modify php.ini file for it.

there are two lines:

; Increase maximum post size
;post_max_size = 12M

; Increase execution time
;max_execution_time = 300

i tried tons of different numbers and no result.

Any more ideas what to do or an alternative plugin for a sitemap?

@andrusk: it depends on errors, plugin shows in debug mode.

it says:

Warning: is_writable() [function.is-writable]: open_basedir restriction in effect. File(/) is not within the allowed path(s): (/nfs:/tmp:/usr/local:/etc/apache2/gs-bin) in /nfs/c06/h05/mnt/93067/domains/domainname.com/html/news/wp-content/plugins/google-sitemap-generator/sitemap-core.php on line 1548

It looks like the story I had. So, here is the way I solved it:
I put the whole path in server’s terms as a custom sitemap file location. In your case it would be something like this (the absolute or relative path) /nfs/c06/h05/mnt/93067/domains/domainname.com/html/news/sitemap.xml (ut looks like the real path to your site’s root, if not? adjust accordingly)
and (URL) – https://yoursite.name/sitemap.xml (replace yoursite.name with actual name of your site)

Try to adjust these string for your site. and run sitemap generation… Hope it will help.