Support

Problems forwarding to Gmail / AOL / Other email address

Re: Forwarded emails not arriving, no bounce message

Many free email services such as Gmail, AOL, Hotmail (and ISPs) are constantly tightening up their spam systems and are being increasingly particular about which emails they allow in to their system.

If you find that forwarding email to one of these addresses is simply ‘disappearing’, ie. no bounce message then you can be safe in assuming that your email alias (address) is temporarily blocked from the target mail system.

Why does this happen?

Let’s assume you are doing all the right things. ie Your SPF record is correctly set, your MX records are correct.

When forwarding emails from your parked domain name, you are also forwarding SPAM to your destination email address. If you send enough SPAM messages then you will block your own alias. Often the block is only in place for a limited time, for example 24 hours. Then it will start working again and once you have forwarded enough SPAM the block is re-applied. Does this sound like the problem you are experiencing?

What can you do?

  • If you are receiving SPAM to your forwarding alias then try a new alias. This will be a suitable solution until you again start receiving SPAM to this new alias.
  • Try to keep your alias names as unexposed as possible to reduce the SPAM sent to them.
  • Create a Mailbox for your alias. The Mailbox will receive 100% of emails sent to it.
  • Do not use forwarding aliases for important or mission critical applications, use a Mailbox.
If you require any  further assistance or advice do not hesitate to contact support.
External resources:

Plesk Backup Manager Not Working – Missing Tables BackupsSettings, BackupsScheduled, BackupsRunning

Re: Backup Manager Not Working in Plesk

If you get the following message when trying to run a backup in Plesk using the Backup Manager then it is likely that a previous upgrade or installation of the Backup Manager did not complete and so there will be some missing tables.

0: common_func.php3:206
db_query(string 'select `value` from `BackupsSettings` WHERE `param` = 'backup_ftp_settinghost' AND `id` = 6 AND `type` = 'domain'')
1: common_func.php3:253
db_query_ex(string 'select `value` from `BackupsSettings` WHERE `param` = '?(paramName)' AND `id` = ?(objectId) AND `type` = '?(objectType)'', array)
2: BackupFTPRepositorySettings.php:205
BackupFTPRepositorySettings->getRepositorySettingsValue(string 'backup_ftp_settinghost')
3: BackupFTPRepositorySettings.php:43
BackupFTPRepositorySettings->init()
4: BackupFTPRepositorySettings.php:25
BackupFTPRepositorySettings->__construct()
5: BackupFTPRepositorySettings.php:283
BackupFTPRepositorySettingsDomain->__construct(integer '6')
6: client.domain.backup.php:8
plesk__client__domain__backup->getBackupFTPRepositorySettings()
7: backup.ftp-repository.php:35
__backup__ftp_repository->getDumpsStorageCredentials()
8: backup.ftp-repository.php:29
__backup__ftp_repository->getRepositoryList()
9: backup.abstract-repository.php:44
__backup__abstract_repository->accessItemsList(string 'GET', NULL null)
10: backup.abstract-repository.php:26
__backup__abstract_repository->accessItem(string 'GET', NULL null)
11: UIPointer.php:596
UIPointer->access(string 'GET')
12: plesk.php:38

The Plesk Backup Manager needs the following tables in the PSA database:

  • BackupsSettings
  • BackupsScheduled
  • BackupsRunning

Execute the following SQL in phpMyAdmin to create the missing tables:

CREATE TABLE IF NOT EXISTS `BackupsSettings` (
`id` int(10) unsigned default NULL,
`type` enum('domain','client','server') NOT NULL default 'domain',
`param` varchar(255) NOT NULL default '',
`value` varchar(255) character set utf8 default NULL,
UNIQUE KEY `index1` (`id`,`type`,`param`)
) ENGINE=InnoDB DEFAULT CHARSET=latin1;

CREATE TABLE IF NOT EXISTS `BackupsScheduled` (
`id` int(10) unsigned NOT NULL auto_increment,
`obj_id` int(10) unsigned NOT NULL,
`obj_type` enum('server','reseller','client','domain') NOT NULL,
`repository` enum('local','ftp') NOT NULL default 'local',
`last` datetime default NULL,
`period` int(10) unsigned NOT NULL,
`active` enum('true','false') NOT NULL,
`processed` enum('true','false') NOT NULL,
`rotation` int(11) NOT NULL default '0',
`prefix` varchar(255) character set utf8 default NULL,
`email` varchar(255) character set utf8 default NULL,
`split_size` int(10) unsigned NOT NULL default '0',
`suspend` enum('true','false') NOT NULL default 'false',
`with_content` enum('true','false') NOT NULL default 'true',
`backup_day` int(10) unsigned NOT NULL default '0',
`backup_time` time NOT NULL default '00:00:00',
PRIMARY KEY (`id`)
) ENGINE=InnoDB DEFAULT CHARSET=latin1 AUTO_INCREMENT=17 ;

CREATE TABLE IF NOT EXISTS `BackupsRunning` (
`sessionId` varbinary(250) NOT NULL,
`param` varchar(250) character set ascii NOT NULL,
`val` varbinary(255) default NULL,
PRIMARY KEY (`sessionId`,`param`)
) ENGINE=InnoDB DEFAULT CHARSET=latin1;

This will resolve the problem, the Backup Manager will now work correctly!

How to get removed from Google Blacklist

Re: Site Blacklisted in Google because of Malware

Ok, so you have cleaned up the malware on your website but find that your site is still blacklisted by Google and you are too impatient to wait for Google to automatically re-scan your website. Then it’s time for you to request a review directly to Google.

This is required if you want to quickly remove your site from Google’s blacklist. Once you submit the request, it’ll take just a few hours to complete the review and remove the warning if your site is clean. Without the request, it may take

The request does two important things:several days before your site’s status is cleared.

1) It tells Google that the owner of the site is aware of the problem and has already taken action to remove malicious content. This shifts the odds in your favour when they make decisions after ambiguous results of scans.

2) It puts the site on a priority list (it should be scanned within 24 hours)

Don’t be afraid to request the review even if you are not sure that your site is completely clean. If any security issues are detected during the review, they will be reported in your Webmaster Tools account. Then you can fix them and request another review.

Blacklisted sites are not removed from search results (they are just labeled as potentially harmful), so you only need to remove the warning.

You can request a review of your site using Google Webmaster Tools:

http://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/

More information about the review process is available in Google’s Webmaster Help Center.

http://www.google.com/support/webmasters/bin/answer.py?answer=45432

Why do I get a blank page or 500 Internal Server error?

Re: Blank page or 500 Internal Server error

The problems are caused by your code failing. A blank page is usually a PHP error so checking your PHP error_log within your Plesk panel will provide causes as to what the problem is. Usually the best course of action is to re-upload your website or restore from a recent backup.

A 500 internal server error is usually related to a scripting issue using CGI or Perl scripts. Again, this means the script is unable to execute and this generic error which does not give much away means you need to check your scripts or simply upload / restore to your last working copy.

Both of these errors means a quick call to your web designer or just restore from your latest backup in the Backup manager (You do take backups right?!)

How to Disable WordPress Comments Block

Re: Disable and Remove Comments from ALL pages without Deleting them

If you are suffering from comment spam but don’t want to delete the comments and just want to disable the comments block from all of you pages in one go, simply do the following.

Locate the file page.php fore your active theme

Find this line:

<?php comments_template(); ?>

Change it to this:

<?php // comments_template(); ?>

The comment block will no longer display and neither can any new comments be posted.