Amassment Message Board

I run two different WordPress installs on my domain--one is my topic blog and the other is my update blog.

I log into the WP dashboard on each blog about every week on both blogs to purge spammy comments. On my topic blog, I can go to Comments > Spam and delete everything no problem, but on my update blog, I get a "500 Internal Server Error" every time I click to go to "Spam". Here's the text:

Internal Server Error

The server encountered an internal error or misconfiguration and was unable to complete your request.

Please contact the server administrator at {nonexistent email address} to inform them of the time this error occurred, and the actions you performed just before this error.

More information about this error may be available in the server error log.

Additionally, a 500 Internal Server Error error was encountered while trying to use an ErrorDocument to handle the request.

As far as I can tell, both WP installs are bug free and set up almost exactly the same way--I keep them updated on the same schedule and there's very little difference in the plugins they're running. What could be causing one install's spam comments to mess up versus the other one? (And where would I find the server error log? I've been poking around in my cPanel with no luck--kind of afraid to hit random buttons at this point xD)

Plugins on the topic blog:
- AddThis
- Akismet
- Evergreen Post Tweeter
- Limit Login Attempts
- Revive Old Post
- Tweet My Post
- Yet Another Related Posts Plugin

Plugins on the update blog:
- Akismet
- Limit Login Attempts
- Tweet My Post

(Side note: I am looking for a new plugin that will auto-tweet when I post a new article on my update blog--Tweet My Post no longer really works that great. I don't think it's the cause of the spam comments problem, though)

I suggest looking at the reviews on the plugins, especially if they're old to see if others have had the same thing or any problems with other plugins.

Besides the plugin issue, this also might be caused by different versions of PHP. I know my host recently updated PHP, and is making the older version work virtually through .htaccess

The 500 error might be caused by different/inconsistent versions of PHP being used, which would be a configuration issue, and in that case it might be easier to just contact your host about it.

EDIT: this sounds like a very similar issue: http://www.surmunity.com/showthread.php ... Error-Page in which case the issue is one of your plugins. Try deactivating one at a time, and see if that makes a difference.

@Camy and @Masao: thank you both! The more I think about it, the more I'm wondering if the Tweet My Post plugin is to blame, since it hasn't been updated in a while IIRC. I will check it ASAP.

Also, where do I go in cPanel to see server error logs?

I don't think cPanel has that, I do have an "error log" under the log section, but mine only showed me non-PHP related errors, but try checking it if you can find it.

Try falling the phpinfo() function on a test page, and see the "error_log" section to see where it stores it. It depends on how your server/host was set up, but a lot of places puts a log file in the directory where your script is run.

Well, I've deactivated Tweet My Post and even changed my theme to Twenty Fifteen ('cause I didn't want to fool with trying to make a mobile theme anymore xD)...but still no luck with the spam comments folder.

It's mostly an annoyance because the OCD in me needs to clean that crap out and I can't, LOL. But I do wonder what has caused this. Lots of tuts online are saying to rename the .htaccess file and get WP to generate a new one...would that really help, though?

It might, but 500 errors are a pain, and the easiest way to find out what the issue is is to ask your host. Sometimes it's a server configuration issue that they can take care of better. Otherwise I can only imagine backing up your database and doing a fresh install.

OK :) Thank you for your advice on this! :D :D if I hadn't asked here, I would have probably ended up with a huuuuge mess LOL

AdriCULOUS wrote:

Robin wrote: (Side note: I am looking for a new plugin that will auto-tweet when I post a new article on my update blog--Tweet My Post no longer really works that great. I don't think it's the cause of the spam comments problem, though)

I know it's an old thread but I don't see anything about a "no necroposting" rule.

Jetpack is my #1 plugin. There is a feature called "Publicize" where you can auto-tweet your posts; you even have the option of auto-post this on Facebook, Google+, and Path. You probably found a solution to this, but just in case, I'd throw this in. ^^

Thank you for the suggestion! As far as I can tell, Jetpack appears to be free now (it wasn't before, which is why I didn't install it)?