Problems with server environment

The CMS Questions
1

I am new to Kirby, so I hope my questions are not stupid.

I have modified the starter kit because I want to quickly replace my WordPress instance. The server is Ubuntu 22.04 LTS from Hetzner using NGINX (plain installation).

After wasting the whole Saturday afternoon trying to find a solution, I decided to ask here.

The project runs fine on macOS, all the images are there.

When the files are moved to the server (without the media folder), I have several problems:

  • JPEGs are missing (WebP works), so the template (from starter kit) and permissions should be fine
  • GD seems to be used on the server, I verified several times that JPEG is supported.
  • I can change the “notes” from the starter kit in the panel, but not the images (format is not relevant) → there is no effect on the content. I also cannot upload an image (error). I can change the status of a page with immediate effect.
  • I installed the Retour plugin and it works locally. But not on the server, when clicking on the menu item, the page stays blank.

This is in my config.php

‘debug’ => true,

'cache' => [
    'pages' => false,
    'files' => false,
    'images' => false
],

(I am in the development stage).

I played around with the thumbs setting, but that made ALL images disappear. I could use only WebP, but I have no confidence in the current system because it’s likely other things like will appear when the issues are not addressed. Furthermore, I also would like to be able to use plugins.

Or is there a guide about installing Kirby from the ground up with more recent technology? I also tried to move stuff from the starter kit to the plain version, but that did also not work.

Any advice is appreciated.

2

Hi, hm, I cannot quite follow all the changes you made. But I’d suggest to

  1. Check out the nginx cookbook to verify that your server configuration is ok: Kirby meets Nginx | Kirby CMS
  2. Use a fresh Starterkit and get that running first before trying to make any changes to it.
3

Thanks, I guess I will decide to again start from scratch once more or just keep WordPress.

4

I don’t understand all this effort it takes for functions that should be completely effortless, like the damn images. Maybe I can donate the license to someone?

5

Pretty sure that if webp works but jpeg doesn’t, that this has nothing to do with Kirby but your server configuration.

But be that as it may, you can get a refund for your license within 14 days of purchase.

6

Maybe you’re right, but neither Kirby Docs, ChatGPT, Claude nor Google have something I didn’t try (and it should not require rocket science, I never had a system with such problems). I appreciate very much the reply on a Saturday, even if I wasted many hours for nothing and have to keep WordPress for another year.

I purchased the license end of March, so 14 days are gone. Furthermore, I also paid for the now useless server. If someone wants to have the license, please reply to me. So much for using European software …

7

When faced with a software issue in code that you can inspect, and you don’t have an error message to work from, it’s usually not useful to search in docs or via search engines or LLMs (I doubt there’s a lot of Kirby-related content in LLMs’s training material anyway).

Systematic debugging is a non-obvious skill that can take some time to acquire. There are some pointers for debugging Kirby and PHP applications here:

I would check a few things:

  • If there are Nginx error logs you can access
  • If there are PHP error logs you can access
  • What the HTTP requests and responses for WebP images look like (when an image doesn’t show up, does that mean there is a 500 error, a 404 error, a 403 error, something else?)
  • If .webp images do get generated by Kirby in the media folder, or not at all. And if those images get generated, whether they look valid (e.g. can you download one via FTP and open it locally in a web browser).

Generally speaking, it’s more useful to collect information about what you’re seeing than to try many different permutations of code and configuration in the hope that something will work.

8

Thanks, I don’t want so spend more time on things that should work out of the box. It can handle WebP, but not JPEG? That seems very strange. Why are there no guides that are not ancient Ubuntu 18, Apache?

I usually work with an Enterprise CMS on the code level, so it surprises me how complicated this is. Install a plugin according to the doc and it does not work on the server? What is the difference? Where are the logs? Why do you have to put code into the frontend all the time?

If it works on the Mac, it should work on Linux.

9

I’m sorry to hear your frustrations with the installation process. It’s really hard to follow your process though without more details (as @fvsch already mentioned) Something is really off here and I would also assume that it is a problem on the server. Kirby is normally very happy with an environment that works for Wordpress. But the cache configuration for example simply does not exist. There is no image or file cache. I assume that some LLM hallicunation might be involved here to be honest.

You also really should not have bought the license first. We state in our docs that you can fully test it first to find out if you are happy with it. We will still give you a refund after the 14 days. There’s no sense in keeping you more frustrated than you need to be if you don’t want to spend more time with Kirby. Just send us an email: support@getkirby.com Might take until after the Easter holidays though.

11

I was able to resolve the problem. Unfortunately, I did not find out what exactly caused the strange issue. Most probably it was a mix of my project and the server configuration. I never had something like this before.

To come to a solution, I used a “fresh” starter kit and updated it with my files. Then I did several “server” setups with Docker and my project, simulating a similar environment.

Starting with Apache, I moved to NGINX and finally to Caddy. This worked with Docker and the project, and it also seems on the cloud server.

Thank you for your support!