Users can't reigster anymore - returns user to 'coppa' page

[Quimbly]

Hi all,
Users at my PHPBB site can no longer register. It's been working fine for ages, but now, for no apparent reason, it's stopped working. When a user tries to the register, it loops back to the site agreement (coppa) page and doesn't let them proceed:
http://cowtowndance.com/forum/profile.php?mode=register


I notice that the SID is not appended to the "I Agree to these terms and am over or exactly 13 years of age
" link. The PHP line for the link is as follows, so the SID should be there, shouldn't it?

Code: Select all

"U_AGREE_OVER13" => append_sid("profile.$phpEx?mode=register&". $board_config['agreed_var'] ."=".$board_config['agreed_val']),

I also noticed that this $board_config value is no longer working. When I hover over the link, the URL is:
http://cowtowndance.com/forum/profile.p ... register&=
instead of
http://cowtowndance.com/forum/profile.p ... greed=true

I tried replace all of the $HTTP_POST_VARS with $_POST and $HTTP_GET_VARS with $_GET, but that didn't help.


I've asked my host in case they've made any changes to hosting server or DB server that might have broke my site, but no word yet.

Any suggestions or tips on what the problem is, how to diagnose it, or where to look elsewhere for help, would be appreciated.
Thanks!

[Patrick]

Hello and welcome, Quimbly.

I just went through registration and I didn't have any trouble. My account has the username iFroggy. Are you still having this trouble?

Thanks,

Patrick

[Quimbly]

I had users requesting to register, so I had to find a quick work-around.

The problem seems to be with the $board_config array in the usercp_register.php file. I noticed two problems:

First...

Code: Select all

U_AGREE_OVER13" => append_sid("profile.$phpEx?mode=register&". $board_config['agreed_var'] ."=".$board_config['agreed_val']),

The agreed value and agreed_val values were always empty, so I ended up with a link like this on the coppa page:

http://.../profile.php?mode=register&=

To fix it, I hard-coded the link to be:

http://.../profile.php?mode=register&agreed=true


Next, the page was short-circuited at this if block:

Code: Select all

if ( $mode == 'register' && !isset($_POST[$board_config['agreed_var']]) && !isset($_GET[$board_config['agreed_var']]) )
{
	include($phpbb_root_path . 'includes/page_header.'.$phpEx);
	show_coppa();
	include($phpbb_root_path . 'includes/page_tail.'.$phpEx);
}

Since the $board_config values were empty, so were the GET and POST variables. So, even with agreed_var on the query string, this block got called and brought the user back to the coppa page.

I replaced the if test with the following:

Code: Select all

if ( $mode == 'register' && $_GET["agreed"] == false && !isset($_POST['submit']) )
{
	include($phpbb_root_path . 'includes/page_header.'.$phpEx);
	show_coppa();
	include($phpbb_root_path . 'includes/page_tail.'.$phpEx);
}

So, I bypassed the $board_config array. This seems to have fixed the issue.



I found out that my host recently upgraded from PHP4 to PHP5 on my server. I'm thinking this might be what caused the issue, but I can't say for sure.

I don't know the innards of phpBB2 well enough to know why they were using the $board_config array like this. Any insights?

Any idea why it was failing?

I'm not sure where else the $board_config array is used. Maybe other parts of my board are not working also.

Thanks for following up, and let me know if you have any ideas.
Cheers!

[Thoul]

I found out that my host recently upgraded from PHP4 to PHP5 on my server. I'm thinking this might be what caused the issue, but I can't say for sure.

It could be that, if you're using a really old version of phpBB 2. Early versions had problems when certain PHP settings were turned off; these particular settings are off by default in PHP 5.

It might be worth the effort to look into an upgrade. $board_config is used to hold most of the board's configuration data.

[Quimbly]

I am planning an upgrade, possibly to a different platform. I didn't upgrade at the time because the modules I needed were not available on phpBB v3.