D6.9 - http request problem

Howdy,

I just upgraded to 6.9 and am having the exact same problem. I even read through that issue you linked to. Even though it looks like they resolved it in there, it was only for 6.8. So if I tried applying the fixes in that thread, I would have no idea weather they would work or not.

Just wanted to let you know that you're not alone.

-Benne

Hi I have 2 completely separate domains, both running D6.8

And both show the same HTTP request status fails error after upgrading to D6.9
Then I created a small test domain with D6.8 upgraded to D6.9, error shown. Downgrading to D6.8 does not help.

grtz,
Twan

The real question is whether requests actually fail (eg. you cannot use update module, it says you have no data). In Drupal before 6.9, Drupal actually blocked HTTP requests when it thought you have no connection. Now it just always tries, so if you have some network outage, the next time it comes up, Drupal will work. This error is just an indication that Drupal thinks it cannot make these requests, it does not mean it does not try to do it on every occasion.

So is it actually working apart from this error message, or it is really broken?

Is the "Update" module (that fetch information about new versions of Drupal and modules) enabled on your installations?

Any more details on the configurations that fail would be helpful - do you have something unusual set for the site's front page or any redirects in your .htaccess file?

---
Work: Acquia

I upgraded this a.m. from 6.8 to 6.9 and now have the HTTP request status fails error.

I did not have the error before the upgrade.

Michael Krapf
The Graphic Design Shop
www.thegraphicdesignshop.com

I upgraded from 6.8 to 6.9 and experienced the same problem. It was working fine in 6.8 and then in 6.9 saw the HTTP failure notice.

After a few attempts to get going again it eventually came back to life so my status page and update report page are both indicating my Drupal system is up to date.

Unfortunately I cannot say for sure what steps are required to get the HTTP requests working again but this is approximately what I did:

1. disable Update module
2. run cron manually
3. enable Update module
4. run cron manually

I was doing a few other things with the site at the time, hence not sure exactly what steps rectified the problem, but hope this helps a little.

I upgraded from 6.8 to 6.9 and now have the HTTP request status fails error.

I did not have the error before the upgrade.

same problem with me on a fresh upgrade geee :D

Me too. Got my sysadmin working on it on his end and me on mine. Hope someone discovers a cure. :)
Downgrading to 6.8 did not fix it for me. Also. backing up the DB and Drupal Directory, ERASING the DB and Drupal Directory, and starting from scratch with a fresh install of 6.9 still yields the error.

i was beginning to feel bad about NOT upgrading yet (i've just been lazy), but now it looks like my laziness has actually paid off.

other than that message, is everything working properly on your sites?

i'm thinking it might be wise for me to just wait a little to see if this problem gets fixed.

I had the HTTP request status Fails message show after I installed drupal 6.9, below is what I did previous to the message disappearing, whether or not it was just a coincidence or an actual solution I don't know as I'm very new to Drupal and well.. don't really have a clue!!

1. Disabled all my modules
2. Ran cron
3. I downloaded and installed this module http://drupal.org/project/http_request_fail_reset
4. Activated all my other modules including the http_request_fail_reset module
5. Went into the http_request_fail_reset module setting and changed interval to minutes
6. Ran cron again
7. Did a cheesy fist pump and treated myself to a bit of chocolate cake

Would be interested to see if this works for anyone else?

I installed Drupal 6.9 on my web site, and I don't have any problems on getting informations about the new module versions.
Whenever I check it manually or Drupal checks it automatically, I don't get the message error described here.

-- Kiam
Kiam la luno renkontas la sunon

After I updated to 6.9, my two sites become blank in firefox.

First it did run update.php successfully, but later the whole site is blank. Even I replace with 6.8 it still shows nothing.

I got the following messages.
[Fri Jan 16 15:10:28 2009] [error] PHP Fatal error: Call to undefined function _system_theme_data() in /home/***/public_html/***/includes/theme.inc on line 459
...includes/menu.inc on line 449
.../includes/menu.inc on line 410

subscribing

I have the same problem with http request fails in D6.9. I tried to change the module /modules/system/system.module line 1868.

$result = drupal_http_request(url('', array('absolute' => TRUE)));

with

$result = drupal_http_request(url('http://www.drupal.org', array('absolute' => TRUE)));

(see http://drupal.org/node/346929)

Now I have no error message in status report, but I don't think changing the system.module is a good solution. Any ideas?

OK, a couple things worth pointing out:

1. The reason some people are seeing the error message in Drupal 6.9 but not in Drupal 6.8 is that the code was changed in Drupal 6.9 to perform the HTTP request checking in more situations than it used to.
2. However, the important point is this: The code was also changed so that the error message is merely a warning. Before, the error message meant that Drupal would block itself from attempting further HTTP requests, which was bad and was a bug. Now, it does not do that anymore. So downgrading to Drupal 6.8 is not actually going to make anything better for anyone; in fact, it's likely to make things much, much worse.

As for why people are seeing the error message, there are two possibilities:

1. The error message might actually be true...
2. The message might be showing up when it shouldn't, which means that although you see the error message, Drupal is still making outbound HTTP requests correctly. From the discussion above, it sounds like most people seeing the message fall into this category.

In order to help fix this, it would be useful to know if anyone who is experiencing this problem has command-line (shell) access to their webserver? If so, it would be helpful if you could log in to your webserver and run a command similar to this (or anything else that allows you to fetch a webpage via the command line):

wget http://www.example.com

(where you replace http://www.example.com with the actual address of your website) and then also run this:

wget http://drupal.org

Then, paste the output you get back into this thread... thanks!

(The reason for doing this is that it sounds likely that people are facing the problem described at #346929: Http request status fails after upgrade to 6.8, where the hosting company's firewall is preventing requests to the server itself but allowing them to the outside world. The above test would allow us to compare.)

I've upgraded today, yes I know I'm too lazy... Same problem, all people, the most strange thing is something similar happened some weeks ago with a friend's wordpress cms...

With the trick of the http module, this works but is a little weird... The only good thing is the important sites are with drupal 5 :D

Oh, and if I execute the wget I received the correct transition...

It's so pretty being all in the green once again! See my post earlier. The one guy's instructions worked for me. Someone else fixed it by another method, I believe. If I'm not mistaken, the problem is 2 fold for many (I know it was for me): Drupal somehow getting blacklisted on firewalls, and then the http_request status getting "stuck" in "failed" mode somehow in the database. By swapping things around like the site being in online or offline mode (maintenance), you seem to be able to trigger clearing out the http request status field/table/whatever in the MySQL database. So if one way didn't try another. Another individual had to turn off all developer modules - so if the easy one didn't work, try that one, it could be you have another module requesting the HTTP Status Request, keeping it stuck - just a guess on my part, anyway.

I've gotta contact my web host, so they know it's fixed! ;0)

I must say I am new to using Drupal. I installed Drupal 6.9 with Apache and MySQL on both my work computer (XP) and my home laptop (VISTA). I am getting the HTTP error on my Vista machine only. I found the following solution online and am eager to get home to see if it will work on my Vista machine. If anyone tries this today, let me know how it goes.

Drupal and Apache in Vista: some tips http://greenash.net.au/posts/thoughts/drupal-and-apache-in-vista-some-tips
Thursday, 5 June, 2008.

I bought a new laptop at the start of this year, and since then I've experienced the "privilege" pile of festering camel dung that is being a user of Windows Vista. As with most things in Vista, installing Drupal and Apache is finickier than it used to be, back on XP. When I first went through the process, I encountered a few particularly weird little gotchas, and I scribbled them down for future reference. Here are some things to look out for, when the inevitable day comes in which you too will shine the light of Drupal upon the dark and smelly abyss of Vista:

1. Don't use the stop / start / restart Apache controls in the start menu (start > programs > Apache > control), as they are unreliable; use services.msc insetad (start > run > "services.msc").
2. Don't edit httpd.conf through the filesystem — use the 'edit httpd.conf' icon in the start menu instead (start > programs > Apache > configure), as otherwise your saved changes may not take effect.
3. If you're seeing the error message "http request status - fails" on Drupal admin pages, then try editing your 'c:\windows\system32\drivers\etc\hosts' file, and taking out the IPv6 mapping of localhost, as this can confuse the Windows mapping of 127.0.0.1 to localhost (restart for this to take effect).
4. Don't use Vista! If, however, you absolutely have no choice, then refer to steps 1-3.

Okay so I went home and put a # in front of the "localhost 127.0.0.1" in the c:\windows\system32\drivers\etc\hosts file and it DID NOT work!!! BUT THEN i put a # in front of the "::1" and voila, it fixed the error message and made loading localhost in my browser way faster than it was loading before. Note: You must restart your machine for the change to take effect.

Thanks to all for the support in solving this irritating error message. I do believe that it relates to using Drupal 6.9 on Vista, because the error does not show up on my XP machines at all.

I hope this helps, good luck to everyone out there

Peace, love and happy website building with Drupal

/grn

Has this ever been resolved

I've loaded D6.9 onto Wamps 2of. Using Vista 64Bit OS.

I read something about the hosts file for vista being the problem.

Is there a support document that spells out the correct fix?

==============================

HTTP request status Fails

Your system or network configuration does not allow Drupal to access web pages, resulting in reduced functionality. This could be due to your webserver configuration or PHP settings, and should be resolved in order to download information about available updates, fetch aggregator feeds, sign in via OpenID, or use other network-dependent services.

==============================

I had the "http ... fail" with looong delays on my Vista x64 with wamp.

Solution for me:

1. I started Notepad as Administrator (right-click Notepad icon/executable and select "Run as administrator")

2. Opened the hosts file "C:\Windows\System32\drivers\etc\hosts"

3. Deleted the line containing: "::1 localhost"

4. Saved file (if you cant save, you did not start Notepad as Administrator)

5. Worked instantly, no restart needed

THANKS for the tip.