HTTP ERROR 500 (website unaccessible, made with Joomla)

[pirotess]

Hello,

after the forced updates, my 4 websites broke. I managed to restore 2 of them, that used WordPress. One of them has the dashboard already restored, but the layout completely destroyed (working on it), while the 4th one, that I made with Joomla, is completely unaccessible, even from the dashboard. Is there a way to repair it? I get the "HTTP ERROR 500".

https://pirotess.altervista.org/

[alemoppo]

You could set temporarily PHP7 with this .htaccess directive:

AddHandler av-php73-temporary .php

So, update Joomla to the latest version, then switching back to PHP 8.

Bye!

[pirotess]

Thank you for your fast reply.
I added that line into the "htaccess.txt" file in the /joomla root, but it still doesn't work. Maybe I didn't understand correctly (it's been 14 years since I made that website, and I completely forgot how it works...).

[alemoppo]

"htaccess.txt" is not the file you have to modify.
Probably your FTP client is hiding the .htaccess.
You can edit it from the cpanel (here) -> Advanced (or in a file list -> edit the .htaccess file).

Bye!

[pirotess]

Some progress: I can now see the (broken) website, but when I try to access the control panel, I always get the error
"The most recent request was denied because it contained an invalid security token. Please refresh the page and try again."

I tried with different browsers and refreshing doesn't help. I found that to solve it, I should go to Extensions (or System) > Manage > Update. The problem is that I can't access the control panel. Is there a way to update joomla from the Altervista Dashboard, without accessing the Joomla Control panel?
Sorry to bother you. Last attempt before giving up. It's not an important website, and everything must come to an end at some point.

Thank you

[alemoppo]

Very strange, you should be able to log in to AlterVista's Control Panel at least. Are you using a modern browser? Do you have a chance to try with another device? Or it could be eventually an antivirus blocking the connection.

Anyway, you can:

• Make a full backup (files [FTP?] + database [phpMyAdmin?])
• Overwrite all files via FTP with files from a new Joomla version (download the ZIP here). Overwrite everything except the file "configuration.php"
• Try to run the update procedure from: yourste.org/administrator/index.php?option=com_joomlaupdate

Maybe, it is better to update "step by step": first update to the 3.5.1 then to the latest version.

Bye!