Missing Files Without Error

[vilesyn]

Hello everyone. A client of mine has run across an odd issue with the 3.2.34 jdownloads, where files are still showing in categories when they do not exist. When doing a scan, or a rebuild, jdownloads never seems to catch that the file is missing. All of these files when downloaded from the front-end give the generic error:

The requested data was not found in the database. Please inform the webmaster.

Just to make sure the file did not exist somewhere else, I made sure to check the entire jdownloads directory with "ls -lR | grep <filename>", which comes up with empty results, letting me know it's not in _uncategorized, or another folder in the jdownloads directory. There seems to be a few files that have this issue for no apparent reason.

We did do an upgrade from 1.9 to 3.2 in February, and did not have any issues. All of the files worked. It wasn't until a few months later that this happened, and all of the categories with this issue have been created after the upgrade, and files added after as well.   

I have made sure to also run a database check/fix for Joomla, but did not turn up any issues. I did notice that we were getting a 1064 error when scanning, because it was searching for '22'.mp4" in the SQL string. Since the client does not host mp4 files, I simply removed them from the scan file types, so that file scans could complete. I'm not sure what that is about, but that's an whole other issue I'm sure.

Is there a programmatic way to check for these bad links, and remove them?

Versions
Joomla: 3.4.3
jDownloads: 3.2.34
MySQL: 5.5.38
PHP: 5.4.41

Thanks in advance.

[ColinM]

Hi
Interesting!   Not come across this before.   The puzzling thing is, if I have understood correctly, it is occurring on newly created Cats/Downloads.

Do you have any Content links in articles? And are they the links causing the problem?  Or are the problem ones derived from a menu item?

Think we will need to look at the site so could you PM the site and also Admin Access at the backend please.  Please also send to Arno (or I can).  And to hep where one can find the problem.

Colin

[Arno]

Hi vilesyn,
when you start the auto monitoring you should get as result a valid list about (published) Downloads which have not a file.
Have you tried this?

[vilesyn]

Yes, this is straight from menu items, and new categories. I'm pretty sure nothing is linked outside of jDownloads, and these issues are coming straight from the menu item.  

@Arno We did have errors at one point for missing files. Here's the current output:

Information about Download Area check:
No new directory found.
71 New file(s) found and added to the database.
All published category directories exist.
All published Downloads exist.

My apologies, it seems they are set to "unpublished". I didn't notice the different icons for editing in the front-end, and how they changed when published/unpublished. I'm betting that the issue is that users can see unpublished items, and trying to download them. I'm guessing this is normal when there is existing data for an entry?

Once again, I apologize, and thank you both for prompt replies!

[vilesyn]

I can't seem to find an option to hide unpublished files. Not in the ACL list, of the configuration. Am I missing something? Also, I just wanted to point this out, as it doesn't seem normal:

Status Download area: ONLINE

Status   Published   Unpublished   Total
Categories   135   59   194
Downloads   8   5   13
The download archive currently contains 13,836 Downloads in 194 categories. To date, these have been downloaded 266,130 times. There are 59 categories and 5,242 Downloads that are not published.

The archive count is right, but the status downloads count is a bit off.

EDIT: Found in the forum where others were showing this issue, but when moving files locally. Didn't move files locally, but I'm guessing a scan without permissions could have done this as well. I'm going to go ahead and publish everything, then rescan. 

[Arno]

Maybe at first a few hints:
- i think not that your problems is the result from bugs in jD
- the auto monitoring works correctly but checks only 'published' Downloads and Categories
- when the monitoring tool says that a Download has not the assigned file then this is really so
- jDownloads delete not any files from self
- it is normally not possible for guests or users to download files from unpublished Downloads

The download archive currently contains 13,836 Downloads in 194 categories. To date, these have been downloaded 266,130 times. There are 59 categories and 5,242 Downloads that are not published.

I can you not say why the files not more exist. That must you ask your client, then this is not the result from jDownloads.
Have you any backups from jD and the DB?
Use you special characters for filenames? This is only possible with special settings in the jD configuration. 

Colin has it already written:

Think we will need to look at the site so could you PM the site and also Admin Access at the backend please.  Please also send to Arno (or I can).  And to hep where one can find the problem.

This could be useful. But we can not restore your download area. We can only check the current state.

[ColinM]

Hi
In the case where you get the message

The requested data was not found in the database. Please inform the webmaster.

one possibility is that the user does not have view access to the file, but may have the required permissions to Download. 

It would also be interesting to note if  you are using Alphapoints.  And also if the downloads require a licence.

Colin