PDF only on some pages + PDF generated only once

[Clemens-x]

Hi!
I just have setup completely new websites with Joomla 2.5x latest. Due to effects with ACE-SEF and Joomla 1.5x interfering with Phoca-PDF, I first tried to run without any additional SEF-Component, only using Joomla built in SEF with htaccess rewrite.
When I saw the problems, I will describe here, I installed ACE-SEF and the problems did not change. So I can exclude being SEF the reason for these effects:

1.) PDF-icons will show up only on articles, which are shown via a menu item with blog character (showing up all articles belonging to a category.

2.) PDF-icons never show up, when I click on the readmore of one of the articles, which are shown via menu blog item, allthough they were shown, as long as the article was presented with introduction text only (like in 1.)

3.) PDF-icons never show up, when a menu item is related to only one article.

4.) If I have clicked on a PDF-icon, at first time the PDF is rendered exactly as I want it. Beautiful! When I close the PDF and then want to generate the same PDF one more time, either it will generate a PDF with only header and footer in it or it shows an empty page.
It seems that this effect is related to Joomla caching, because it happens with all browsers AND (!) across the browsers. This means: When I have generated a PDF once with Firefox and have closed it and then open the same webpage in Chrome and try to generate the same PDF, it will show up header and footer or an empty page!
When I empty the Joomla cache in the backend (Cache Cleaner / NoNumber.nl), then the PDF will be generated again!
It has nothing to do with browser cache.

Further information, so that you can help me with these problems:
I have no caching active within htaccess and the server itself.
I have no caching active wthin the Phoca-PDF plugin, due to steady enhancements on the text on my webpages.
The links, which are associated with the PDF-icons are non-SEF and I have made sure, that they are not affected by ACE-SEF.
Any articles, where I miss the presence of the PDF icons, are checked, wether they have the print icon etc. set active and also the related menu items. So it is sure, that I have not erroneously deactivated it.
In the htaccess file, I have defined PDF as MIME-type: AddType application/pdf pdf

This is the URL:
http://beratung.lebenslust-jetzt.de

If there are any other informations, I should give, please ask me!

My wish:
I want to have the PDF icons on any article where I have a print icon now.
I want to ensure, that PDF is generated not only once but any time, without having to clean the cache in the Joomla backend.

Kind regards
Clemens

[Jan]

Hi,

1), 2) really no idea there, the PDF icon is hard coded to article view - so if the article is displayed as itself, it gets the PDF icon - only full article sites get PDF icons

3) testing now without any such problem - https://www.phoca.cz/joomlademo/phoca-pdf

Anyway - the SEF should not have any influence on displaying or not displaying the PDF icon - if some PDF icon is displayed and you click it, then if the PDF will run - the link is OK but why the body is not displayed the second time, really no idea, testing on my different servers without any problem the rendering should not be cached there

Jan

[Clemens-x]

Hi Jan!
Thank you for your quick reply!

You wrote:

the PDF icon is hard coded to article view - so if the article is displayed as itself, it gets the PDF icon - only full article sites get PDF icons

As you can see on my entire website, it is just the other way round: The PDF-icon shows up only, when the article is NOT shown in fill length, but only with intro text!

Please look at this: http://ideecreativ.de/leistungsprofil.html

And you will find the same problem on a website, which is completely separated from that first mentioned here. They have in common, that it runs on the same server on the same webspace but in different root directories which are additional seperated from another by server quota.

There is a third site, which shows up the same problem. But I cannot make this site public available at this time.

The above mentioned site and the third site, both have very few additional other components installed and so a cross influence from so many other components is not given. The site in my first posting really has a lot additional components installed.

BTW: On the first site, my template (http://jyaml.de) has a built in chunking and compressing feature for css and javascripts. After compressing and chunking, we only have two large files in the website which improves loading time.

The disturbing effects with Phoca-PDF are there regardless whether this compression and chunking is activated or not!

So what can I do, if even you cannot help now???

The good in this case is, that the problem is reproducable, that the problem is happening on three different sites and that these sites all are fresh installed Joomla without any core modifications etc.
So it should be possible to find the cause for this behaviour!

PS: I have checked on all three affected sites: You will have to deactivate any Joomla built in caching and then the PDF is built any time, you click the icon. But I think, that cannot really be the solution for the problem.
Further there is still the remaining fact, that the PDF-icons show up contrary to that, what is intended. And this is the main problem for me actually!

Kind regards
Clemens

[Jan]

Hmm, then there is some problem with cache it seems but why the cache does not cache the pdf icon normally rendered with html

[Clemens-x]

Hi Jan!
Yes, there is a problem with the Joomla caching and Phoca-PDF. But I am on a fast server and I suppose, there will not be a great improvement in speed, when Joomla caching is active. Further I have the caching of all these scripts and css on my site and this really improves loading speed.

So let us please focus on the most disturbing fact: Phoca-PDF icon does not show up, where ist should! I would like to have this problem solved at first and don't know how. I am no programmer and don't have a chance, to understand the interacting between Joomla and Phoca-PDF.

If you need some additional information about my website configuration or about anything else in my setup etc. then please let me know.

Kind regards
Clemens



PS: In contrast to many Joomla users, I have an acknowledgement for all Joomla programmers on my website:
http://beratung.lebenslust-jetzt.de/lin ... ierer.html

I say thank you for being allowed to use Joomla and all these components without a fee. It would not be possible for me, to run my websites, when I would have to pay for those components. And I thank you for your Phoca-PDF.

[Jan]

Hi, and did you purge all chace settings after you have instaled the Phoca PDF on your site (it means, maybe there was some cached page before using Phoca PDF which needs to be removed and renewed )

Jan

[Clemens-x]

Hi Jan!
The good news is, that these websites are fresh and new from the very ground. Fisrt i have chosen all the additional components, I need for the additional functions. Phoca PDF was one of the very first components on my installations.

At this point there has been no content on the sites. Then I have built the content by copying the text article by article from my old Joomla 1.5 site on my old hosting.
After everything was OK so far, the date has come, where the contract to my ISP was terminated and I had to transfer the URL to the new hosting.

Then I experienced the problems, that Phoca-PDF did not show up its icon on all pages, I wanted it. But some video problems had been more demanding and so I did not work on the PDF problem.

Then I experienced, that all Joomla-URLs included ID-numbers and all such things and so I had to install a SEF component. I feared, that this could break Phoca-PDF. But instead it did not. But all the Phoca-PDF problems have been the same, as before the installation of SEF.

So I am very sure, that there has never been any cache remaining, before installation of Phoca-PDF. In order to get rid of the PDF-problem, I have deinstalled and reinstalled Phoca-PDF and additionally I have looked at the SQL-tables, wether Phoca-PDF has been deinstalled completely. Yes it has been deinstalled completely.

Only on the website of IdeeCreativ, I have not tried those tricks, because I had already experienced, that all this would not heal the problem.

BTW: The last thing, I have switched on, that was the Joomla Cache! That's because I had to experiment very hard with the videos on my website. I am happy to have found a solution, that lets the video to be shown on any platform and on any browser etc.

Further: The problem still remains, when I switch off caching: Some pages show the PDF icon others do not! That is the main problem here! Not the cache!

Kind regards
Clemens

[Clemens-x]

Hello Jan!

I had to focus on other themes on developing my websites. Therefore I had no time to have a look at Phoca-PDF.

First of all:
Of course I have cleaned all caches, before I was sure, that here is a bug within Phoca PDF.
Of course I have deactivated all SEF URL generation, before I was sure, that here is a bug within Phoca PDF.
I even have deactivated all other scripts on the site and I had no success!

I have been able to do all this experimentation, because I have setup several websites at the same time and so I could compare things and results.
You can be sure, that I have regarded nearly every bad influence on Phoca PDF functions!

In the last weeks, I occasionally have tried some other tricks: I tried to set PDF URLs via SEF (ACE SEF), so that it is linked directly, but I had no efforts, no improvements by this. Most of these tries lead to malfunctioning.

Concerning the caching:
I have activated Apache Caching via htaccess, as it is recommended by Joomla htaccess proposals. The result was a great improvement in speed of my websites without having the problem with "PDF generating only once".
But I have to keep the Joomla own caching deactivated!

Further I have discovered a strange behaviour of all of my Joomla sites, when caching is deactivated in Joomla and also deactivated in htaccess:
There is a mod called Cache Cleaner and it comes from nonumber — I have this installed and each time, I click on cache cleaning icon in the backend, it shows up a message, that the cache is cleaned and it also shows the amount of data, which is cleaned from cache.

Thus I wonder, what data is to clean here from cache, when there is no caching active!?!?!

However, the status of my bug description is still valid.
With server side caching via htaccess (htaccess caching of PDF files is not active!) there are the following effects:

1.) PDF icon does not show up on pages, which are linked directly via menu item like:
http://beratung.lebenslust-jetzt.de/ang ... sicht.html

2.) PDF icon does not show up on pages, which are opened out of a blog menu item via the readmore link.

3.) PDF icon shows up and is full functional, when pages are shown via the blog menu item with introduction part only like:
http://beratung.lebenslust-jetzt.de/pro ... uppen.html

It would be great, if you would have a look at these problems again. Perhaps we can find a solution?

Kind regards
Clemens

[Jan]

Hi, hmm, testing on different servers - not such problems there

1) SEF enabled (htaccess too) direct link to pdf article: https://www.phoca.cz/joomlademo/phoca-pdf (works ok there)
2) tested on localhost - see no problem

Will do more tests, but really not sure if I can find something as it works

[mattiz]

Hi Jan, I'm using Phoca PDF for generating PDFs in Joomla 2.5 + ACE-SEF + Standart Joomla Cache

I had a similar problem like this

4.) If I have clicked on a PDF-icon, at first time the PDF is rendered exactly as I want it. Beautiful! When I close the PDF and then want to generate the same PDF one more time, either it will generate a PDF with only header and footer in it or it shows an empty page.
It seems that this effect is related to Joomla caching, because it happens with all browsers AND (!) across the browsers. This means: When I have generated a PDF once with Firefox and have closed it and then open the same webpage in Chrome and try to generate the same PDF, it will show up header and footer or an empty page!
When I empty the Joomla cache in the backend (Cache Cleaner / NoNumber.nl), then the PDF will be generated again!
It has nothing to do with browser cache.

After clearing the cache from the admin site. If you add structure to any article ?format = pdf, then the first boot normal document, but if you try again with the same address, there will be a clean PDF c header and footer.