Hi @pixelpops,
Are the suggestions you tried the ones listed here?
If so, could you please:
- Go to the Wordfence Options page
- Set “Maximum execution time for each scan stage” to 20 (in the Other Options section)
- Hit the “Save Options” button
- Then go to Wordfence –> Tools –> Diagnostics
- Check the box to “Enable debugging mode”
- Click the “Save Changes” button
- Start a new scan
- Paste here the last 20 lines or so of the activity log
Also, could you check if there are any specific error/warning messages in the Web server error log?
Tried execution time of “20” – that didn’t work. Then changed it back to 24 (80% of what my server reported , which was 30) and tried again. This is all I ever get:
[Apr 13 16:28:14] Ajax request received to start scan.
[Apr 13 16:28:14] Entering start scan routine
[Apr 13 16:28:14] Got value from wf config maxExecutionTime: 24
[Apr 13 16:28:14] getMaxExecutionTime() returning config value: 24
[Apr 13 16:28:14] Starting cron via proxy at URL http://noc1.wordfence.com/scanp/feniachang.com/wp-admin/admin-ajax.php?action=wordfence_doScan&isFork=0&cronKey=28e3308460957196253d39a7
[Apr 13 16:28:15] Scan process ended after forking.
It never does anything after that last line. Using latest version and no errors in server logs.
Hi @pixelpops,
Can you confirm that you haven’t limited access to the wp-admin folder with a .htaccess file?
Also, is the activity log extract, you pasted above, all you get even with the debugging mode enabled?
Have you tried setting “Maximum execution time for each scan stage” to a lower value? For example, 15 seconds.
@pixelpops,
I’m wondering if the problem could be related to the theme you’re using, as it was the case for this user.
Haven’t installed a theme yet, so (by default) using the WordPress 2016 theme.
Inspected htaccess and it has two sections: 1) the default WordPress section and 2) the Wordfence section, and I have compared both sections to other verbose examples in previous posts here, so it appears htaccess is good.
Can (Wordfence’s) “access to the wp-admin folder” be prevented by a different method?…other than htaccess?
Lastly, when I visited the Scan section again today (4/14) I DID have a few more activity lines that seem to have occurred:
[Apr 13 16:28:15] Scan process ended after forking.
[Apr 14 20:30:13] Calling Wordfence API v2.23:h-t-t-p-s://noc1.wordfence.com/stats.json
[Apr 14 21:06:32] Calling Wordfence API v2.23:h-t-t-p-s://noc1.wordfence.com/v2.23/?v=4.7.3&s=h-t-t-p%3A%2F%2Ffeniachang.com&k=58811d10f5b365a63da12e4aaa0df21a4638282765bf7ba27d6d213cbef3c9482210b48fb8195fd5a5d478f38a0592275ecb176554e3eff27ceed6c4efb43bc00887cb6d537e99ea23ab66e4460a9db0&openssl=268439647&phpv=5.6.16&betaFeed=0&cacheType=disabled&action=ping_api_key
Not sure I understand these additional lines 🙁
(dashes inserted in http code above to prevent forum from formating this into hyperlink)
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This reply was modified 9 years, 2 months ago by
pixelpops.
Changed execution time to 15 and still resulted in forking.
Hi @pixelpops,
I see the additional lines appeared on April 14th, so this is most likely the result of another scheduled scan.
When you are using the free version of Wordfence, scans are automatically done once every 24 hours on your site at a time of our choosing. (You can find more information on this topic in our documentation)
I’m still unsure of what’s causing the issue you’re experiencing but one thing you might want to check is the connection to the Wordfence servers:
- Go to Wordfence –> Tools
- Click the Diagnostics tab
- Scroll down to the Connectivity section
Does it read “OK” for both connection types (http & https)?
Yes, both connection types are checked as OK.
I’m still confused as to what forking even is. It appears that Wordfence stops (because of forking) immediately after it tries to send a cron job to the Wordfence servers
[Apr 13 16:28:14] Starting cron via proxy at URL
http://noc1.wordfence.com/scanp/feniachang.com/wp-admin/admin-ajax.php?action=wordfence_doScan&isFork=0&cronKey=28e330846095719253d39a7
[Apr 13 16:28:15] Scan process ended after forking.
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This reply was modified 9 years, 1 month ago by pixelpops.
Hi @pixelpops,
Because most web servers don’t allow processes that run for several minutes, Wordfence needs to proceed as follows:
- Start a scan
- Pause the scan when the “Maximum execution time for each scan stage” is reached
- Then launch another process (that’s the forking part) and pick up where it left off
There are cases of scan failure related to the forking but in your case I believe the cause could actually be that your host is unable to connect to itself.
In order to confirm (or rule out) this probable cause, could you please enable the “Start all scans remotely” feature?
- Go to the Wordfence Tools page
- Click the Diagnostics tab
- Scroll down to the Debugging Options section (bottom of the page)
- Tick the “Start all scans remotely” checkbox
- Start a new scan manually (Wordfence –> Scan –> Start A Wordfence Scan) or wait until the next scheduled scan
Hi @pixelpops,
Since I haven’t heard back from you I am assuming that the instructions solved your issue so I am marking this topic as resolved.
If however, for whatever reason, you are still experiencing this issue and it is not resolved please respond to the post, which will move it back up the queue, and mark this topic as “not resolved”.
Thank you.
No, not resolved. Nothing I try prevents forking. Confused because I have a dedicated server that I host several sites on. I have at least 4 other sites on the same server where Wordfence works just fine – just not this site.
Hi @pixelpops,
Thanks for getting back to me.
At this stage it would be interesting to compare one of the Wordfence environments that works fine with the problematic one.
For each Wordfence instance (one that works and the one with the issue), could you please:
- Go to the Wordfence Tools page
- Click the Diagnostics tab
- Scroll down to the Send Report by Email section
- Send the reports to yann[at]wordfence[dot]com
