Hello,
Thank you for contacting Rank Math and bringing your concern to our attention. I’m sorry for the delay and for any inconvenience this issue may have caused you.
I’ve tried updating a random plugin with Rank Math activated, and it seems that it’s working fine on our end:
https://i.rankmath.com/fP4600
Could you please specify which plugin are you referring to for this issue? Also, could you provide if you have any errors in your website’s logs to further investigate?
I hope that helps. Thank you, and looking forward to your update.
Hello,
I will try to be as specific as possible.
My setup is such that I have to manually enter the FTP password any time I install or upgrade a plugin or the core etc. This setup has worked just fine for anything I do, including the installation of Rank Math. Your plugin works on my site – there is no problem there.
However, after installation of your plugin, things are different. First of all, any attempts to update, install or delete a plugin fail. I noticed that there is no longer the requirement to enter the FTP password manually – the process just starts automatically. I assume this is where it all fails because the password is not provided anywhere. Following the automatic start, I get a lengthy listing of what went wrong with each plugin that I attempted to update/install. The message talks about a mismatch of data and user rights and a failure to write all these plugin files. Then the process stops, the site comes out of maintenance mode and that’s it.
If I then deactivate your plugin and attempt to upload/install any plugin, the situation is back to how it was. I am asked for my FTP password, and the process is carried out successfully. This leads me to think that there must be an issue connected to your plugin and how it deals with this upgrade/install process or any changes it inflicts on any related procedures.
I am not an expert, though. I would very much like to use your plugin. I find it fantastic, but it is a little difficult like this.
I don’t have a screenshot or anything at the moment, as I am running a backup, but I will try to supply something later.
Hello,
Thank you so much for the detailed explanation of your issue. Yes, a screenshot or a video screenshot would be helpful for us to investigate this further.
We may also need to access your WordPress admin and your FTP logins so we can take a closer look at the issue. Please edit the first post on this ticket and include your WordPress & FTP logins in the designated Sensitive Data section.
It is completely secure and only our support staff has access to that section. If you want, you can use the below plugin to generate a temporary login URL to your website and share that with us instead:
https://wordpress.org/plugins/temporary-login-without-password/
You can use the above plugin in conjunction with the WP Security Audit Log to monitor what changes our staff might make on your website (if any):
https://wordpress.org/plugins/wp-security-audit-log/
We really look forward to helping you.
Hello,
I have updated the sensitive data as requested. Can you please check further?
Thank you.
Hello,
Thank you for the update, and sorry for the delay.
I’ve replicated the issue on your website. Are you using any plugin for this restriction feature? Or this feature comes with your theme or web hosting?
This would be helpful to further investigate the issue with Rank Math to your plugin settings page.
Thank you, and looking forward to your update.
I’m not sure I understand what you mean by restriction feature. As far as I can tell there are no restrictions from either hoster and/or any plugin used.
Hello,
I believe what my colleague was referring to is the feature here you have to enter the FTP password manually when updating/installing a plugin on your site. Are you using any security plugin to achieve this? Do you have control over enabling/disabling this and if you do, how?
Looking forward to helping you.
Hello,
This ‘feature’ showed up after a reinstall following problems with a database. It is – as far as I know – not related to any security plugin. I’m also not sure whether I have control over it or not. I thought it handy and never attempted to change it.
All I can say is that it was different before the reinstall.
I’d be happy to change it back to automatic updates – if possible – in order for your plugin to work properly. Deactivating the plugin every time an update is required is really not very desirable.
Thank you!
Edit: Apparently my memory tricked me and it was never possible to do the automatic updates according to my hoster. You always have to enter your ftp password when installing/updating plugins.
It works fine with all other plugins, but not with yours. As soons as Rank Math is activated it somehow prevents this process and all installations/updates fail.
I modified myconfig.php and added my ftp credentials, but this doesn’t change anything of course as this is prevented by the hoster.
Is there anything left that one could do? Otherwise I will have to uninstall your plugin. The hoster won’t change all this just for me…
Hello,
We see the issue on your website and have asked the dev. team to take a look.
We will get back to you ASAP and really appreciate your patience in the meantime.
Please keep the logins active for the time being.
Thank you.
Hello,
I have accessed your site through FTP and made some changes in Rank Math’s code in order to troubleshoot this issue and to fix it temporarily. If you update the plugin, my modifications will be lost.
I have taken note of this issue and we will include a permanent fix for it in a future update. Keep an eye on our changelog to know if an update contains the fix or not.
For future reference, I edited this plugin file:
/wp-content/plugins/seo-by-rank-math/vendor/mythemeshop/wordpress-helpers/src/helpers/class-wordpress.php
I commented out the following line (which has the same effect as deleting the line):
define( 'FS_METHOD', 'direct' );
Thank you for bringing this issue to our attention. If you have any question, please feel free to ask.
Thank you very much for your support with this issue. I really appreciate that.
The login will be active for another 3 days – if needed I will extend it or create a new temp login.
Hello,
We do not need the logins any longer so you can remove them.
We are always here if you need us in the future.
Hey, if it isn’t too much to ask for – would you mind leaving us a review here?
https://wordpress.org/support/plugin/seo-by-rank-math/reviews/#new-post
It only takes a couple of minutes but helps us tremendously.
It would mean so much to us.
Thank you.
Hello,
Thank you for your patience.
Please update Rank Math & all other plugins, themes, and WordPress to the latest version.
The issue should be fixed.
If not, please feel free to open a support topic or reply to this message and we will be more than happy to assist.
