suddenly?  well something must have changed…  no wp core, plugin or theme updates?   migth want to check what changes your host made…

is this chrome browser? seems lots of google topics on it…

Of course I update plugins as soon as my WP dashboard advises of an update. But with all plugins physically deleted from /wp-content/plugins/ it still hangs. 

But I have not updated a theme. However, I will reinstall the current default SP theme that I use, as a precaution.

It’s not browser related. Users use a variety of browsers.

I am a newbie, but try this one: Disable all cache !!!!

I have just disabled object cache on my host and performances have suddenly started to get better. It seems to me that SP is allergic to cache systems…

allergic?  it wont be a simple press thing… it would be a wp thing…  if you were running an object cache, you would need to optimize the rules for wp (depends on which object cache you use)…

a caching plugin for wp is a whole other story…  they simply try to cache the wp page which is wrong since its dynamic in nature…  so if you have wp super cache or w3 total cache, you can use them, just have to tell them not to cache the wp page the forum is on…  not doing so wont slow things down, just give wrong information…

@capitano let us know what you find…

Well, first things first I guess. Regarding the security patch on Wed that occurred a few hours before the forum issue arose:

“Nothing was changed on your VPS. Changes were made to the main server node.”

I will now test things like the SP theme and SP plugins – strip it down and see if it works.

I am not a Linux/PHP coder so my debugging ability is limited.

I am seeing a syntax error when you try to run the forum page but it is in something to do with ‘slides’? Does that mean anything to you? Not sure if it has any relevance however – it is the only thing showing up in the script console.

Thanks – no, does not ring a bell.

Now I am at the end of things I am competent to try. Happy to pay for an investigation. I can PM credentials for SSH, FTP etc. as required. Is this something I should request in the Paid Work section of the forum?

lets try a couple more things first…

I see you are running wp super cache…  are you caching the forum page?  can you try clearing your cache and perhaps even disabling wp super cache (making sure the advanced-cache.php file in wp-content is removed too)…

lol, is your wp theme really called simple press?  since you theme may have been updated, can you try a quick temp change to the default wp theme?  thinks it flexslider plugin is causing the js error Andy alluded too though doubt it would bring down the forum…

what is odd is that I dont see a single http request coming from the site when you try to load the page… so basically, no wp code is loading yet… and no wp code means no sp code…  something going south real early…

lol Mr P – yes, The WP theme is called SimplePress, by Elegant Themes – not to be confused with any forum elements.

I will test your ideas tomorrow early.  I had deleted Super Cache (no, it does not cache /forum/ ) but I was not aware of advanced-cache.php

Thanks

okay, we will be here…

No joy. This is what I did:

From wp-admin dashboard:
1 – Deactivated WP Super Cache
2 – Deleted it, incl 2 php files in wp-content
advanced-cache.php
wp-cache-config.php

ismyblogworking shows super cache no longer active

tested forum – no change
=================================
Activated 2014 theme

tested forum – no change

re-activated the site’s own theme
============================

I have not re-installed Super Cache.

I think perhaps the only way we are going to be able to offer any assistance here is if you can let us have access to your admin for a short while so we can investigate and try and diagnose. This would need to be a full SP Admin account. If this is acceptable to you…

Please PM credentials to both myself and to ‘Mr Papa’. Please include in the PM a link to your site, a link to this thread and brief reminder of the problem. And one of us will take a look for you.

I am also still curious about these ‘slides’ that are causing an error.

If you inspect the HTML for your home page there are references to a ‘slider’ with pictures. Yet I see none of these showing up on the page, presumably because of the script error.  This will need to be sorted out as it is stopping jQuery from being used elsewhere on the page which will have a negative effect in SP and possibly other things as well.

So somewhere – I would suggest – you have some sort of image slider that is set up but is failing and causing errors. This might be a product of your theme or perhaps another WP plugin. It needs fixing or turning off.

You had a corrupted database. One of the key SP tables had crashed. I did repair this. Your datasbase is badly in need of optimisation which you can do via phpMyAdmin from your cPanel. Display the list of tables, check them all and then from the drop down at the bottom select Optmise.

These things really should be done regularly – once a week is not out of order. Or install a WP plugin that will take care of it for you like WP DB Manager.