It looks – on the face of it – like a clear case of the url and query variables not being accepted by your server. Probably the two most common reasons why this might happen would be (a) some kind of plugin that is monitoring the urls to try and find anything it might consider malicious or suspect? Or (b) if your host has mod_security turned on on your server which looks for pattern matches in the url and is consistently and painfully a problem to all developers.

Assuming it is not the the first then I would start by asking your host about the second and maybe also sending them the search url to see if they can tell you why t is not being processed.

I manage the host which is a dedicated server running Windows 2003 Server and IIS 6.

I don’t have mod_security since it’s Apache, and I have not installed something equivalent for IIS.

I have installed Helicon Isapi Rewrite, which is an aquivalent of Apache mod_rewrite for IIS. You will find below my httpd.conf. It works fine for WP and SPF, but maybe there is something wrong for SPF search page.

RewriteBase /
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ index.php?p=$1 [NC,L]

Regarding WP Plugins, I have different plugins installed but none of them seem to inspect URLs, based on what their functionalities are.

Knowing that I have full access to the hosting server, which additional investigation should I do to diagnose and correct?

isnt IIS 6 a bit dated?

so we need to figure out why query args are being ignored…

perhaps you can try some other urls/pages for both sp and wp that use query args?  and see if similar problems…

for sp, perhaps try subscribing or watching a topic when viewing the topic… buttons at the bottom below list of posts…

for wp, trying viewing the wp page the forum appears using the wp query arg synatx…  http://yoursite.com/?p=xxxx where xxxx is replaced by the page id of the wp page…

Here are the results of the tests you suggested.

For WP, URLs with args work fine, just test these ones :

• http://www.teachlynx.com/?page_id=60
• http://www.teachlynx.com/?page_id=240

Also notice I host Java applications on other IIS sites on the same host, also using URLs with args, and they work fine.

Subscribe/unsubscribe links in SP use args and they don’t work either. You can test by yourself:

• go to http://www.teachlynx.com/communautes 
• click on the link “se connecter”
• On the login screen which appears (I use Web SSO based on CAS Jasig), enter “recette” as userid and password
• You are in and you can navigate to forums and topics
• On any post, you can click on “s’abonner” or “se désabonner”, nothing happens

It’s really strange, because I have tested the subscribe feature a day ago, as I wanted my users to be able to be notified by email, and it was working. I have been able to subscribe to topics and to receive emails. The search feature newer worked, it was one of the features I tested first.

The only things I have done recently are installing french translation files and a new theme (iForum). And I have also a problem with themes. I can’t see the Themes tab in SP admin panel. I have posted another topic about this. Maybe the two problems are related somehow.

just to mention the missing “Themes” tab in SP admin panel is solved. I add “Manage Themes” to Admin capabilities.

I will close the other topic related to this issue.

So we are left with only the search issue to solve.

Not related to themes… we gave you the solution over there… you just need to be able to manage themes…

so search requests with the query args are being redirected back to the main forum page for some reason… looking again at your .htaccess rewrite rules, it is perhaps something there… those are NOT the standard wp rewrite rules… but do not know if wrong because of the fairly unique set up you are using…

normally, the rules would be:

RewriteEngine On
RewriteBase /
RewriteRule ^index.php$ – [L]
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
RewriteRule . /index.php [L]

you are doing something different with index.php – namely the C argument…

and the search request will use a url based off of index.php… 

http://www.teachlynx.com/index.php?sp_ahah=search&sfnonce=52666d2e01

which then will process the query args…

so probably worth checking the rules again…

That’s it ! I have updated the rewrite rules as you mentioned, and it works perfectly.

I really thank you for the quality of your software and support. I needed to find a forum solution embeddable in any wordpress site and also able to support the Web SSO solution I use.

I have been through bbPress, buddyPress, Vanilla, and none of them was able to support all the features I needed or to run without bugs. Then another Google search brought me to your site. In less then 3 days, everythings works fine, and I just have to finalize some minor details such as colors, font type and size, which are probably simple CSS updates.

Thanks again. 

well, now, that is good news! thanks for the update and kind words!

If you are going to customize a theme, please be sure to start with your
own to keep from losing changes if you update our themes… See:

http://codex.simple-press.com/codex/themes/theme-basics/creating-a-theme/

and also note that if your want to adjust css or icons from a plugin,
you can simply drop a copy in your sp theme and it will get used instead…