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(Reading time: 5 - 9 minutes)
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27Nov2021

How to fix the “failed to start session” error in Joomla

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4492 hits Updated: 28 November 2021 Blog

How to diagnose and repair a common error with Joomla websites: “Failed to start application: Failed to start the session”

Taming the Joomla session handler

Common causes for the “failed to start session” error in Joomla

… and some not-so-common causes

I think it’s fair to say that one of the most baffling problems people encounter with Joomla! is when they get an unexpected fatal error that reads “Failed to start application: Failed to start the session”.  The Joomla! forum is rife with examples of this problem and, unfortunately, many people do not get always get answers that solve their problem.

My website, stopped working all in a sudden. I uploaded an article and it was working for a week and then, without any further changes, I get this message:  “Error:  Failed to start application: Failed to start the session”.  I even cannot login to my Joomla backend!forum user, Joomla Forum, 13-Sep-2020

I won’t go into technical details about what a sessionhttps://www.quora.com/What-are-internet-sessions is but it’s important; you can’t work with internet websites without some kind of session management.  Sessions are used to make sure that you get what you want and you don’t get something that someone else wants if they happen to be accessing the same page that you are accessing.  Sessions are a way of keeping your interaction with a website separate from other people who may be interacting with the website.

Joomla uses sessions.  The details about Joomla sessions are stored on the server.  There are several ways that website owners can configure Joomla to handle session management but the two most common methods are to store the session data in the database or to store the session data on a temporary file.  We will examine both methods in this article.  We will also look at some of the common causes for why people get these “failed to start the session” errors.

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(Reading time: 7 - 14 minutes)
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04Oct2021

Install Joomla! the right way

Disable the FTP layer

Check the PHP environment

Enable the System - Joomla! Notification plugin

Update Sites

Disinfect the website

Backup the website

Use a separate site for testing

Keep those third-party extensions up-to-date

Use the Joomla! Update component

Joomla! is a popular way for people to build their websites: it’s easy to installI produced a video tutorial a few years ago that shows how to create a basic Joomla! website in under 15 minutes. and it’s easy to maintain.  So why do people have trouble maintaining their Joomla! websites?

In a previous article, we discussed the importance of having a maintenance strategy so that you won’t wake up up one day to see months or years of hard work suddenly disappear with inexplicable HTTP error messages or remnants of your craft indistinguishable from a jig-saw puzzle with half the pieces missing.  This article contains the top ten things that you can do today to make sure you will be able to maintain your Joomla! websites for many more months or years to come.

User Rating: 5 / 5

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(Reading time: 4 - 7 minutes)
07Sep2021

Behind the scenes September 2021

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1402 hits Updated: 11 September 2021 Blog

Joomla J! 3.x and 4.0 releases

A few new products

Changes to the downloads page

Preparations for launching a new business

As you will probably guess from the image I've used with this article, this article has been on my list of things to do for a long time!  Since I created my last behind-the-scenes article nearly three years ago, a lot has happened.  The Joomla development team has produced twenty-nine new versions for J! 3.x, including the long-awaited release of J! 3.10, as well as thirteen test versions for J! 4 and now the [even more long-awaited] release of J! 4.0 as a stable version.  Those developments have kept me very busy testing those releases and writing about them.

Enough said about what’s happened with Joomla!  The world has been shaken with a global pandemic that pales “achievements” in IT by comparison. I think we would all agree with that.  In the meantime, I haven’t been idle and I would like to take this opportunity to talk about some of the work that I’ve been doing behind-the-scenes.

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(Reading time: 3 - 5 minutes)
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02Jun2021

Firefox 89: tabs on bottom

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4184 hits Updated: 03 June 2021 Blog

Firefox Proton (Firefox 89) uses tabs on top

How to place tabs on bottom

Taming the dragon:  enabling the CSS

This article shows you how to change Firefox’s appearance from tabs on top (where the tabs appear above the URL address bar) to display the tabs below the URL address bar with CSS and a small browser tweak.Before the release of Firefox v57, it was possible to change the location of the tabs by changing a browser parameter setting.  FF89 does not have this setting.

We will see how it’s possible to change the location of the tabs.My earlier articles—Firefox: tabs on bottom, Firefox: tabs on bottom (again) and Firefox: tabs on bottom (third time around)—discuss Firefox before v89.  This article updates that advice following the release of FF89.

User Rating: 5 / 5

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