While trying to update a Joomla website to the latest version we encountered the following weird error:
Could not open /home/[user]/public_html/administrator/modules/mod_latestactions/mod_latestactions.xml for writing
At first glance, we didn’t know what that error was because we didn’t know that the module mod_latestactions existed in Joomla. A quick research revealed that this was a new module and was used for displaying the latest admin actions in the backend (e.g. admin abc did action xyz), but why did the update have a problem creating that module?
A research revealed that this issue was caused by a permission setting: Apache just didn’t have permissions to write to that folder, and it was because of the chattr +i command (which makes files/folders immutable) that we explained in details here. Fixing the problem consisted of simply removing the immutable setting from all the Joomla folders before updating the website (this was done by issuing the chattr -i command).
As usual, if you are experiencing the above problem and if you were not able to fix it yourself by using our guide, then please contact us. Our fees are right, our work is clean, and we always aim for long term and strong relationships with our clients.