If you are experiencing an issue with connecting your website to your MainWP Dashboard, be sure to check this list of potential issues and solutions.
MainWP Child plugin missing
To be able to connect your website, you need to make sure that the MainWP Child plugin is installed on your website that you are trying to connect.
MainWP Child plugin installed but not activated
If you are not able to connect your website to your MainWP Dashboard, and you are sure that you have installed the MainWP Child plugin on your website, make sure that the plugin is activated.
Plugin conflict
If, after verifying that the MainWP Child plugin is installed and activated on your website, the website still can’t be connected to your MainWP Dashboard, try to disable all plugins except for MainWP Child and connect your site after that.
Dashboard Site Server Misconfiguration
To be sure that your Dashboard Site server is configured properly and can be used for hosting MainWP Dashboard plugin:
- Log in to your Dashboard Site
- Go to the MainWP > Server Information page
- Locate the following checks and make sure that all of them display the Pass response:
- SSL Extension Enabled
- SSL Warnings
- cURL Version
- cURL OpenSSL Version
Child Site Server Misconfiguration
To be sure that your Child Site server is configured properly and can be connected to your MainWP Dashboard:
- Log in to your Child Site
- Go to the WP > Settings > MainWP Child > Server Information page
- Locate the following checks and make sure that all of them display the Pass response:
- MainWP Upload Directory
- SSL Extension Enabled
- SSL Warnings
- cURL Version
- cURL OpenSSL Version
Dashboard and Child site on the same server with disabled loopback connections
In case your Dashboard Site is on the same server as your website that you are trying to connect to it, you need to make sure that the loopback connections are allowed and enabled on your server. To do that;
- Log into your Dashboard Site
- Go to the MainWP > Server Information page
- Locate the Server self-connect check
If you see anything different then Response Test O.K. it means that the loopback connections are disabled. In that case, you will need to contact your host support and request enabling this feature. If by any chance, that is not possible, you should consider moving your Dashboard Site to another Webserver or Localhost.
The website has been migrated recently
You may have recently moved the website to another server, and your Dashboard’s Server may not have an updated DNS, or your server may be experiencing DNS issues. To check this, use the Test Connection tab and verify the IP that shows up with the IP that shows on your website WP > Settings > MainWP Child > Server Information page.
In case there is an IP address mismatch, you will need to contact your hosting provider and request two things:
- Dashboard Site host: request DNS Cache flush
- Child Site host: request DNS Settings verification
Requests being blocked by the Child Site server
In some cases, the Child Site server blocks requests sent from the Dashboard site, and your website may return the message that the MainWP Child plugin can’t be found. In this case, you need to contact your Child Site host support department and have them check if the server Firewall or ModSecurity is blocking access by reviewing server logs. See our help article about whitelisting MainWP Dashboard for ModSecurity.
The connection being Blocked by Cloudflare
Some users with Cloudflare have reported trouble connecting their website to their MainWP Dashboard. If you are experiencing this issue please try to whitelist your MainWP Dashboard in your Cloudflare settings.
Adding a Child Site with Let’s Encrypt SSL
To be able to add a Child Site with the Let’s Encrypt SSL Certificat make sure that following requirements are met:
- MainWP server must have up to date CURL and OpenSSL (this means running Apache 2.4 not 2.2 in some cases that will require switching from MAMP to XAMPP)
- In the MainWP > Add New Site > Advanced Options select the TLS 1.2 in SSL-Type option.
