Drupal Migration and 404 Errors

Question

I've set up a Drupal 7 site locally and have ftp'd the site over to my ISP's server which is a linux box running PHP and MySQL.

I've never successfully logged into the remote site before and I have locked myself out as I got the admin password wrong. When I go http://www.example.com/?q=user and click on request New Password then I get this error:

Not Found

The requested URL /user/password was not found on this server.

Additionally, a 404 Not Found error was encountered while trying to use an ErrorDocument to handle the request.

One thing I've been confused about and that is the .htaccess file. I never had one locally on my Mac and I did not need it (I know it is hidden) - so I downloaded one and deployed it to the web site but then I got 500 errors, it made it worse.

I've since deleted that file and at least I get some content - but not very much - just the front page. I overrode the themes name in settings.php as I have user access errors when using a new template, if I get passed this bit I can probably fix that. I changed it back to one of the default themes and that allowed me to get some content and not the 'white screen of death'

Advice welcome!

Answer 1

To get site working properly: It seems like .htaccess issue. You do need the .htaccess file. It should be in the document root folder and secured so that any host account can read it. Out of the box Drupal has this file.

To recover Drupal User=1 password: If you are lucky, your ISP may have drush installed globally on this server. SSH to the server and try "drush uli" command. If not, you can try installing drush on your local machine - the pain will be well worth it if you plan to continue working on Drupal. You can use "drush uli" command on your local machine, login with the on-time login link given and change the admin password. They upload the database back to your ISP.