Setup missing bracket error when upgrading to 2.7 - My Forums

Setup missing bracket error when upgrading to 2.7

cottagestuff — Jan 30, 2019, 09:17 AM

Upgrading from 2.6.5 to 2.7, and failing when setup returns an error message saying there is a missing bracket on a certain line in the core/model/modx/modx.class.php file. So I download the file, and don't see a missing bracket.

So try again running set up. click to install and get a white screen.

Try uploading 2.6.5 again and running that setup. Same white screen.

Now have to restore the backup.

Tried the same on a second site and succeeded with no error message. Then tried on a third site, and have the same problem as the first.

Any advice on how to consistently upgrade to 2.7 from 2.6.5 without getting error messages about apparently missing brackets?

Re: Setup missing bracket error when upgrading to 2.7

BobRay — Mar 13, 2019, 05:50 AM

TBH, I made the same mistake myself in an extra. And Guzzle6 has lots of them, so any extra that uses Guzzle6 will have the same problem, including a couple of my extras.

Re: Setup missing bracket error when upgrading to 2.7

markh — Mar 12, 2019, 08:42 PM

To my knowledge, no, there are no other short array notations anywhere else in the core. (Note that $foo = array(); $foo[] = 'bar'; does not count as short array syntax; only $foo = [] does).

Like I said, it wasn't a deliberate minimum version bump, but an oversight on my part that nobody else caught in time. If it would've been a deliberate increase in the minimum version, the setup would've also been updated to tell the user their PHP version is out of date so it wouldn't crash.

There's very little point in changing existing code just to use short array syntax, agreed. It's Syntactic sugar and 4 saved bytes at best. Easy habit to get into though.

Re: Setup missing bracket error when upgrading to 2.7

BobRay — Mar 12, 2019, 06:55 PM

@Mark Hamstra -- Mark, aren't there some short array notations in the MODX core? I don't understand why anyone is using them because the old notation is not deprecated and there are a whole lot of people still on PHP 5.3. They certainly should upgrade to PHP 7, but I'm not sure we should be making MODX crash to encourage that.

Re: Setup missing bracket error when upgrading to 2.7

markh — Mar 12, 2019, 04:36 AM

FYI, in 2.7.2, that offending line has been switched back to be 5.3 compatible: https://github.com/modxcms/revolution/pull/14461

That line was introduced in 2.7.0 (by yours truly... sorry) and because I'm so used to not supporting anything before 5.5 in my extras (which is going up to 7.1 in July 2019) that short array notation accidentally made it into the core. Because it has been catching people off guard it's now been changed to be 5.3 compatible again.

Definitely keep making sure your sites get switched to PHP 7 though.

Re: Setup missing bracket error when upgrading to 2.7

andytough — Mar 08, 2019, 10:18 AM

I am glad it is all working well for you now. It would have been a sad thing for us all if you had gone over to WP. I also wish that Keith Flint was still with us.

Re: Setup missing bracket error when upgrading to 2.7

cottagestuff — Mar 08, 2019, 08:30 AM

Quote from: andytough at Mar 07, 2019, 12:23 PM

I think it would be worth trying a newer version of PHP. Some people have had problems installing certain extras with PHP versions below 5.4.

Andy, you have rescued me from a very dark place (especially dark after the demise of Keith Flint). I was just seconds away from clicking the "Buy Now" on the Beaver Builder page, which would have meant scrapping MODX and going over to WP. No need now. The sun is shining. The birds are singing in the trees. The caterpillars have stopped eating all our cabbages.

Switched over to PHP 7, ran the install again with no problems. Sorted.

I owe you a coffee, a beer, or a whole barrel of beer.

Thanks also to you, Bob, for your earlier, tireless assistance.

Re: Setup missing bracket error when upgrading to 2.7

BobRay — Mar 07, 2019, 09:41 PM

running PHP 5.3.29

This is almost certainly your problem. As of PHP 5.4, you can use [] notation for arrays (instead of the traditional array() notation).

Either MODX or one of your extras is using [] notation and PHP 5.3 doesn't know what to do with it. PHP 5.6 would solve your immediate problem, though PHP 5.6 is no longer supported and was released almost five years ago.

If I were in your situation I'd upgrade to at least PHP 7.1, which was released in 2016.

[Update] I didn't see Andy's message before writing this. He definitely got there first with the solution.

Re: Setup missing bracket error when upgrading to 2.7 (Best Answer)

andytough — Mar 07, 2019, 12:23 PM

I think it would be worth trying a newer version of PHP. Some people have had problems installing certain extras with PHP versions below 5.4.

Re: Setup missing bracket error when upgrading to 2.7

cottagestuff — Mar 06, 2019, 07:59 PM

Latest sad update:

Tried a fresh install of 2.7.1 in a subfolder of the site in question (where 2.6.5 is running perfectly happily) using a new MySQL database and keeping the core for 2.7.1 separate from the one for 2.6.5.

Got to the page where you enter the dbase details. Entered them and clicked to install. Got the next page that says: "Core installation was successful. Click Next to complete the installation," and - BAM! - same damned error message:

Parse error: syntax error, unexpected '[' in /home/finca/public_html/test/core/model/modx/modx.class.php on line 283

I see the modx table looking nice in PHPmyadmin, and the config.inc.php file in core/config looks correct.

This is shared hosting on Linux, running PHP 5.3.29 and dbase: 10.1.37-MariaDB-cll-lve. The server software is Litespeed, not Apache. Could that be the cause of all the woes?