First, you need to make sure that every Discus script is indeed producing an error. Check to see if the Discus diagnostics script runs properly (click here to learn how).

If the diagnostic script also comes back with a 500 (Internal Server Error) message, then it is virtually certain that one of the following two problems is causing the error message:

• Script files not uploaded in ASCII mode

  If you uploaded the script files in binary or automatic mode instead of ASCII mode when performing the FTP setup, this causes problems. Re-upload the script files to your server in ASCII mode and test again.

• Wrong permissions on script files

  On unix servers, the permissions on the Discus scripts (typically *.cgi but sometimes *.pl) need to be set to 0755 (rwxr-xr-x). Other permissions may cause an internal server error. For permissions setting tips, visit our CHMOD help page.

• Wrong path to Perl

  If you chose the wrong path to Perl when you performed the setup, or if your web host reconfigured the server and changed the path to Perl, the scripts will fail. You could check your ftpdiag.cgi script (if you didn't delete it, it's probably in your cgi-bin or similar directory) to see if it's still working with the Perl path you gave. Note that while this problem occasionally occurred in the past, as of Discus 4.0 the ftpdiag.cgi script hard-codes the correct path to Perl in the installation configuration, so this is not likely to be the case.

If you ran the FTP setup but used telnet to extract the archive directly on your server and did not upload the individual files as instructed, you will also get this error. If you did this, we will not provide any support at all until you actually follow our instructions and transfer the files individually as instructed. Trust us; it does make a difference!

If you tried each of the above and it did not work, here are some other suggestions that may lead to the identification of the problem:

• Cute FTP as your FTP client

  Some versions of Cute FTP may not work properly when distinguishing ASCII and binary mode. Cute FTP 4.2 does work properly (be sure that you go to Transfer | Transfer Type... and check "ASCII" before transferring files that are supposed to be transferred in ASCII mode).

• CGI not permitted in subdirectories of cgi-bin

  Some web hosts do not permit the execution of CGI scripts in subdirectories of your cgi-bin directory (i.e., scripts in your main cgi-bin directory, like ftpdiag.cgi, work fine, but scripts in your cgi-bin/discus directory will not work). Generally this is an oversight in your web host's configuration, as it is not intuitive to prohibit their customers from organizing their CGI script files. You can work around this by reinstalling Discus appropriately, although we suggest that you have your web host fix their server instead.

• Other cause reported in server's error log

  If the error was not resolved by the above suggestions, look in your server's error log to see if the reason is reported there. If there is an indication of a problem with the Discus scripts (such as "syntax error" or the like), please contact DiscusWare support.