Maybe try clicking on "Preview" at the top in WebSiteX5 while holding down the Ctrl key and waiting until the progress bar at the bottom has run all the way through so that WebSiteX5 can rebuild the pages.

Then export the entire website to the Internet, not just the updated files, so that incorrect files are overwritten.

If that doesn't help, then wait for the Incomedia employees so they can say something about the problem.

However, it could be that the Incomedia employees will not be online again until Monday.

So the site does not automatically rebuild pages when an upload to a host occurs? It relies upon doing a preview first to stimulate it to do so???

Can safely say, that had zero effect. I just attempted an order, and from the click to ask it to send order to the point where the page refreshes and sends is approx. 2 minutes and 45 seconds. It does send, but it gives the impression that the site locked up.

And x5settings.php is not a web page. It supplies data to all the web pages, probably telling them how to behave. And the send cart and send forms is badly misbehaving. This is not isolated to the cart. Yet, when on a web page, seems like it takes the prices for the products to take 90 seconds or so to populate the product card. And the counter for qty did not appear. So MULTIPLE SETTING are acting up.

And all because I uploaded from 2025.1.2 to 2025.3.6. Only thing I did differently Wednesday evening.

To Incomedia employee who will chime in. My PHP version on my host server is 8.0. My host was asking if 8.3 would make a difference. He has that available.

As far as I know, only PHP 8.2 should be discontinued.

I live in Germany, my web host is Hosteurope and I have set up PHP 8.2.

I opened my demo shop project with WebSiteX5 2025.3.6, rebuilt the pages with Ctrl and "Preview", then did a complete export of the website to the Internet.

My demo shop >> https://findelinks.de/123shop-hosteurope/cartsearch/index.html (no sales)

A test purchase can be made here, no goods will be sent and nothing has to be paid.

Test data can be inserted, all fields marked with * must be filled out.

If you want to test sending the order by email, please provide a valid email address.

Notes:

The product search takes about 10 seconds until the products are displayed.

When you click on the buy button, it takes around 10 seconds for the shop to respond and the pseudo bank details for payment are displayed.

During my test, I received an email as a shop operator (domain email address) and as a test customer (Freenet email address).

My site has worked well and fast since 2019 when I first uploaded pages from X5 to the same host I have used since the year 2000. The only time I have had issues is when I have chosen to let the software update itself. Last March I went through this with the "generic error" when trying to submit the cart info. Had something to do with PHP at that time. My host boosted me from 7.something to 8.0 for the PHP. And he had to do a few other things. Incomedia staff was helping too. Kind of stinks that there is no weekend support. The number of customer orders lost over the weekend is ten times the value of the annual cost of the software. Really stinks.

I try to keep the pages simple, no background graphics, nothing dancing on the pages. Thus pages load quickly. Product Cards are displayed with their images, descriptions, prices, and add to cart buttons without hesitation. And when submitting the cart info, usually just a 2 second thing. I had been on a 500/500 home internet speed for a few years. Now on a 1 Gig service, so that allows me to see things fast. Anyone with a connection speed of 15 MB or faster would see things near as fast. Anyone on dial up, good luck.

And testing it just now, it is crashed. I am now getting the "generic error" and no cart info is being sent. The settings file might have died. VERY FRUSTRATING.

The Incomedia employees will not be online again for around 36 hours.

During the test I only get to step 3, but no further, see

----- Screenshot -----

You are confusing me a bit here. Are you saying you are having the same issue as me? Because the above screenshot is not from my website. And you would have none of the files from my computer to work with. So are you having the same issue?

I found the website address in your profile, see

----- Screenshot -----

-----

I have no problems, my demo shop works, see link above.

-----

Okay. I am still confused. Yes, your site works. And yes, the source code above you are showing me is MY source code with the updated version of X5. But my site is taking near 3 minutes to send order data or any form data. Just tried my contact form too and it took minutes for the Captcha to appear to send the form, and then minutes for the form to send, which it did send. In the past, the captcha was there and ready in the first second of the page loading, and when sending, the refresh page comes up in just a few seconds.

Something is causing the SEND function of the software to really take a long time. And my host said that there is some sort of broken line of code in the x5settings.php file. He said all error logs, or at least most, are pointing to that factor.

On Monday, someone from Incomedia needs to tell me something. Obviously it is a php problem and it has something to do with that file which must control the whole site function.

I went to your site and started the order process to see what happens. The price and quantity both come up. I can place things in the cart then go back to shopping. No real delays there. I put all my details in and the only thing that went slowly was clicking next to go to payment details. That took about 15 seconds. 

I got sent an order email but that arrived before I needed to add in my payment details. It showed the order details and had a "Pay Now" button in it.

Obviously I stopped before doing this, as I don't need your products and I live in New Zealand!

So, not too much going wrong as far as I can see but obviously I didn't go ahead and place an order, so don't know what might happen after that. Did you get an email about my order?

Wayne, yes, I see that order for various Hera ELites. I did receive two real orders this morning, and two partial order forms without payment.  I looked at the time stamps on the e-mails sent to me. On one of the orders, the order info e-mail and then payment e-mail were only 2 minutes apart. That would imply that this person did not have diffuculty. So I decided to do a test order just a few minutes ago. When I went to a page, price was not shown, but I added the item to the cart, whipped through the cart, asked it to continue with the order, and the screen refreshed in about 2 seconds. And the order is in my e-mail. However, my credit card details that I started way over 5 minutes ago, are still hung up and that page is not sending. That is just a normal form WITHOUT a captcha to respond to.

So obviously two people overnight either had no problem or were just very patient and sent in orders. And two people sent in order info without payment. Which is not unusual. Since I do not have a cart to calculate shipping because no robot has a clue as to how to do it right, I get a lot of people who send in order info and wait for me to get back to them. I even have a radio button to check off to allow us to calculate shipping in advance of you sending in your credit card info.

My credit card submit is still frozen. Nothing happening there.

Okay, strange. My credit card send was still frozen. It allowed me to leave the page. I tried my contact form, which does have a captcha. It sent within 4 to 5 seconds and I have that form data in my e-mail. Along with another order from a customer with payment info showing sent two minutes right behind it.

So now it is working intermittently. Adding more mystery to the solution. I did not do anything overnight. When I stopped working on it around 5 PM my time yesterday, it was still misbehaving. Now I suddenly have 3 orders. Guess I get to watch it closely today, and I will ask my host if he tried any tricks overnight. He is in Thailand, so close to the same time zone as you. I am on Eastern time in the US.

I will still hope someone from Incomedia chimes in to figure this out.

Problems with the web host would also be possible, even if they don't want to admit a problem.

If the problem cannot be solved, try uploading the shop to another web host as a test.

That is always true. Mine is on an Apache server. Have had really good luck with it with his hot swapable hard drives and the way he backs up. Up time is usually 99.99%. Two decades ago, I experienced down times. But over the last 10 to 15 years, it has been a good experience with this host.

He did switch me to a different IP over a week ago. This problem started when I updated the X5 software again. So I do understand, something in the software changes, and something on the host may have to change with it to accommodate it. This is why he was asking about the best php version to use. He wondered if 8.3 would make a difference vs. the 8.0 that I am using.

But he did say he saw a problem with that x5settings.php file that a chunk of it was causing a loop. I do not know this stuff, I can only relay the message.

From Monday the Incomedia employees will be online again here and can help with the problem if it is due to WebSite X5.

Hello John,
I am sorry about the issue.
Could you provide additional information on what the hosting provider found?
What errors did the server logs show exactly regarding the x5settings.php file, for example?
Thank you.

Hi Eric,

What he told me initially when he first looked into it is this:

ok, the file:

/home/ware/public_html/res/x5settings.php

is broken. It has an unclosed section of some sort that breaks the whole thing. That might be the root of all your problems.

Second, the errors are happening at: /home/ware/public_html/res/x5engine.php line 12958 - the vast majority of errors in your 10MB error log from today are related to this line of code.

But that line may just be reading the settings and unable to do so and hanging... so solving that settings issue will hopefully fix everything.

Dave

----------------------------------

I have sent your question to him. Not sure when I will see answers. If you are in Italy, I am in the Eastern US, and he is in Thailand. That is a lot of juggling of time zones and all different sleep schedules. I will get back to you with his response.

What I can tell you from the activity on Saturday and Sunday. On Saturday, two orders did come in. One had a time stamp of 2 minutes between the cart data send and the payment form send, which is normal for most customers. Had the same thing Sunday morning, two orders came in, one looked like it occurred at normal speed. I tested it a few times myself. Behavior it did to me:
Sending in the cart data was quick most every time, anywhere from a 2 second to 10 second refresh page displayed.
When sending the credit card info (which I have done via a secondary form within X5), first time, that hung up for over 5 minutes and never sent. Second time, it sent in about 10 seconds. Normal time seems to be about 2 seconds. But I am on a 1 Gig service. My connection speed is always fast.
I tested the contact us page. First time, no captcha ever appeared, thus page would not send. Next time, captcha was there right away and it did send fast.
When going to a page with products on it. The product card data is instantly visible: part number, description, picture, add to cart button, BUT, the price does not show. After about 90 seconds, the prices may appear. If you add something to the cart, you can see the prices flash appear before it takes you to the next step of the cart. Once in a while, the counter box to select a qty greater than one does not appear. So I am not sure if the prices are there or if the command file is not refreshing the view.

So overall, there seems to be a drag on time for prices to appear, captchas to appear, and the cart or any form to send the info to me via e-mail. I had one occurance where the send on the credit card into was hanging up, page would not leave and refresh, but the data was sent to me. Already saw the e-mail pop in, but the website gave the illusion that it was frozen. That happened only once.

My php version is 8.0. And everything was working smoothly until I decided to update the software from 2025.1.2 to 2025.3.6. When I did that and uploaded "changes only", that is when I noticed orders slowed down to zero. I had performed a test order myself right after that, and all seemed fine. This was Wednesday evening. On Thursday evening, I updated some product quantities and prices, changes only. It was Friday morning when I discovered the real problem. Had two customers calling me complaining that they could not place and order. Their cart data came through, but no payment info. That is when we started seeing the real problem. And I did the CTRL+preview thing. Then did a full upload of the site, then did two more full uploads of the site. For a brief time, I got the "generic error" when trying to send the cart info. Did another full upload, and the generic error disappeard for me. But I do not know if it is there or not for other people across the US. 99% of my customers are in the US.

There are zero new orders today. I do tend to average right now 4 to 8 a day. So going Thurs, Fri, Sat, and Sun with 2 each day is bad. All other functions of the site, jumping from page to page, pages loading, all that seems quick with the exception of prices showing. And some pages will have the prices there immediately, others take up to 90 seconds or so to display them.

And, when I upload. The x5settings.php file was 15.6 MB for the longest time. I was watching it, it was showing 15.4 during the last few uploads, whether changes only or whole site. Last time I did it yesterday, it was 15.5. So the file is fluctuating in size. All I have done in my file over the last few days is change some numeric amounts for quantities, and change some prices. So I changed numbers. I did not add part numbers or pages. Did not write any new content. I deleted just a few old part numbers thinking it should make a file smaller. Did that only after discovering the problem, not before.

So this last update seems to have altered the x5settings.php file and possibly other files with relate to sending data and calling up data to be displayed on the screen, predominately the prices in the product cards and the captcha phrase.

Hope that gives you some clues to work with.

Hello John,
I will be waiting for their reply then and there may be some additional information, as I suspect there may be a server-related issue, considering there were no similar reports recently.
For additional investigations in the meantime, could you provide me with a copy of the project so that I can investigate more closely?
You can export it in Step 5 - Export, choosing the “Export the project” option to generate an IWZIP file.
You can then upload the file with SwissTransfer, TransferNow or similar services, and provide a download link to support @ incomedia.eu (without the spaces).
Thank you.

Eric, my host just sent me this for you:

Gotta love AI. Asked it to summarize what we did: 

Subject: WebSite X5 2025.3.6 – E-commerce checkout hangs at final step (PHP 8.0) + server log errors

Hello Support Team,

We have a site generated by WebSite X5 2025.3.6 where the order/checkout process hangs on the final step. Server is currently running PHP 8.0.

Symptoms

• Checkout reaches the final step, then appears to stall/hang.

• Issue started after updating to 2025.3.6.

Server log findings (high signal)

1. Repeated fatal timeouts

• Multiple entries like:

  • PHP Fatal error: Maximum execution time of 30 seconds exceeded

• Most frequently in:

  • /home/ware/public_html/res/x5engine.php

• Frequent hotspot:

  • x5engine.php around line 12958 (appears repeatedly in the log)

• This suggests the final checkout step is triggering an operation that blocks long enough to hit the default 30s execution limit (mail send, payment gateway call, DB write/lock, session issue, etc.).

1. Parse errors reported for x5settings.php (in log)

• Log also includes parse errors referencing:

  • /home/ware/public_html/res/x5settings.php

• Errors observed:

  • "Unclosed '(' ..."

  • "syntax error, unexpected string content ..."

• The log snippets include embedded HTML/JS-like text such as:

  • onclick="return x5engine...

  • <script>...

• The log also shows product text similar to:

  • "Sietto Reflective P303 pull w/..." including inch quotes like 1-1/4".

Important note about x5settings.php

• We downloaded res/x5settings.php directly from the server and ran a syntax check locally; the file parses cleanly (php -l reports no syntax errors).

• That creates a discrepancy: log shows parse errors but the current downloaded file appears valid.

• Possible causes (for your awareness):

  • stale OPcache serving an older broken compiled script

  • multiple copies of x5settings.php being included/executed

  • parse errors occurred earlier and are no longer reproducible (but remain in historical logs)

Request / questions

• Can you advise what operation at/near x5engine.php:12958 corresponds to in 2025.3.6 (e-commerce finalization / mail send / gateway / DB write / session save)?

• Do you have recommended PHP versions and required/recommended extensions specifically for 2025.3.6 e-commerce checkout?

• Are there known issues in 2025.3.6 with product descriptions containing quotes (e.g., 1-1/4"), HTML/JS fragments, or string escaping that could corrupt/impact generated settings/engine files?

• Any known issues with timeouts during final checkout step on PHP 8.0?

If you'd like, we can provide the relevant log excerpt covering the failures and (if you tell us what you need) a sanitized copy of the x5engine.php surrounding the reported line.

Thank you.

send that to them ... it should help! 

Hello John,
the full log would be helpful, so that the specific errors can be checked and compared to the contents of the php file.
In the meantime, I have published the project on my hosting space to test whether similar errors occur, you can place test orders as well and tell me if you notice the same behavior:
https://eric-c.websitex5.me/progetti/www.eclectic-ware.com/

Thank you, JiPeR.

Eric, I used your test site and tested 3 orders. It was fast. When hitting the Buy Now button, screen refreshes to the next page within one second. Then I noticed the payment screen reverts back to my domain, due to me using a static link for the refresh. But even that, when on my domain, it sent the details within 3 to 5 seconds.

I will ask for additional error logs.

Eric, of the three test orders I did, only one sent a confirming "customer" e-mail. The other two did not. Not a biggie to be concerned about at this time.

I did make a request to my host for extended error logs.

Eric, try this

https://www.transfernow.net/dl/20260203ZRulkiJi/EkF228Bc

Eric, this note is from my host, pertains to the file link above too.

There are 3 error logs (downloading them to the same folder made them change their names by appending numbers). one for the website root, one for the /res folder and one for the /cart folder. All 3 are attached. Send this to them and see if that sheds some light. Also re-ask them if they can send you their suggested stack for PHP (extensions, version etc) - perhaps moving you to their latest recommended version with all the recommended extensions may help. \

I still have a nuclear option as well. I could put you on your own VPS. You would lose cpanel if I do that, but you would have a dedicated (not shared) RAM and CPU. If they cannot fix this by tomorrow ill start setting that up for us to test at least.

------------

Thus, he is asking about recommended versions of php to work best with the X5 software.

"Also re-ask them if they can send you their suggested stack for PHP (extensions, version etc) - perhaps moving you to their latest recommended version with all the recommended extensions may help. \"

According to Incomedia, PHP 8.2 is recommended.

Hello John,
looking at the log, the main error is "PHP Fatal error: Maximum execution time of 30 seconds exceeded in /home/ware/public_html/res/x5engine.php on line 12958"
Do you have the option to increase this maximum time through your hosting settings, or perhaps their support could assist in changing this through the .htaccess file?

Regarding PHP, as Daniel mentiones the latest supported version is 8.2, from what I can see you are currently using 8.0.30 which is also supported, but you may want to check the situation with 8.2 as well.

Thanks, Eric. I have relayed what you wrote to my host.

But I want to express this thought. All worked well until I updated the software. Order send was generally just a couple of seconds. Increasing the timeout setting is only going to give it permission to take longer without timing out. Thus, it could still be taking longer and giving the impression that the site is frozen.

What about Dave's comments about line 12958 seeming to be open, broken code???

Eric, my host is asking about php "extensions."

Ill let you test for a while before I try to move to 8.2 ... and yes extensions are something different. Every version of PHP has extensions that allow it to do different things - like there is one for zipping, one for caching, etc. - but there are literally thousands of extensions and every site uses some and not others... the trick is to only install the ones you need and no extras - extra extensions slow everything down. which is why I asked. I would have created a version of php tailored exactly to what X5 needs and no more.

Hello John,
this would allow to see whether it would finish loading after the additional allotted time, or if a different error would occur.
Regarding extensions, nothing in the 2025.3.6 update should require any specific change for this.

Line 12958 is only referenced by the fatal error, are you referring to this instead (as the log files do not contain "unclosed" in any of the listed errors or warnings)?

"[31-Jan-2026 18:36:54 UTC] PHP Parse error: syntax error, unexpected string content "onclick="return x5engine.imSho..." in /home/ware/public_html/res/x5settings.php on line 149031"

Okay. I relayed that to my host. You guys are the tech guys.

Eric, how much longer today are you there. I know it is after 5 PM in Italy.

Hello John,
apologies but I was checking some other requests and only noticed your latest reply now.
We are about to close our offices for today, as we are available until 5:30 PM.

After 8 hours today of my host giving me his exclusive attention, setting up a secondary site to test my full X5 upload, and then agreeing that we should try erasing everything on the normal server and uploading fresh, here is his initial response to that clean new upload:

Final results are in.

old files:
28742 files totaling 2.85GB

new files:
7024 files totaling 350MB

--------------

Here's what I can say about 21,000 extra files. Since Nov. 2019 when I first uploaded from X5, I have lost a few product lines. When I remove HTML files, those are easy to decipher, I attempt to remove all graphics files associated with the page, and I delete cart product cards in the software. I also set up 301 redirects in the .htaccess file since html files are now off the server. But I do not do anything with the .css or .js files or any X5 writes for those pages. I just don't know what they are called or where to find them. So I probably have deleted around 100 or so html files. But to have 21,000 extra files. What is the X5 software doing with all these extra files, that it did not do on this last upload with a lot few files. Any kind of explanation for what is causing this. Because I plan to create some new pages. I know some old pages will need to go. There will be a lot of uploading changes over the next many months. What can I expect of the behaviour of these uploads? I will refrain from updating the version of my software.

I will see if there is any potential for creating a list of file names, old and now new.

For example, dozens of small images of the shopping cart symbol are generated, see screenshots

A small empty image with 5 x 5 pixels was even created hundreds of times.

It probably remains a secret from Incomedia why it uploads a small image dozens or hundreds of times on the web space.

-----

-----

Daniel,

Yet with a fresh upload, it neglected to update a few images, one being my company logo, and 21,000 other files that it seems to think it does not need any more.

I also found a lot of very large images that I had added to my demo shop for free via WebSite X5.

The built-in library probably cannot manage the images properly and keeps creating new copies and uploading them to the web space.

Wait and see what the Incomedia employees say about this flood of images.

-----

-----

Hello John,
I will also check the number of files of the test version I uploaded.
What you did not mention is: what is the current situation with the errors with the fresh upload, or the secondary site?

Daniel, I am assuming one of the images in your screenshots is an "Add to cart" image, where is the other image used?

I remain available.

Eric, I'm not sure if any error logs were checked yet since everything (most everything) seems to be functioning. We did notice a few graphics did not upload with the full upload. And in my Blog pages, seems the teasers for the blog articles are stuck in some sort of phone viewport to the left. A narrow column instead of stretching the width of the page on a PC. Checked it in Firefox and Chrome. So it is not the browser. When selecting an article, then it reverts to full screen. Odd behavior, and I'm sure that one is an X5 setting.

I did receive one new order about 2:30 my time. So at least one customer proved it is working for them.

I just ran an order myself, it was very fast, order results are in my e-mail, as well as another customer order. So it does seem like it is working.

One glitch I am noticing, on this page:
https://www.eclectic-ware.com/ceramic-towel-bars.html

The quantity selector boxes are not appearing next to the ADD buttons. These are product cards that are on other pages. For example:
https://www.eclectic-ware.com/meridian-round-white-porcelain-towel-bars.html

That LEN-600-01 towel bar on the first page with no qty selector is the same product card on the second URL, and the qty selector is there. Even with refreshing the first page, the qty selector does not appear. 

So there is still some ODD behavior. I have noticed a few prices on some pages take a few seconds to appear. Whole page is there, but price act 3 different ways: a) not there and pop up in a few seconds, b) are there normal, c) are there with a line drawn through them, and then the line disappears after a few seconds. It was actually doing the line thing for months. Long before this mess just happened.

That is what I can tell you so far this morning. I do plan to do an upload later of a few changes, just to see how everything responds. Changes only, not whole site. The blog issue with its funky viewport, is not high on my list to get to right now. Must look normal for phone people. But laptop and PC's, must be coming off as kind of weird.

@Eric C.: The large image was used in the shop. Why was it uploaded so many times?

Hello John,
some of the Product Catalog objects have the Show Quantity Field option disabled.
Regarding the display of prices, although we released some optimizations to minimize this in past updates, this may still be noticeable on some hosting spaces, while on others the loading is faster.

I am looking at the blog with the copy of the project I have available, I will update you about that.

Hello Daniel,
so it is a product image?
The project in question is the one you sent an IWZIP of a few days ago for a different post, correct?
Thank you.

@Eric C.: Yes. it is the demo shop from IWZIP.

I have since deleted the /images directory and am cleaning up the sitemap. I will replace missing images in the shop with new images.

The demo shop on my hard drive is therefore different than in the IWZIP I sent.

Thank you Daniel.

John, were the last uploads done after a CTRL + Preview? I wanted to make sure if there were possibly some files still not generated correctly, as the blog is displayed correctly on my published version:

When my host wiped my server clean, I just did a normal upload. I did not do any preview first on my computer, didn't seem necessary. So if I do CTRL+preview on my PC. Then go back and upload "changes only" or "all pages" you believe it will correct the blog issue.

And I will look at the cell parameters for the product cards not showing the qty. Might be turned off in that cell block.

Hello John,
please give it a try when you are able to, as I would like to confirm what the blog looks like in the same conditions, and be able to isolate whether this was due to partially generated files or something else.

Eric, something else. I did the CTRL+preview, then did an upload of changes only. It did not fix the blog. Looked at it in Firefox and Chrome, still aligned to the left, even after asking the browser to refresh. Not sure if I should try a "full upload of all pages." Your thought?

Did fix the counter box on that one group of product cards, saw the check box missing a check mark.

Host says no errors are being reported at this time, site is functioning.

Hello John,
yeah, I was referring to the export of all pages.
We will inspect and compare the page on my hosting and yours to find out more.
There were no changes regarding the blog settings in your version of the project compared to the one you sent me, correct?

I have not touched or added to the blog at all.

Will attempt a full upload.

Eric, the CTRL+preview first, then full upload to the host seems to have corrected the blog viewport error. I tested an order and that is still working fast.

We may be concluded with this issue for now. Still wondering what the extra 21,000 files could be.

Hello John,
how long have you been working and exporting this website, and was any other project exported in that same hosting space in the past?
Usually the most common source for a gap in number of files would be obsolete files that were once present in some version of the project, such as pages, images or files related to the style of certain elements that were then removed from the project, but were not deleted from the web space, though the number of files in your case is particularly large.

Yes, erroneously large considering the entire site is under 300 pages. Granted potentially 100 pages that were there are gone. New pages added, but still under 300.

I have been using this host for 25 years, and 2019 is when I first uploaded using the X5 software. There is a possibility that Net Objects Fusion left some garbage behind, even though I did go through and cleaned out what I could in 2019. I would think only a few dozen files remained from the old software.

In my demo shop, dozens and hundreds of copies of the same images were made and loaded into the images directory.

The vast majority of the 21,000 files are probably in the images directory.