Deprecated error repair

system · February 18, 2014, 7:37pm

Hi all, i’m running php 5.3.27 and have had a lot of deprecated errors which seemed to be the =&and I fixed these by removing the & from the files in question, however I still get "Deprecated: Assigning the return value of new by reference is deprecated in " for a file for line 147, on that line (shown below) is default: any ideas how to cure this error?[php]case ‘mysqli_slave’:
{
require_once(DIR . ‘/includes/class_database_slave.php’);
$db = new vB_Database_Slave_MySQLi($vbulletin);
break;
}

// load extended, non MySQL class
default:
{
// this is not implemented fully yet
//	$db = 'vB_Database_' . $vbulletin->config['Database']['dbtype'];
//	$db = new $db($vbulletin);
	die('Fatal error: Database class not found');
}

[/php]I’m not even a beginner at php, I simply got these faults when my server was upgraded and now i’m trying to fix them so everything will work now and in the future
Kind regards,
Simon

benanamen · February 18, 2014, 7:43pm

Somewhere you still have a

=& new

It should just be = new

Best to post the whole code.

Simon_Lloyd1 · February 18, 2014, 7:55pm

Hmmmm, I checked and there isn’t, here’s the entire code (as I’ve taken out the header with the license number the error will now be at line 140)[php]<?php

if (!defined(‘VB_AREA’) AND !defined(‘THIS_SCRIPT’))
{
echo ‘VB_AREA and THIS_SCRIPT must be defined to continue’;
exit;
}

if (isset($_REQUEST[‘GLOBALS’]) OR isset($_FILES[‘GLOBALS’]))
{
echo ‘Request tainting attempted.’;
exit;
}

@ini_set(‘pcre.backtrack_limit’, -1);

// Force PHP 5.3.0+ to take time zone information from OS
if (version_compare(phpversion(), ‘5.3.0’, ‘>=’))
{
@date_default_timezone_set(date_default_timezone_get());
}

// start the page generation timer
$pagestarttime = microtime();
define(‘TIMESTART’, microtime());

// set the current unix timestamp
define(‘TIMENOW’, time());

// Define safe_mode
define(‘SAFEMODE’, (@ini_get(‘safe_mode’) == 1 OR strtolower(@ini_get(‘safe_mode’)) == ‘on’) ? true : false);

// define current directory
if (!defined(‘CWD’))
{
define(‘CWD’, (($getcwd = getcwd()) ? $getcwd : ‘.’));
}

// #############################################################################
// fetch the core includes
require_once(CWD . ‘/includes/class_core.php’);
set_error_handler(‘vb_error_handler’);

// initialize the data registry
$vbulletin = new vB_Registry();

// parse the configuration ini file
$vbulletin->fetch_config();

// Add AdSense if present
$vbulletin->adsense_pub_id = ‘’;
$vbulletin->adsense_host_id = ‘’;

if (CWD == ‘.’)
{
// getcwd() failed and so we need to be told the full forum path in config.php
if (!empty($vbulletin->config[‘Misc’][‘forumpath’]))
{
define(‘DIR’, $vbulletin->config[‘Misc’][‘forumpath’]);
}
else
{
trigger_error(‘Configuration: You must insert a value for forumpath in config.php’, E_USER_ERROR);
}
}
else
{
define(‘DIR’, CWD);
}

if (!empty($vbulletin->config[‘Misc’][‘datastorepath’]))
{
define(‘DATASTORE’, $vbulletin->config[‘Misc’][‘datastorepath’]);
}
else
{
define(‘DATASTORE’, DIR . ‘/includes/datastore’);
}

if ($vbulletin->debug)
{
restore_error_handler();
}

// #############################################################################
// load database class
switch (strtolower($vbulletin->config[‘Database’][‘dbtype’]))
{
// load standard MySQL class
case ‘mysql’:
case ‘’:
{
if ($vbulletin->debug AND ($vbulletin->input->clean_gpc(‘r’, ‘explain’, TYPE_UINT) OR (defined(‘POST_EXPLAIN’) AND !empty($_POST))))
{
// load ‘explain’ database class
require_once(DIR . ‘/includes/class_database_explain.php’);
$db = new vB_Database_Explain($vbulletin);
}
else
{
$db = new vB_Database($vbulletin);
}
break;
}

case 'mysql_slave':
{
	require_once(DIR . '/includes/class_database_slave.php');
	$db = new vB_Database_Slave($vbulletin);
	break;
}

// load MySQLi class
case 'mysqli':
{
	if ($vbulletin->debug AND ($vbulletin->input->clean_gpc('r', 'explain', TYPE_UINT) OR (defined('POST_EXPLAIN') AND !empty($_POST))))
	{
		// load 'explain' database class
		require_once(DIR . '/includes/class_database_explain.php');
		$db = new vB_Database_MySQLi_Explain($vbulletin);
	}
	else
	{
		$db = new vB_Database_MySQLi($vbulletin);
	}
	break;
}

case 'mysqli_slave':
{
	require_once(DIR . '/includes/class_database_slave.php');
	$db = new vB_Database_Slave_MySQLi($vbulletin);
	break;
}

// load extended, non MySQL class
default:
{
// this is not implemented fully yet
//	$db = 'vB_Database_' . $vbulletin->config['Database']['dbtype'];
//	$db = new $db($vbulletin);
	die('Fatal error: Database class not found');
}

}

// get core functions
if (!empty($db->explain))
{
$db->timer_start(‘Including Functions.php’);
require_once(DIR . ‘/includes/functions.php’);
$db->timer_stop(false);
}
else
{
require_once(DIR . ‘/includes/functions.php’);
}

// make database connection
$db->connect(
$vbulletin->config[‘Database’][‘dbname’],
$vbulletin->config[‘MasterServer’][‘servername’],
$vbulletin->config[‘MasterServer’][‘port’],
$vbulletin->config[‘MasterServer’][‘username’],
$vbulletin->config[‘MasterServer’][‘password’],
$vbulletin->config[‘MasterServer’][‘usepconnect’],
$vbulletin->config[‘SlaveServer’][‘servername’],
$vbulletin->config[‘SlaveServer’][‘port’],
$vbulletin->config[‘SlaveServer’][‘username’],
$vbulletin->config[‘SlaveServer’][‘password’],
$vbulletin->config[‘SlaveServer’][‘usepconnect’],
$vbulletin->config[‘Mysqli’][‘ini_file’],
$vbulletin->config[‘Mysqli’][‘charset’]
);
if (!empty($vbulletin->config[‘Database’][‘force_sql_mode’]))
{
$db->force_sql_mode(’’);
}

if (defined(‘DEMO_MODE’) AND DEMO_MODE AND function_exists(‘vbulletin_demo_init_db’))
{
vbulletin_demo_init_db();
}

// make $db a member of $vbulletin
$vbulletin->db = $db;

// #############################################################################
// fetch options and other data from the datastore
if (!empty($db->explain))
{
$db->timer_start(‘Datastore Setup’);
}

$datastore_class = (!empty($vbulletin->config[‘Datastore’][‘class’])) ? $vbulletin->config[‘Datastore’][‘class’] : ‘vB_Datastore’;

if ($datastore_class != ‘vB_Datastore’)
{
require_once(DIR . ‘/includes/class_datastore.php’);
}
$vbulletin->datastore = new $datastore_class($vbulletin, $db);
$vbulletin->datastore->fetch($specialtemplates);

if ($vbulletin->bf_ugp === null)
{
echo '

vBulletin datastore error caused by one or more of the following:

Turck MMCache has been detected on your server, first try disabling Turck MMCache or replacing it with eAccelerator

You may have uploaded vBulletin 3.6 files without also running the vBulletin upgrade script. If you have not run the upgrade script, do so now.

The datastore cache may have been corrupted. Run Rebuild Bitfields from tools.php, which you can upload from the do_not_upload folder of the vBulletin package.

';

trigger_error('vBulletin datastore cache incomplete or corrupt', E_USER_ERROR);

}

if (!empty($db->explain))
{
$db->timer_stop(false);
}

if ($vbulletin->options[‘cookietimeout’] < 60)
{
// values less than 60 will probably break things, so prevent that
$vbulletin->options[‘cookietimeout’] = 60;
}

// #############################################################################
/**

If shutdown functions are allowed, register exec_shut_down to be run on exit.
Disable shutdown function for IIS CGI with Gzip enabled since it just doesn’t work, sometimes, unless we kill the content-length header
Also disable for PHP4 due to the echo() timeout issue
/
define(‘SAPI_NAME’, php_sapi_name());
/
if (!defined(‘NOSHUTDOWNFUNC’))
{
if (PHP_VERSION < ‘5’ OR ((SAPI_NAME == ‘cgi’ OR SAPI_NAME == ‘cgi-fcgi’) AND $vbulletin->options[‘gzipoutput’] AND strpos($_SERVER[‘SERVER_SOFTWARE’], ‘Microsoft-IIS’) !== false))
{
define(‘NOSHUTDOWNFUNC’, true);
}
else
{
vB_Shutdown::add(‘exec_shut_down’);
}
}
*/
define(‘NOSHUTDOWNFUNC’, true);

// fetch url of referring page after we have access to vboptions[‘forumhome’]
$vbulletin->url = $vbulletin->input->fetch_url();
define(‘REFERRER_PASSTHRU’, $vbulletin->url);

// #############################################################################
// demo mode stuff
if (defined(‘DEMO_MODE’) AND DEMO_MODE AND function_exists(‘vbulletin_demo_init_page’))
{
vbulletin_demo_init_page();
}

// #############################################################################
// setup the hooks & plugins system
if ($vbulletin->options[‘enablehooks’] OR defined(‘FORCE_HOOKS’))
{
require_once(DIR . ‘/includes/class_hook.php’);
$hookobj = vBulletinHook::init();
if ($vbulletin->options[‘enablehooks’] AND !defined(‘DISABLE_HOOKS’))
{
if (!empty($vbulletin->pluginlistadmin) AND is_array($vbulletin->pluginlistadmin))
{
$vbulletin->pluginlist = array_merge($vbulletin->pluginlist, $vbulletin->pluginlistadmin);
unset($vbulletin->pluginlistadmin);
}
$hookobj->set_pluginlist($vbulletin->pluginlist);
}
unset($hookobj);
}
else
{
// make a null class for optimization
/**
* @ignore
*/
class vBulletinHook {
function fetch_hook() { return false; }
function fetch_hookusage() { return array(); }
}
$vbulletin->pluginlist = ‘’;
}

// if you push things onto this, you need to include the single quotes!
$datastore_fetch = array();

($hook = vBulletinHook::fetch_hook(‘init_startup’)) ? eval($hook) : false;

if (!empty($datastore_fetch))
{
$vbulletin->datastore->do_db_fetch(implode(’,’, $datastore_fetch));
}
unset($datastore_fetch);

// #############################################################################
// do a callback to modify any variables that might need modifying based on HTTP input
// eg: doing a conditional redirect based on a $goto value or $vbulletin->noheader must be set
if (function_exists(‘exec_postvar_call_back’))
{
exec_postvar_call_back();
}

// #############################################################################
// initialize $show variable - used for template conditionals
$show = array();

// #############################################################################
// Clean Cookie Vars
$vbulletin->input->clean_array_gpc(‘c’, array(
‘vbulletin_collapse’ => TYPE_STR,
COOKIE_PREFIX . ‘referrerid’ => TYPE_UINT,
COOKIE_PREFIX . ‘userid’ => TYPE_UINT,
COOKIE_PREFIX . ‘password’ => TYPE_STR,
COOKIE_PREFIX . ‘lastvisit’ => TYPE_UINT,
COOKIE_PREFIX . ‘lastactivity’ => TYPE_UINT,
COOKIE_PREFIX . ‘threadedmode’ => TYPE_NOHTML,
COOKIE_PREFIX . ‘sessionhash’ => TYPE_NOHTML,
COOKIE_PREFIX . ‘styleid’ => TYPE_UINT,
COOKIE_PREFIX . ‘languageid’ => TYPE_UINT,
));

// #############################################################################
// Setup session
if (!empty($db->explain))
{
$db->timer_start(‘Session Handling’);
}

$vbulletin->input->clean_array_gpc(‘r’, array(
‘s’ => TYPE_NOHTML,
‘styleid’ => TYPE_INT,
‘langid’ => TYPE_INT,
));

// conditional used in templates to hide things from search engines.
$show[‘search_engine’] = ($vbulletin->superglobal_size[’_COOKIE’] == 0 AND preg_match("#(google|msnbot|yahoo! slurp)#si", $_SERVER[‘HTTP_USER_AGENT’]));

// handle session input
$sessionhash = (!empty($vbulletin->GPC[‘s’]) ? $vbulletin->GPC[‘s’] : $vbulletin->GPC[COOKIE_PREFIX . ‘sessionhash’]); // override cookie

// Set up user’s chosen language
if ($vbulletin->GPC[‘langid’] AND !empty($vbulletin->languagecache["{$vbulletin->GPC[‘langid’]}"][‘userselect’]))
{
$languageid = $vbulletin->GPC[‘langid’];
vbsetcookie(‘languageid’, $languageid);
}
else if ($vbulletin->GPC[COOKIE_PREFIX . ‘languageid’] AND !empty($vbulletin->languagecache[$vbulletin->GPC[COOKIE_PREFIX . ‘languageid’]][‘userselect’]))
{
$languageid = $vbulletin->GPC[COOKIE_PREFIX . ‘languageid’];
}
else
{
$languageid = 0;
}

// Set up user’s chosen style
if ($vbulletin->GPC[‘styleid’])
{
$styleid = $vbulletin->GPC[‘styleid’];
vbsetcookie(‘styleid’, $styleid);
}
else if ($vbulletin->GPC[COOKIE_PREFIX . ‘styleid’])
{
$styleid = $vbulletin->GPC[COOKIE_PREFIX . ‘styleid’];
}
else
{
$styleid = 0;
}

// build the session and setup the environment
$vbulletin->session = new vB_Session($vbulletin, $sessionhash, $vbulletin->GPC[COOKIE_PREFIX . ‘userid’], $vbulletin->GPC[COOKIE_PREFIX . ‘password’], $styleid, $languageid);

// Hide sessionid in url if we are a search engine or if we have a cookie
$vbulletin->session->set_session_visibility($show[‘search_engine’] OR $vbulletin->superglobal_size[’_COOKIE’] > 0);
$vbulletin->userinfo = $vbulletin->session->fetch_userinfo();
$vbulletin->session->do_lastvisit_update($vbulletin->GPC[COOKIE_PREFIX . ‘lastvisit’], $vbulletin->GPC[COOKIE_PREFIX . ‘lastactivity’]);

// put the sessionhash into contact-us links automatically if required (issueid 21522)
if ($vbulletin->session->visible AND $vbulletin->options[‘contactuslink’] != ‘’ AND substr(strtolower($vbulletin->options[‘contactuslink’]), 0, 7) != ‘mailto:’)
{
if (strpos($vbulletin->options[‘contactuslink’], ‘?’) !== false)
{
$vbulletin->options[‘contactuslink’] = str_replace(’?’, ‘?’ . $vbulletin->session->vars[‘sessionurl’], $vbulletin->options[‘contactuslink’]);
}
else
{
$vbulletin->options[‘contactuslink’] .= $vbulletin->session->vars[‘sessionurl_q’];
}
}

// CSRF Protection for POST requests
if (strtoupper($_SERVER[‘REQUEST_METHOD’]) == ‘POST’)
{

if ($vbulletin->userinfo['userid'] > 0 AND defined('CSRF_PROTECTION') AND CSRF_PROTECTION === true)
{
	$vbulletin->input->clean_array_gpc('p', array(
		'securitytoken' => TYPE_STR,
	));

	if (!in_array($_POST['do'], $vbulletin->csrf_skip_list))
	{
		if (!verify_security_token($vbulletin->GPC['securitytoken'], $vbulletin->userinfo['securitytoken_raw']))
		{
			switch ($vbulletin->GPC['securitytoken'])
			{
				case '':
					define('CSRF_ERROR', 'missing');
					break;
				case 'guest':
					define('CSRF_ERROR', 'guest');
					break;
				case 'timeout':
					define('CSRF_ERROR', 'timeout');
					break;
				default:
					define('CSRF_ERROR', 'invalid');
			}
		}
	}
}
else if (!defined('CSRF_PROTECTION') AND !defined('SKIP_REFERRER_CHECK'))
{
	if ($_SERVER['HTTP_HOST'] OR $_ENV['HTTP_HOST'])
	{
		$http_host = ($_SERVER['HTTP_HOST'] ? $_SERVER['HTTP_HOST'] : $_ENV['HTTP_HOST']);
	}
	else if ($_SERVER['SERVER_NAME'] OR $_ENV['SERVER_NAME'])
	{
		$http_host = ($_SERVER['SERVER_NAME'] ? $_SERVER['SERVER_NAME'] : $_ENV['SERVER_NAME']);
	}

	if ($http_host AND $_SERVER['HTTP_REFERER'])
	{
		$http_host = preg_replace('#:80$#', '', trim($http_host));
		$referrer_parts = @parse_url($_SERVER['HTTP_REFERER']);
		$ref_port = intval($referrer_parts['port']);
		$ref_host = $referrer_parts['host'] . ((!empty($ref_port) AND $ref_port != '80') ? ":$ref_port" : '');

		$allowed = preg_split('#\s+#', $vbulletin->options['allowedreferrers'], -1, PREG_SPLIT_NO_EMPTY);
		$allowed[] = preg_replace('#^www\.#i', '', $http_host);
		$allowed[] = '.paypal.com';

		$pass_ref_check = false;
		foreach ($allowed AS $host)
		{
			if (preg_match('#' . preg_quote($host, '#') . '$#siU', $ref_host))
			{
				$pass_ref_check = true;
				break;
			}
		}
		unset($allowed);

		if ($pass_ref_check == false)
		{
			die('In order to accept POST request originating from this domain, the admin must add this domain to the whitelist.');
		}
	}
}

}

// Google Web Accelerator can display sensitive data ignoring any headers regarding caching
// it’s a good thing for guests but not for anyone else
if ($vbulletin->userinfo[‘userid’] > 0 AND strpos($_SERVER[‘HTTP_X_MOZ’], ‘prefetch’) !== false)
{
if (SAPI_NAME == ‘cgi’ OR SAPI_NAME == ‘cgi-fcgi’)
{
header(‘Status: 403 Forbidden’);
}
else
{
header(‘HTTP/1.1 403 Forbidden’);
}
die(‘Prefetching is not allowed due to the various privacy issues that arise.’);
}

// use the session-specified style if there is one
if ($vbulletin->session->vars[‘styleid’] != 0)
{
$vbulletin->userinfo[‘styleid’] = $vbulletin->session->vars[‘styleid’];
}

if (!empty($db->explain))
{
$db->timer_stop(false);
}
?>[/php]

benanamen · February 18, 2014, 8:21pm

See, now that you posted more code, I see we are dealing with Vbulletin which would have been helpful to know.

What version are you running? How exactly did you “check” that there were no more =& new? If you just scrolled through the code eyeballing, you need to use a good search and replace tool to find every occurrence. I use the one from Funduc. It is very powerful and super fast.
http://www.funduc.com/search_replace.htm

Is this a default install or do you have add-ons?
Have you made any modifications to the original code other that removing some “&” ?
What version of Php WERE you on?

There is much more code involved than what you posted.

Simon_Lloyd1 · February 18, 2014, 8:45pm

Ok, yes i’m using vbulletin 3.8.6, I have the option for the upgrade so it’s nothing to do with not wanting to buy it, I have modifications that wont work on the upgrade, I have fixed deprecated errors in the modification files that presented issues (just 2), the forum, for ran fine on 5.3.27 (the issues with php and vbulletin are with php5.4.x), I have removed a modification that I didn’t want anymore as it’s insecure (VBSEO) and these errors then appeared.

I used Find & Replace in wordpad to find =& (seemed to work fine!), I then did a find for =& new and for & new and finally checked all occurrences of new, there were no &'s and every occurrence of new wasn’t preceeded by one. Just for good measure as it isn’t a large file I did eyball it too

Other than removing the occurrences of =& and replacing them with = I haven’t changed the code at all.

I WAS on php5.3.27 and still am! (server info pic attached)

benanamen · February 18, 2014, 9:20pm

This was a rather important piece if info that has taken several posts to find out about.

I have removed a modification that I didn't want anymore as it's insecure (VBSEO) and these errors then appeared.

Previously you said

Other than removing the occurrences of =& and replacing them with = I haven't changed the code at all.

Now you tell me you removed something. Yet your original post said

I simply got these faults when my server was upgraded

You see the problem here?

You have not provided any info on this modification to help us help you. I had to go google it to get some idea what it is. The easier you make it for us to help you by providing relevant info, the quicker and more likely you will get it resolved.

It brings up the XY problem that JimL had posted about.

Back to your problem. I would start with a clean install of your Vbulletin so you have a working platform to start from and then make your other mods one at time, checking for errors at each step. If you recreate the error, you will be able to provide much better info on exactly what you did when it broke from a clean install rather than how it broke after you started taking stuff out.

Simon_Lloyd1 · February 18, 2014, 9:28pm

A clean install wouldn’t be possible, there is data stored in the db “datastore” and “adminutils” that will still populate items with traces of vbseo, I no longer have vbseo so cannot reinstall that, as for core files the only one I edited was functions.php to remove =& (not by hand but by find and replace) I have the unedited copy of that but adding that back just gives back the deprecated errors.

Thanks for trying to help anyway

benanamen · February 18, 2014, 9:33pm

I already assumed you had data. I meant install a copy of it on a local server on your computer such as xampp or Zend Server, both of which can run on your PC for development.