Update to Joomla 3.8.2 and Hikashop 3.2.1 Breaks a LOT of stuff

nicolas wrote: Hi,

Then please provide a backend and a FTP access to the website along with a link to this thread via our contact form:
www.hikashop.com/support/contact-us.html

nicolas wrote: Hi,

I've had a look for several hours but couldn't find a suitable solution to prevent your issue.
The issue you have is this:
When you click on something on your website your browser sends two kind of data:
- the data in the GET (in the URL)
- the data in the POST (the data sent hidden, like forms data)
Upon arrival on the server, both of these are merged into the REQUEST.
Normally, to get data coming in (what page to display, what data was sent by the user, etc), a PHP script will look in these variables.
In order to get that data HikaShop go through the Joomla JInput system.
This system filters the data for HikaShop so that the data is securised. All Joomla extensions are supposed to go through JInput and not use directly GET/REQUEST/POST.

The problem comes from the line:
$ref =& JFactory::getApplication()->input;
in the file administrator/components/com_hikashop/helpers/helper.php
This is where HikaShop get the JInput system from Joomla to be able to use it everywhere.
When I display it on your staging website with a var_dump(JFactory::getApplication()->input); all I get is the data in the GET (in the URL) and not the data in the POST, where I'm supposed to get both merged together in the REQUEST.
If I change that line to:
$ref =& JFactory::getApplication()->input->request;
then the data is there and I can use it.
However, besides GET and POST, browsers also send COOKIES and FILES data (for cookies and file uploads) and the FILES are not merged in REQUEST.
So if I do that change there, that means that the upload of files won't work properly in HikaShop. You can try to see if that change works for you, but we won't be able to include it on our end.

The real issue is that JFactory::getApplication()->input is actually supposed to have the data of REQUEST and not the data of GET only. And I don't know why it doesn't have that data on your staging website.

nicolas wrote: Hi,

The fact that JFactory::getApplication()->input doesn't contain the same thing than JFactory::getApplication()->input->request and that this only happens on your website (and not on other websites using HikaShop) is indeed strange.
I suppose that it must be linked to another extension doing strange things with JFactory::getApplication()->input
Posting on Joomla groups could be an idea yes.
Also, what you can do is try to disable the plugins, modules, components, templates one by one and see each time if you have the problem. Hopefully, you can mek it work with only disabling one extension, which will mean that the issue is something linked to what that extension does and we can move forward from there.

Nicolas, Jerome, whoever...

I'm still stuck on this. I've reached out to people I figure can fix it, and they all want an upfront fee of OVER $2000 USD to even look at it (except one guy...I haven't heard yet how much he would want). I've already spent $700 USD to find out from a tech group that unfortunately doesn't know anything about HikaShop based on Nicolas' statement that this isn't a HikaShop problem...only to find out that Joomla & all my plugins ARE FINE AND THE PROBLEM IS WITHIN HIKASHOP!!!

I'm getting pretty aggravated by the constant issues of when a patch or new release comes out, it constantly breaks things. Now I'm out of MONEY because of it and it's STILL not fixed! This one has been the worst. Issues ALL over the place! After my USPS shipping issue, someone in the community here reached out & said the newest version fixed it, which it did for me...but now when trying to do everything else, I'm back to having these GET & POST issues you found Nicolas 3 months 2 days ago!

I'm to the point of wanting a refund for the years of service I've pre-paid for HikaShop and just move to a new platform that doesn't have so many issues. Please...someone, help me with this. I need my site fixed because HikaShop keeps breaking and it has nothing to do with the rest of my site. The issue is within HikaShop!

nicolas wrote: Hi,

I don't understand what you mean... Two messages ago I provided a potential solution you can try:

The problem comes from the line:
$ref =& JFactory::getApplication()->input;
in the file administrator/components/com_hikashop/helpers/helper.php
If I change that line to:
$ref =& JFactory::getApplication()->input->request;
then the data is there and I can use it.

This should help but you never gave any feedback about it. And based on the information of that message, a normal PHP developer should be able to write a patch for your website so that it can even allow the files and cookies to work properly too.
It should only require a few hours of development/testing I guess.

While we're happy to fix issues in HikaShop for free when they are reported, no one else reported a similar issue since HikaShop 3.2.1 and there are thousands of merchants using more recent versions of HikaShop. So it's not possible that the issue is inside HikaShop. Others would have had the same issue.
So it can only be another extension impacting the use of JInput on your website.
We can't spent several hours developing a patch for your website for something which isn't caused by HikaShop. And I've already spent several hours debuging the issue on your website to understand the situation.
If you want to pay us to develop a patch for that situation for your website, we can but we can't do it for free.
In that case, please use our contact form to request a quote and we can work on it for you.
www.hikashop.com/support/contact-us.html
However, I would first recommend to do the change I proposed before and see how that works for you. That might actually be enough.

nicolas wrote: Hi,

Mmm. I wanted to have a look again at the situation but the staging2 website you had provided doesn't work anymore, and on the staging1, the backend access doesn't work.

One other solution I was thinking about was to change all the:
hikaInput::get()->
to:
$input->request->
and add on the line before each:
$input = JFactory::getApplication()->input;
in the file components/com_hikashop/controlllers/checkout_legacy.php in order to bypass HikaShop's JInput override to directly use Joomla's. However, if the JInput of Joomla is broken by another extension it won't help.

Another solution I'm thinking about is to change the code:
if(HIKASHOP_J30) {
class hikaInput {
to:
if(false) {
class hikaInput {
in the file administrator/components/com_hikashop/helpers/helper.php so that it will switch to the old system of input filtering of Joomla instead of the new one.

So please try these and see how that goes.

nicolas wrote: Hi,

Please try the changes and report back. If that doesn't help, make sure that the staging info we have is correct so that we can look into the issue.

And...it broke something after it was all pushed live. I've never seen this before...any ideas? I was able to click Shopping on the menu, then the manufacture, then the sub categories, but when I got to product, I got this error.

Jerome wrote: Hello,

You should perform a "check database" via the toolbar in your HikaShop configuration screen.

Regards,

Ok...all links seem to work. Order went through fine on the live site. Database had no errors. Nothing...it updated like it never had a problem like it should have 4 months and 3 days ago based on the first post of this thread.

I'll keep an eye on it and report back if there's an issue.

Thanks for putting up with the insanity, sorry it was so frustrating.