One of the most frustrating things about Magento is when there is a conflict that occurs between Extensions.  In today’s post, I will share with you a few ways to determine where your conflict is coming from so that you can address it.

Before You Start

Backup

Always make a backup of your site and database.  If something goes horribly wrong, you will be glad that you have this.  Also, check with your hosting provider, they may already create and keep backups for you on their server to quickly roll your site back.

Getting Started

Take Notes

Any significant change that you make can alter your site in more ways than you can imagine which is why it is important to document everything you do.  I always keep a notepad open and paste in anything signification.  Some of my notes will include steps, dates, file names, file sizes, and sequences of steps taken.  Once you are 30 or 40 steps in, you will be glad that you documented along the way.

Disable/Delete Cache

From your Magento backend, disable cache.  Also, visit var/cache and completely clear out the cache for a fresh start.

Enable De-bugging

Be sure to turn on logging in everything that you use including Magento, php, Apache, etc.  You may need to review log files later and will be glad that you took this step.

Disabling Modules

We will want to disable each module, one by one, at the module level.  This means, we will temporarily rename a file so that Magento cannot point to it.

Location:  app/etc/modules

A long list of modules will appear.  The ones that start with Mage_ are core modules.   Our practice is to put the term -bak at the end of the file.  We use this method to disable a file and at other times to make a copy of a file, this signifies that it is the original unmodified file.

NOTE:  If this is too tedious, you could take a handful of modules and place them in a folder such as modules/test.  If you have prvented your issue, then you will know that it is one of the modules in the new /test folder causing the issue.  Test them one by one by placing each one individually back in the modules/ folder until you determine which one is causing it.

Tips

If you feel that your modules have a conflict but you can’t find it, turn to MagentoConnect for an extension. Here is one that I found today –

http://www.magentocommerce.com/magento-connect/modules-conflict-detector.html