This isn't a question, but a description of a major dilemma faced after our Moodle 2.3 instance became inaccessible after an attempted module install.
The back story: we have an NSF project based on a blended delivery model using Moodle. Upgraded the core to 2.3 a few weeks back. Some modules installed were lost during the upgrade (questionnaire, Exabis, Abode Connect).
The team asked for the "old" modules to be added to the new install. So I dowloaded the latest versions, and added them last night.
The problem: I logged out and then tried to login a few hours later. I then discovered that my login didn't work. So I tried the password recovery route ... neither the username or the email route would work: both ... both kept returning an error "Incorrect sesskey submitted, form not accepted!"
Thinking that I had corrupted my password, I was able to access the SQL database using PHPmyadmin, and navigated to the mdl_user table. I replaced the password with a newly generated MD5 hash ... and it didn't work!
Tried changing the password for other admin users ... no joy. Even tried changing Guest permissions ... didn't work.
So I was now totally locked out of a moodle instance with all the course materials ... and the last time the courses were backed was months ago (moral of the story: backup all courses before you do a thing!)
Solution:
Step 1: create a new instance of moodle, complete with its own moodledata directory and SQL database. Test the install to make sure it is working.
Step 2: Using PHPMyadmin, open the database for the OLD instance and the NEW instance (dual monitors helps ... needless to say, I was in the middle of a conference, and so had to use a laptop ... not recommended!). Compare the table definitions from both instances, and delete all tables in the OLD instance that do not appear in the NEW database. [At the conclusion of this process, the OLD database and the NEW database have the same table definitions. Any mods/blocks/etc. tables that were installed in the OLD database will be deleted.]
Step 3: Backup the OLD database with the EXCEPTION of all the mdl_user related tables (there are about 5 of them) as a SQL database.
Step 4: Using Myphpadmin, navigate to the NEW database. Clear every table of its contents with the EXCEPTION of all the mdl_user related tables. Do NOT delete the tables, just empty the content (This takes a lot of time!).
Step 5: Using Myphpadmin, import the OLD database backup to the NEW database. This will bring in all the data from the old database with the exception of the user information.
Step 6: Locate the Moodledata directory in the old instance. Copy the entire Moodledata directory into the new Moodledata instance.
Step 7: Run the new instance, and login using the credentials used to create the new instance ... if you are fortunate, your site will be up and running.
Step 8: All user data will be lost, so will have to reimport or recreate user accounts.
There may well be an easier way to do this, but I couldn't find it after much searching on a lot of Moodle forums!
As mentioned earlier, if you regularly backup courses, this would not have been a problem.
