WP Rocket minification and BPS Pro Plugin Firewall

[Todd]

After a recent update to BPS Pro our mobile friendly site (about 2 weeks ago) became not-so-mobile friendly according to Google. The site also blew apart on Google Chrome, Firefox and Safari. Deactivating the plug-in WP Rocket resolved the issue, so I contacted them for tech support. They suggested turning off minification, which did resolve the issue somewhat. I then gave them access to the site, they downloaded a copy to their server to tinker with the configuration. Here are their findings:

“I was able to figure out the problem. The BulletProof Security plugin placed an htaccess file in the wp-content/plugins folder, with a lot of rules in it, designed to restrict access to the files. However, this file also prevents the minification process from running correctly, causing the problem you initially reported.”

She’s referring to the htaccess file found in the plug-ins folder. She continues:

One issue I had with BPS, is that, even after the plugin is de-activated , the files still remain.

“So that means that these are your options:
Figure out which option in BPS created this file, and turn it off (assuming it will clean up after itself and actually remove the file).
Manually delete or rename this htaccess file
If you want to keep the protection of this file, then you just have to keep the CSS/JS minification options in WP Rocket turned off.”

I had previously read this thread about the htaccess file changes necessary when using WP Rocket and had followed those steps. But it sounds like there is a second htaccess file that needs to be altered?

[AITpro Admin]

The BPS Pro Plugin Firewall cannot work correctly if you are minifying js plugin scripts.  The reason for that is the Plugin Firewall creates whitelist rules based on the actual paths to plugin js files.  When you minify js scripts you are changing the actual original path to plugin js files.  The Plugin Firewall does not do anything with CSS files so it is fine to minify all CSS scripts.  All BPS Pro features can be turned On|Off for troubleshooting so you do not need to deactivate the BPS Pro plugin for troubleshooting:  http://forum.ait-pro.com/forums/topic/read-me-first-pro/#bps-pro-general-troubleshooting

Plugin Firewall Forum Topic:  http://forum.ait-pro.com/forums/topic/plugin-firewall-read-me-first-troubleshooting/

Minify Plugins: If you are using a Minify plugin then you will probably not see Security Log entries / alerts.  Most if not all minifying plugins allow you to choose to exclude plugin scripts that you do not want to minify.  If you want to use the BPS Pro Plugin Firewall then you can choose not to minify particular plugin scripts so that you can use both minifying and the Plugin Firewall together.  It is recommended that you turn Off/deactivate minifying to get the plugin scripts that need to be whitelisted in the Plugin Firewall.  After you have added those plugin scripts to your Plugin Firewall whitelist you can then exclude those same plugin scripts from being minified in your minify plugin and turn On/activate your Minify plugin. Note:  If you are using a Minify plugin and you do not want to exclude any js plugin scripts then you CANNOT use the Plugin Firewall due to the way plugin scripts are minified.  You cannot add plugin scripts manually or whitelist the Minify plugin’s folder or use the Plugin Override tool either due to the way the true origin of the plugin scripts are combined / minified.  The Plugin Firewall is completely optional – you can turn it On or Off.

The other forum topic: http://forum.ait-pro.com/forums/topic/wp-rocket-plugin-htaccess-code-where-to-put-it/ has instructions to add WP Rocket htaccess code to BPS Custom Code if you are using any WP Rocket htaccess code.

[Todd]

That serves to clarify the issue and the solution perfectly. Thank you.

[Author]

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