Hi @caming,
Hope I can help.
“Widget not found” isn’t an error that Widget Instance will output. It outputs “No widget found with that id”. We need to be specific if we have any chance of resolving your issue, are you seeing “No widget found with that id?”
Also what is the id you are using? It should follow the format like:
search-2
Can you run through this checklist and see if anything pops up:
This is what you need to do to debug the issue:
1. Test for plugin incompatibility
Disable all plugins, only have Widget Instance enabled. If it works as expected, one by one enable the other plugins to narrow down which plugin isn’t playing nicely with Widget Instance.
2. Test for wordpress related php errors
In your wp-config.php file. Replace the default line that reads: define(‘WP_DEBUG’, false); with the lines:
@ini_set(‘display_errors’,0);
define(‘WP_DEBUG’, true);
define(‘WP_DEBUG_DISPLAY’, false);
define(‘WP_DEBUG_LOG’, true);
After you have saved the wp-config.php file, click the puzzle piece icon. Then open the debug.log file (in your wp-content directory). If the plugin is throwing an error, it should be recorded in that file. Let me know if you found any relevant errors.
3. Test for javascript errors
Open the javascript console in the browser inspector tools to see if there are any javascript errors
4. Test for ajax errors
If you have Google Chrome through it’s inspector tools you can the view the ajax (xhr) request under the network tab (filter by xhr). Every time the puzzle is clicked a new ajax call is sent to wp-admin/admin-ajax.php.
Could be a permission issue with that file (sidenote do you have that directory password protected by apache)? If you inspect the xhr request and it doesn’t return a json object (will return a error or -1) than there is problem with accessing that file.
