Can you check the Media Library, and the EWWW IO Settings page to see if those load with 2.4.4?
Then check your server error logs for clues as to why it failed.
Thread Starter
bahead
(@bahead)
I’ll give it a try on my dev server. Unfortunately, IIS/FastCGI error logging isn’t much help.
I wonder if the new gifsicle.exe is causing trouble? See what happens if you try running it directly from command prompt. I know it doesn’t work on XP, so that could be the issue (and I don’t have any Server 2003 test machines).
If gifsicle.exe won’t run, copy the version from 2.4.3 or earlier into the ewww-image-optimizer/ folder and see what happens. The plugin should then copy it over to the wp-content/ewww/ folder automatically and replace the new one that came with 2.4.4.
Server 2003 is end-of-life next month, so you might want to look into upgrading. We’ve been running a bunch of 2008 R2 servers here at work nicely for several years, they are much more stable than 2003.
Thread Starter
bahead
(@bahead)
OK, I’ll follow your troubleshooting suggestions when I get a chance and will report back. Thanks for the advice, I am aware of the situation with 2003.
I found an iso online, and fired up a VM with it to confirm my suspicions. I was able to download a slightly older version of Visual Studio, and the build from that seems to work properly on both XP and Server 2003 again. You can grab it from the Development Version: https://wordpress.org/plugins/ewww-image-optimizer/developers/
or just copy over an older version of gifsicle.exe like I mentioned until the next release (which is also available on the developers page).
Thread Starter
bahead
(@bahead)
Thanks! I updated to the current version and copied over gifsicle.exe from the older version. As you suggested, this resolved the issue.