Error on Divi Booster update: "PCLZIP_ERR_BAD_FORMAT (-10) : Invalid archive structure"

Written by Dan Mossop

If you're very unlucky, you may get the following error when you try to update Divi Booster:

The package could not be installed. PCLZIP_ERR_BAD_FORMAT (-10) : Invalid archive structure

This error indicates that WordPress has not been able to successfully download and extract the latest version of Divi Booster from the server.

Updating Manually

The error is not actually a problem with the Divi Booster zip file being installed by the update process. Rather it is seems to be down to configuration issues on the server on which the WordPress site is hosted.

As this only affects the automatic update process, a quick way to get going with the latest version of Divi Booster is to update manually.

Ensuring cURL is configured on server

While I'm still trying to understand this issue fully myself, it appears that the primary cause is the cURL library not working on the server, either because it has not been enabled, or is incorrectly configured.

When cURL is not available to WordPress, it falls back on other methods of retrieving the update file which appear to fail to correctly transfer the zip file (in some cases, at least), resulting in the error mentioned above.

While it is beyond the scope of this post, and my ability, to advise how to install cURL for all the combinations of servers and PHP versions, there are two basic things that need to be done. First, cURL needs to be installed on the web server itself (e.g. Apache). Then the PHP cURL extension appropriate to the web server and PHP version needs to be installed. This post contains some examples of the commands for installing various versions of cURL, but note that they may not be the correct commands for your server / PHP version.

If you are hosting your site with a web host, they should be able to assist you with the installion of cURL / PHP cURL.

You can check if cURL is available to PHP on your server (and therefore WordPress) by creating a phpinfo page. If you have cURL installed, you should see a "cURL" section in the php_info output with a row saying "cURL Support: Enabled".

Ensure WordPress has Enough Memory

Assuming that doesn't work, another potential cause is WordPress reaching its memory limit and as a result being unable to completely decompress the file. This post explains how to do it:

https://docs.woocommerce.com/document/increasing-the-wordpress-memory-limit/

Simplify Your Updates with Divi Booster!

Having trouble with automatic updates? Ensure you have the latest features with our easy-to-use manual update and boost your Divi site’s performance effortlessly. Resolve issues and make the most out of Divi Booster today.

About Dan Mossop

Dan is a Scottish-born web developer, now living in Brisbane with his wife and son. He has been sharing tips and helping users with Divi since 2014. He created Divi Booster, the first Divi plugin, and continues to develop it along with 20+ other Divi plugins. Dan has a PhD in Computer Science, a background in web security and likes a lot of stuff, 

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