Migrating a site with files supplied by former host. Unfortunately, it came from a multisite environment with Admin privileges restricted. One of the restrictions we notice after importing the site was the Admin cannot add a new theme (the “Add Theme” button is not present under Appearance > Themes) nor Delete any themes.
Looking at the database _usermeta > meta_value for the site owners wp_capabilities, we notice two different kinds of string for two different admins:
a:1:{s:13:“administrator”;b:1;}, which is normal and then
a:2:{s:15:“unfiltered_html”;b:1;s:13:“administrator”;b:1;}, which I believe was set from the host’s multisite control.
All I want to do is gain back full control of the WordPress environment.
The theme was purchased and manually installed. All plugins came from the plugin developers sites, so none of those assets were imported.
The WordPress files are completely fresh–we had the new host replace all of the WordPress files.
We’re thinking that somewhere within the database is the cause of the the restrictions and am not sure what (or where) else to look into changing things back to normal.
Hey, I totally feel your frustration—it’s such a pain when you don’t have full control over your own site, especially after going through a big migration like that!
It sounds like you’ve done a lot already by replacing the WordPress files and getting everything set up on the new host. The problem you’re describing, where you can’t add or delete themes, probably stems from some leftover settings from the multisite setup. Let’s see if we can sort that out.
First off, the issue likely lies in the database, specifically in the _usermeta table. There’s a setting in there called wp_capabilities that controls what each user can do. For a regular admin on a single site, you should see something like a:1:{s:13:"administrator";b:1;}. That’s just a fancy way of saying, “This user has full admin rights.” But you mentioned seeing an extra string with unfiltered_html, which might be some weird leftover from the multisite setup.
You can try tweaking that wp_capabilities value to match the standard admin one. If that doesn’t do the trick, you might want to check another setting called user_level. For a full admin, this should be set to 10. If it’s lower, that could be why you’re missing some controls.
Also, sometimes multisite setups leave behind other bits in the database. It wouldn’t hurt to poke around the wp_options table for anything that looks like it’s related to multisite settings. Sometimes just cleaning out those remnants can restore normal functionality.
If all else fails, you could even try creating a new admin user directly through the database. That might bypass whatever’s blocking you with the current user account.
Hope this helps you get back on track! It’s super frustrating to deal with these kinds of issues, but with a little digging, you should be able to take full control of your site again. Good luck, and feel free to shout if you run into more trouble!