Cannot Initialize mbstring with PHP 7

Question

Whenever I try to access phpMyAdmin, I receive the following error:

"The mbstring extension is missing. Please check your PHP configuration."

I am running a LEMP stack on a CentOS 7 server. I have elected to use PHP 7 for this installation. I have not experienced this error on identical set-ups running earlier versions of PHP.

extension_loaded('mbstring') returns false even though mbstring.ini (/etc/php.d/) contains:

; Enable mbstring extension module
extension=mbstring.so

I am 100% sure that the mbstring module is installed on my server.

I'm completely stumped so if anyone has any ideas whatsoever, please let me know. Thanks.

Solution 1

A solution was reached with the following method:

I put extension=mbstring.so inside php.ini even though that is no longer the method PHP uses by default to load modules.

From php.ini itself:

Note: packaged extension modules are now loaded via the .ini files found in the directory /etc/php.d; these are loaded by default.

It seemed to fix my problem. I would still be interested to hear if anyone else has a different take on this matter.

Solution 2

For those who have debian :

 sudo apt-get install php7.0-mbstring

Otherwise in centos (tested in centos 6.6)

sudo yum install php70w-mbstring

and as @mpen said you can activate it

sudo phpenmod mbstring

Solution 3

For PHP7 on centos

try this yum install php70-mbstring

Comments

[Andrea]

Perhaps the distribution of PHP 7 you used does not use the same configuration locations?

[Zane]

I had already installed php7.0-mbstring but for some reason phpenmod mbstring did not enable it. I had to manually enable it using this method. Additionally, my environment required a sudo service apache2 restart for the change to take effect.

[mpen]

PS: It can be enabled with sudo phpenmod mbstring

[David Refoua]

I needed to restart apache too service httpd restart

[David Refoua]

For CentOS 7 + PHP 7, the package name was php70u-mbstring. If you get No package php70w-mbstring available, you have to do sudo yum list | grep "\-mbstring" to find the corresponding package.

[borislemke]

yum install php70-mbstring did it for me on an Amazon Linux Instance

[fmc]

I just installed php7 and had the same issue. Much appreciated, Chopchop!

[ssaltman]

This is the correct answer if you have php 7.0 Note, first do a php -v to find your version.

[Geoff]

@DRSDavidSoft you should post your comment as an answer it solved my problem with php 5.6