PHP function suddenly stops working...?

I have a question for the PHP gurus here:

I have two websites, both hosted by eDataRack, on two different servers.

I have been tracking traffic on both sites with BBClone, a PHP based web counter.

On both sites, I followed the BBClone set-up directions for Apache servers, which includes directions for having the server append the PHP tracking code to every .htm and .html file, and also causes the server to parse all .htm and .html files for PHP code.

I set these two sites up, one in June/July and one in August, and everything worked perfectly, exactly as the BBClone instructions said it would. I was a perfectly happy camper.

Then, on or about November 28th, the second website became unavailable. Any attempt to load it, regardless of computer or browser, resulted in a message that went (I'll give you the NS7 version) roughly... the file "" is of type application-html-php and NS doesn't know what to do with it... and offered me the option to d/l, save to disk, etc. At the same time, BBClone quit counting any page hits.

I'll save the long, ugly and vituperative exchange that followed over the next two days with what eDataRack calls customer service reps. They pointed the finger at the modifications to my .htaccess file, mumbled something about the data "appears to be messed up" and then begged off 'cause BBClone is just something they throw in for me to use and they don't support it.

That, at least, gave my rookie self something to chase down, and I started checking on the PHP code. Using BBClone's basic installation procedure, which means adding the PHP code manually into the index.html file and renaming it index.php got BBClone back up and running, counting the main page. If I want to follow this method, though, it means modifying EVERY page and renaming EVERY page to a .php file. It was so much easier when the Apache server handled all this.

So I tried putting the code into the .htaccess file again, one step at a time. The website choked on the first step, the command to tell the server to parse the .htm and .html files for PHP code. Taken from my previously working set-up, that line is: AddType application/x-httpd-php .htm .html

As soon as I re-introduced that line into the .htaccess file, the page loading error happened again.

The original set-up, using commands in the .htaccess file to append the PHP code to each page on the site is still running, with no problems or hiccups whatsoever, on my other site!

The last change that I can recall making to the problem site was two weeks before it choked, and all I did was correct a grammatical error that a friend had pointed out.

The tech support cretins at eDataRack ignored the facts of the situation, despite being beat over the head with them (and mostly in all CAPS) and simply repeated the blind mantra that they don't support BBClone, and that PHP was working fine on all 500 quadzillion sites that share my same server.

So, my desperate plea to you is this - someone please point me toward an explanation of how the AddType command can suddenly stop working, and what I can do (if anything) to get this site back to working like it was, and as my other site continues to do????

(My apologies for the in-depth and probably over-long post, but I wanted to answer as many questions as I could with the statement of the problem.)

My heart-felt thanks, in advance, for ANY help,
Paul Gibbons
congostowing.com