It's not the OS after all (read on). I think my update procedure was either faulty or incomplete.
1) initially I used the "download" button on the downloads page and got this unusual file
dokuwiki-d9556fbc2c1c07a0baaf81c07d4165f6.tgz which I used for the upgrade....
2) yesterday, on a hunch I thought, "Let me try a clean install"
I created a new dir on the server
public_html/newwiki/
logged in and ran wget "
http://download.dokuwiki.org/src/dokuwiki/dokuwiki-stable.tgz" which is further down on the downloads page
tar xvfz etc. and then ran
http://mydoomain.com/newwiki/install.php
Guess what? It worked just fine! Here I am look at a new home page with suggestions to proceed and create pages etc. I did not have to mess with any .htaccess file changes or anything. I go ahead and create my first page... no problem... no permissions issues. check from the back end... Yep... there is my new "start.txt"
Conclusion: My old /public_wiki/wiki directory must be seriously corrupt or something.
ergo: I don't think it has anything at all do to with Apacher, or the OS... my upgrade must have been faulty.
Now how to either a) redo the upgrade or b) port all the pages and the acl and plugins from the old wiki to the new wiki.
OR I can go back an undo all that nasty .htaccess stuff I did which apparent is not needed... as see if that help.
I feel i would rather "port" my data/page and acl over to the new wiki if I could... changing the theme sidebar etc... all can be done anew...
I'll just try copying some of the folders from the old data over to the new /data/pages and see what happens.
That part is obvious... but how can I export and import my old ACL settings... otherwise all my users have to register again... a nuisance for everyone.
last ditch attempt: I go to the "upgraded" wiki and fix all the .htaccess file back to simply
order allow,deny
deny from all
try again... still get the message...
DokuWiki Setup Error
The datadir ('pages') at ./data/pages is not found, isn't accessible or writable. You should check your config and permission settings. Or maybe you want to run the installer?
end of my long saga:
So I think that the old directory/site is hopelessly corrupt...
I'm move data/pages now... one by one.. will turn on plugins slowly... meanwhile if anyone can help me port my ACL that will be great.