Registered on this forum just to say thank you to all of you, especially bran9133.
I’ve replaced the actually front control panel, the solenoid, and water filter without getting the ice or water to start dispensing again. Creating a fresh connection on the blue wire at the bottom of the freezer door fixed it right away. Thanks!
A little background for anyone with a similar issue to mine. Here is what was happening for me.
Side by side GE. The freezer would make ice just fine, it just wouldn’t dispense it out the front. Panel lights were on, ie I could select ice, chipped ice, water etc. It’s just that it wouldn’t actually dispense any water when pushing the lever. If you pushed the lever, the courtesy light would go on, so lever seemed to be triggering properly. Only button that didn’t seem to work was the button for "Quick Ice". Push that one, and no response.
ALso when pressing lever, you could hear the ice chute door kick open, then close a few seconds later. Still I replaced the solenoid that opens that chute as it seemed a common problem. no better.
Replaced the front control panel. No better. Sometimes it would randomly work for 1/2 day, then go out again for a week.
I even read somewhere in the past about this wire thing, and thought to myself "That can’t be it, I get power just fine, the lights are on etc". However, I think the wire that was bad was the blue wire, which might be the control wire. So, pushing the lever would control the things that were directly next to the chute (trap door solenoid, light etc), but would not send a signal back to the main body of the fridge (presumably via this blue wire) to trigger the auger, open the water valve etc.
I imagine if your wire problem was the hot or ground wire, then you might have more universal power issues to the control panel.
However, it seems if your issue is the blue wire, then you will have power to panel buttons except "quick ice".
Hope this helps convince someone else to try this wire trick earlier then I did, as it really was the problem.