Step by step guide to installing the XennoBB Forum script for beginners

Assumptions:

1. You are using a Windows Operating System and have some basic knowledge of windows commands.

2. You have a webhost which supports PHP and MySQL. MySQL us a more popular choice and most webhost supports this database.

1. Download XennoBB 2.2.0 from htpp://www.xennobb.com

Download the latest version

2. After you have finished downloading the software, unpack it You need a software to unzip the file, below is a list of software which can help you do that.

- Winzip: http://www.winzip.com (Shareware)

- 7-Zip: http://www.7-zip.org/ (Freeware)

- IZArc: http://www.izarc.org/ (Freeware)

- Winrar: http://www.rarlab.com/ (Shareware)

3. After unzipping the file to somewhere, for example, to your desktop, you need another software called an FTP Client to upload your files to your webhost. Below is a lost of FTP Clients.

- FileZilla: http://filezilla.sourceforge.net/ (Open Source)

- CoreFTP: http://www.coreftp.com/ (Freeware)

- SmartFTP: http://www.smartftp.com/ (Freeware for personal use)

In this example, I am using FileZilla. But it should be around the same way for other FTP Clients. Key in your userid, password and host address and login to your site.

4. Upload the files to your webhost using your FTP Client. Make sure you uploaded all the files.

Choose the XennoBB directory’s contents to upload.

Ensure ALL files are uploaded.

You need to upload them to your html root. Not your account’s root directory!

Every file is uploaded.

After we have uploaded all the files, we need to change the permissions of the files. There are 9 folders and 1 file to modify. You need to chmod them to 755 ( if you cant do that, chmod to 777)

- img/avatars
- var/backup
- var/cache
- var/uploads
- var/uploads/math
- include/style
- include/user
- include/template
- img

config.php (777)

For Filezilla, the command to chmod is called File attributes. Other FTP Clients have different commands for that. Check around or refer to your Client’s documentation.

Check these permissions or just chmod 755.

Do it for all the files listed above.

If any folder is missing, you need to create them and chmod them accordingly as well.

Create the missing directory

Chmod them as well

For config.php, you need to chmod 777. Not 755! But 777, goes all writing and execution permissions!

5. Create a MySQL database for your script’s database. Since I am using cpanel, I can do a simple example for you here. If your webhost has a different method of creating databases, please do follow them.

First login into your webhost’s cpanel control panel and choose MySQL Databases.

Choose this.

Create a new database.

Create a database here.

Remember the name of this database.

Then create a user and password to access this database and give the user full access to the database. Remember the username and password as well.

DO note that cpanel does a prefix on your database name and username. Please check the names carefully.

Give the user you have just created full access (ALL privileges) to your newly created database.

Create a username and password here.

6. Ok, after all that, we are about to begin. Goto http://www.yoursite.com/install

Change the “yoursite.com” to your domain name. If you have placed your site on a subfolder, then you should goto http://www.yoursite.com/subfolder/install

You will come to a page like this:

Click next and if everything checks out, click on next again. Here you will have to enter your mysql settings which you have made previously and setup your administrator account.

Key in xen or something here. Doesn’t really matter.

Key in your database name, user and password.

The Database server should be normally “localhost”. Unless your webhost has another server for it’s database.

Key in all these.

Key in all the particulars for setting up the administrator account and then click next. Remember the account name and password, you will need to login with them. Make sure your base forum URL is correct.

6. Finishing up. Yes, we are almost done, but there is something very important to do first before you start playing around with xennonbb.

You need to start your FTP Client again and login to your webhost. We need to delete off a folder and change permissions to a file.You need to delete off the install folder.

This is a very important step. Delete off the install folder.

Then remove writing permission from config.php or just chmod 644.

And that’s about it. You have finished and you can start playing with your script.

Goto http://www.yoursite.com/ or http://www.yoursite.com/subfolder/ and login with your administrator account. At the bottom right on the page you will see the administrator button.

Click here to access your administrator control panel

Have fun!!!

Date: 20/8/2006

Written by: Solidghost

Website: Singapore Travel Agenices

Webmaster: Simple Sites