Basic help...

elko

Hullo all. I really did try not to start this discussion but I've had to come to the conclusion that I don't have a clue what I'm doing. I downloaded Vanilla because it looked pretty smart, with the intention of mucking about with it and seeing how much I can learn about how forums work (I have one, but I only do the easy bits). I'll try and make this as clear as possible. I opened up the readme, in Firefox: //An installer is available. If you are viewing this file through your web server (ie. not through your filesystem), you can access the installer here.// I have no idea what a web server is, but when I click the link, it's gibberish. So on to the manual instruction. //Contained in the root directory of this application is a vanilla.sql file. You can use an existing database (if you have one), or you can create a new database named whatever you like. You can install this database using the following command: mysql -u your_database_username -p your_database_name < vanilla.sql The database is an empty shell, containing a single administrative user in the system with the username "Admin" and the password "Admin".// With what do I create a database? Where do I put this command? What program do I use to open PHP files? (I do know I am quite a way out of my depth here, but I'm struggling to find any place to learn to swim, as it were...) Any help would be much appreciated.

Mark

Vanilla is web forum software. In order to install it, you will need to put the files on a web server. A web server is a computer that is connected to the internet on a high speed connection. Normally people will rent space on web servers to put up their own web sites, blogs, all kinds of other things, and forums. Every web site you look at is hosted on a web server.

It is possible to install it on your computer if you also have a web server installed on your computer. On windows you can install Microsoft's IIS web server. On apple machines you can install an apache web server. There are lots of other web servers you can install, but those are the most common. It is WAY beyond the scope of this forum's discussions to tell you how to install a web server - and there is already lots of documentation out there (google it!) if you want to go down that route.

The easiest route for you would be to rent some space on a web server that supports php and mysql. Something like dreamhost would do you just fine. There are lots of different web hosts out there you can check out. Again, just google it

Once you've got somewhere to put your forum, then come on back if you are having problems and we'll see how we can help out.

elko

I did get something running, just on free webspace. (http://strangeways.lxhost.com/strangeways/) Congratulations on the instructions on the website, they were very intuitive once I got past my own page one errors. Is there any sort of preview post option? I think it would be very handy, especially as a lot of people are not going to be used to the way these forums work.

Minisweeper

Not yet, it has been discussed and is on the extensions request list. Perhaps you could teach yourself php and write one!

Krak

You can use the live preview extension. I find that works well enough. Heres a link to the post

Minisweeper

um. Yeah. Someone slap me. I looked at the requested extensions list and scanned straight past the fact it was already done above. *goes back to sleep.

stuart

Yeah, come on mini, credit me for one darn thing I've contributed to this beast! ;)

elko

Thanks to all three of you, I'm sure you get a ton of people just using this forum for help and it's much appreciated (just need to figure out how to add that extension now).

Minisweeper

hah stuart, you've done more for this place than me! One day i'll work out how to make a decent extension... elko just incase you havent got it sorted, all you need to do is upload it to your extensions dir, then go into extension management under the settings tab and click enable! Easy as pie :)