Posted by Katrina B on January 9, 2010 at 3:51pm
I finally(!!!) got OpenPublish to install correctly on my shared hosting account. I can't guarantee that the steps I used will work for eveyone, but I'd be happy to share what I did, in case it helps out anyone else.
Side note: I'm also testing ProsePoint (since I'm researching CMS options for the newspaper I work for); it installed correctly on the first try!
Comments
Congrats!
It's a euphoric feeling.
Now, the work begins.
Glad to hear it
Was it a transfer to, or, an install on your shared server?
Also, if you don't mind, what host was it?
I've also looked into ProsePoint. It seems a bit more limited than OP.
Personally, both are probably good for the job. My biggest problem, so far, is learning how to make the themes do what I'd like done.
OP is supposed to go to 2.0 version for the next Drupalcon?? this year. It's at that point I'd like to place it on my main site, since the OP I finally got transferred to my shared server is really for testing purposes till then. So, please post the steps you took.
Installing on shared host
Hosting company:
My hosting company is InMotion Hosting; I began my account with them in 2008 after suffering through outage after outage with another hosting company (and since one of my sites hosts my graphic design portfolio, and I was job-hunting at the time, my portfolio being inaccessible for any length of time was unacceptable).
I have a business-class account that lets me host five domains (I have three so far) and lots of subdomains, and comes with lots of extras (including the ability to install Drupal, WordPress, and a number of other options).
I've been very pleased with the InMotion Hosting service and technical support. When I first began my account with them in 2008, an email request for support took about 24 hours to get a response; phone support was much faster.
I prefer email, since i can write out my problem in detail and make certain I haven't left anything out ... and provide links instead of having to spell out URLs on the phone. But the phone service was always quick and efficient, and the people on the other end were always warm and gracious, so if I needed immediate help, I would call; otherwise, I'd depend on email.
Their email response time has improved dramatically over the course of the last year; now, when I put in a request for help, I generally get a response within a couple of hours ... unless I make a request outside of business hours, in which case I sometimes have to wait until the next morning for a response. And I've only had one outage -- which was fixed in less than an hour; I didn't even have time to email a complaint.
Installing OP:
My successful install of OP started normally: download the compressed file, open it on my Mac, FTP all files over into a new subdomain I created, and create an empty database. Then, in Firefox, I went to the URL for my OpenPublish site to begin the next stage of the installation process.
First problem: The "max_execution_time" issue. I tried making the recommended changes to php.ini, but because I can't restart the Apache server, the changes didn't take effect.
So I continued doing research online and somehow stumbled across the advice that PHP changes could be made using the .htaccess file.
To get clean URLs for ProsePoint, I had already had to create an .htaccess file; I started with the code from here: http://drupalcode.org/viewvc/drupal/drupal/.htaccess?view=markup
For my OpenPublish installation, I used a copy of my ProsePoint .htaccess and added these lines:
php_value max_execution_time 600
php_value max_input_time 600
php_value realpath_cache_size 2M
(Notice the lack of = marks; if you put in the = marks, the code won't work.)
That solved the "max_execution_time" problems and got me through that part of the install process. I linked to the database I'd created ... and then ended up with a screen full of errors, most of which started with "MySQL has gone away ...."
So I did research on that and found this suggestion: http://drupal.org/node/259580#comment-1511512
So I downloaded (via FTP) the includes/database.mysql.inc and the includes/database.mysqli.inc files onto my computer, opened them, and added the lines as suggested, so the code looked like this:
(For the database.mysql.inc file)
// Force UTF-8.
mysql_query('SET NAMES "utf8"', $connection);
mysql_query('SET SESSION wait_timeout = 60', $connection);
return $connection;
(For the database.mysqli.inc file)
// Force UTF-8.
mysqli_query($connection, 'SET NAMES "utf8"');
mysqli_query($connection, 'SET SESSION wait_timeout = 60');
return $connection;
I replaced the files on the server (via FTP) and went back to the installation process ... which then continued with no further problems!
Katrina
Site builder, writer, trainer, graphic designer
Shared hosting success
I was able to install both OP2.2 and OP2.3 on HostGator shared hosting with very little difficulty. I expanded the .zip file onto my PC, and then used FTP to copy all files over to public_html folder. Go to http://domain.com and follow the prompts to select the language.
Next, I got an error about register_global. I had to go into domain/cpanel and use php.ini EZConfig to change register_globals to OFF. I did not get some of the typical errors on server resources, but you can also set those in EZConfig if necessary.
For some reason, I had to download feedapi et. al. during 2.3 installation. This module was not included in build 432 .zip, yet was required during install. Didn't have that issue with 2.2 install.
When you are asked to add database information, 2) Still in /cpanel, make the MySQL database, add user, and add user to database. You need to understand that /cpanel sites add your main username as a prefix to the database and username (userid_opdb, userid_fred) so make sure you get that right when you tell OP what your database name is.
After this, return to the install page, enter the database information, and continue. After this, the install went through without incident.
Then you'll need to view your domain.com again, and select the little wrench in the upper left corner to start configuring.
I believe that was it. I apologize in advance if I've forgotten anything. Hope this helps.