SMF Tutorial - SMF Manual Installation

SMF Manual Installation

 

SMF (Simple Machines Forum) is a poweful forum hosting application. It can be installed either manually or using the cPanel's automated tool called Fantastico. In this part ot the tutorial you will learn how to intall SMF (Simple Machines Forum) manually on your TMDHosting account. Manual installation is ofter the better solution for installing the latest stable version available on the SMF's website, because sometimes the Fantastico version differs from it.

 

First of all, you will have to download the SMF installation package from here:

 

http://www.simplemachines.org/download/

Once you get it, you should extract it on your local computer using your favorite archivator tool (WinZip,WinRar, tar, unzip). When you are done, you will have to upload it to your TMDHosting account.

 

If you would like to have the SMF forum installed and accessible using your account's primary domain name, you should upload the contents of the extracted folder to the "public_html" folder of your TMDHosting account. However, if you would like to have the SMF forum accessible through, say, yourdomain.com/forum, they you will have to rename te extracted folder to "forum" and then upload it (not only its contents, but the entire folder!) to the "public_html" folder of your TMDHosting account. In this tutorial the scenario will be "SMF manual installation using the primary domain name (in our case smftutorial.tmdhosting.com).

 

So, when you are done uploading to your public_html folder you shoul head to your cPanel and create a MySQL database. cPanel can be reached through your User area, by following the My Hosting packages and using the "Login to cPanel" button or by going to yourdomain.com/cpanel.

 

Once you are logged in at your cPanel, follow the MySQL database wizard to create a MySQL database. It can be reached through the icon shown on the image below.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

First, you will have to choose a name of the database. Let us name it "forum".

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Then, you will have to choose a name of the user associated with the database. Let us name it "forum", too and pick password "str0ngp@ssw0rd" for it.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In the next step, you should assign the newly added user all privileges to this database. This can be done by "ticking" the "ALL PRIVILEGES" check box as shown below.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Once you finish this step, you are done with adding the MySQL username to the newly created MySQL database. Note that if you create a database named "forum" and your cPanel username is, say, "greg12", your MySQL database name and username will be prefixed with your cPanel username. For example, in this tutorial we are using the username "smf" and we have created database and username "forum". They will be recognized by the system, when later needed in the installation as:

 

database name: smf_forum
database username: smf_forum

 

When the MySQL database is added, you will have to launch the installation. This can be done by visiting with your favorite browser the location where you have previously uploaded the installation. In our case that is http://smftutorial.tmdhosting.com.

 

When you visit it, you will be prompted with a screen like this one:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Input your FTP password in the required box and confirm it with the appropriate button. You will be forwarded to a screen, which is divided in two sections:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In this part (Basic settings) you should define the name of your community (the forum name), which can be changed further, though. Note that if your forum will contain posts in cyrilic or other non-latin langugage, it is strongly recommended that you check the "Use UTF-8 as default character set" box.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In this part (MySQL server settings) you will have to use the MySQL database details that you have defined earlier using the "MySQL database wizard" in your cPanel. You will need to use:

 

MySQL username: smf_forum (substitute smf with your cPanel username!)
MySQL password: str0ngp@ssw0rd
MySQL database name: smf_forum (substitute smf with your cPanel username!)

 

By the end, the form should be looking like the one below:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Click Proceed and you will end up at the page where you should create your Administrator account. Note that the act of creation is being confirmed by the MySQL password, so do not forget it yet.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Choose something of your preference for username, pick up a password and input an email. Write the MySQL password and click "Finish" to complete your SMF installation. In few seconds you should reach a screen, similar to the one below:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Mark the "Click here to delete this install.php file now." and simply refresh the page. Your SMF forum new installation will appear!

 

 

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