Installing Mambo Server on Windows - IIS

[phardstaff]

A first attempt at a definitive guide to installing Mambo on Windows, any comments appreciated. There is a real mix of info about installing on Windows out there, but nothing that goes from start to finish (well that I know of anyway) Once I get this right any ideas on where to post it ? I notice there is no separate forum here for Windows users, that might be a place to start ?

Phill

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Installing Mambo Server on Windows 2000, XP and Windows Server 2003

This has been tested on Windows 2000 and XP, should work fine on Windows 2003 Server. I am assuming an install into a directory and not into the root of the site, to install into the root just follow the same instructions and substitute your web server root directory, usually c:\inetpub\wwwwroot , I am assuming this is where your IIS root is. For these instructions I am assuming an install to c:\inetpub\wwwwroot\mambo.

Install IIS

Make sure you have IIS running, Settings Control panel – add or Remove software - Add or remove Windows Components - Internet Information Services (this is called something different under Windows 2003 server ?) Once installed http://localhost will bring up a web page saying your web service is running or something similar, do not go any further if this is not the case.

Install PHP

Once you have a web server running and you can browse http://localhost then it’s time to install PHP. Download PHP from www.php.net the best way to do this for IIS is to download the PHP x.x.x Installer, which will install PHP and configure IIS at the same time.

Test PHP

Make sure your PHP installation works, copy the following code into a text file and save it as c:\inetpub\wwwroot\test.php

<?php phpinfo();?>

Open your web browser and open http://localhost/test.php and you should get back a nice page with all the info about your PHP version.

Find php.ini, usually in your Windows directory, ie c:\wnnnt or c:\windows and change the line that says

error_reporting = E_ALL; display all errors, warnings and notices

and change it to

error_reporting = E_ALL & ~E_NOTICE

so that PHP sow all errors, except for notices, you will probably want to change this to just errors after you are happy your Mambo site is working OK.

error_reporting = E_ERROR


Install MySQL

Download and install MySQL from http://www.mysql.com

Once installed run c:\mysql\bin\winmysqladmin.exe, this will install Mysql as a service, you cannot really do any admin with this program but you can see what’s going on.

A default install of MySQL has a blank password for the database user root, this should be changed ASAP.

Mysqladmin –uroot password new_password

Create the Mambo DB by using c:\mysql\bin\mysqladmin.exe (this is optional, the web based installer will do this for you but it’s nice to know how to make a table)

mysqladmin -uroot -ppassword create mambo_database_name

so, if your user name was root and password was tst321 then this would be

mysqladmin -uroot –ptst321 create mambo_database_name


Set up Mambo

Unzip the mambo files to the directory where it will be used, in our case

C:\inetpub\wwwroot\mambo (which will be http://localhost/mambo ) when you have done this it should look something like this

Volume in drive C is S3A1293D005
Volume Serial Number is E44E-B32B

Directory of C:\Inetpub\wwwroot\mambo

30/03/2004 09:14 AM <DIR> .
30/03/2004 09:14 AM <DIR> ..
30/03/2004 09:13 AM <DIR> administrator
30/03/2004 09:13 AM <DIR> classes
30/03/2004 09:13 AM <DIR> components
06/02/2004 01:35 AM 3,069 configuration.php-dist
30/03/2004 09:14 AM 0 dir.txt
30/03/2004 09:13 AM <DIR> documentation
30/03/2004 09:13 AM <DIR> editor
19/09/2003 11:08 AM 1,433 globals.php
22/12/2003 09:37 PM 687 htaccess.txt
30/03/2004 09:13 AM <DIR> images
30/03/2004 09:13 AM <DIR> includes
27/02/2004 03:53 AM 5,208 index.php
24/12/2003 10:20 PM 2,794 index2.php
30/03/2004 09:13 AM <DIR> installation
30/03/2004 09:13 AM <DIR> language
15/12/2003 01:05 PM 1,095 mainbody.php
30/03/2004 09:13 AM <DIR> mambots
30/03/2004 09:13 AM <DIR> media
30/03/2004 09:13 AM <DIR> modules
24/12/2003 09:39 PM 3,250 offline.php
07/02/2004 10:58 PM 6,925 pathway.php
21/01/2004 10:32 AM 304 robots.txt
30/03/2004 09:13 AM <DIR> sql
30/03/2004 09:13 AM <DIR> templates
30/03/2004 09:13 AM <DIR> uploadfiles
27/02/2004 09:35 PM 704 version.php
11 File(s) 25,469 bytes

Rename configuration.php.dist to configuration.php

OK, now to change some permissions, this is very important that you do this before you proceed any further.

Right click each of the following directories, select security and make the sure that the “Internet Guest Account” (usually IUSR_computer_name) has the following permissions.

Modify
Read and Execute
List Folder Contents
Read
Write

i.e. everything EXCEPT full control. Do this for these directories and files.

images
media
uploadfiles
components
language
modules
templates
administrator/backups
administrator/components
configuration.php

OK, lets see what we got, rather than manually editing configuration I found that using the web based installer works best, it will also create your tables in MYSQL for you rather than using the sql script  This is why we have set configuration.php to be writable, do NOT forget to change this to read-only later !!!

Open your browser and go to http://localhost/mambo/installation/install1.php and you should see the “Welcome to Mambo Open Source Installation” page, if not you need to go back and find out why.

Assuming we have this page, plug in our data for the database, if you are running MySQL on the same machine as Mambo then the host is localhost. Do not put the name of the machine. You will probably want to check Install Help Data and Sample Data.
Click next.

OK, if you get to the next page that’s good, it means everything you entered about your database was correct, if you have an error then you need to check what you entered on the previous screen, OK, we are not out of the woods yet.

On the next screen enter a name for your site.

Click next.

On the next screen you have to enter some paths, DO NOT change the defaults unless you are certain they are wrong as in 99% of cases they will be correct. You might want to change the URL from localhost the FQDN of your system and the password but that’s about it.

Click next

OK, if you made it to install4.php that’s good, if you take a look at configuration.php with a text editor you will see your config changes in it. Do not open this with Wordpad, it will screw it up, also, it will look funny in Notepad because it is a Unix type text file, usually you won’t have to touch this file anyway.

Delete the installation directory ( c:\inetpub\wwwroot\installation )

Right Click configuration.php, select properties, and change to read-only. That means on the first tick Read-Only.

Click Run.(back in your browser at install4.php)

You should now see that standard peeklime Mambo Home page. Make sure you can run the admin program, click on administrator, if you get an error it just means you have not set up index.php to be a default page, try

http://localhost/mambo/administrator/index.php rather than

http://localhost/mambo/administrator/index.php

To make your system recognize index.php as a default page, do this.

Start - Settings – Control Panel – Administrative Tools – Internet Information Services
Open out to default web site
Right click default web site
Properties
Documents tab
Add
Index.php
Apply
Close everything

Trouble Shooting Guide

1) You cannot get into the admin page, you see a few errors fly up and then you are back at the logon screen.

The default PHP installer does not set permission for the c:\php\sessiondata directory so that the “Internet Guest Account can write etc to this directory, right click c:\php\sessiondata and select properties, give the Internet Guest account

Modify
Read and Execute
List Folder Contents
Read
Write

2) Fixed something ? send it to me so I can add it here !!

Et Voila, that’s it, you should have a 100% functional Mambo Site.
Phill Hardstaff V1.0
Last Updated 30 March 2004 1033h

phill@hardstaff.com

[sunray73]

All's I can say is...

THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU,

Regards,

- Christian

[dbissett]

Phil,

Thanks a lot for your effort. This should be added to your Windows instructions. There is a little problem with PHP that it generally assumes that it is installed on Unix. Therefore, one of the default settings in the php.ini file is:

session.save_path = /tmp

This would be fine on Unix because this directory is always there, but not necessarily so on Windows. The fix is to create a subdirectory under the PHP directory, i.e. "C:\PHP\Temp" Then, change the session setting:

session.save_path = "C:\php\temp"

If this is not correct, Mambo will not work correctly! Probably, one will have problems logging in as ADMIN.

I hope that you can get together with someone seasoned with Apache on Windows to add to your work. Also, you will need to get this posted permanantly where people can get to it in the future.

Thanks

[ryanhuneidi]

thanks alot, you and srosa helped alot!! THANKS!!

[Gayle]

Excellent stuff

[BeeBop]

Awesome Post!

I have been looking for documentation for an IIS install for a while now.

Anyway im going to try it first thing Monday morning....

[stingrey]

Good stuff Phil,

You should submit/post this on the Documentation Project
http://mosdoc.mamboserver.com/wakka.php?wakka=Home_Page

[lewisteo]

I should have read this portion before I proceeded with my test.. now I know what I had done wrong ... and that was after scratching my head for 5 hours, gave up and went to sleep... woke up, tried the past half hour and decided to search the forum for clues...

Bless you all my friends....

[alanmcd]

I'd like to add one more ting to an IIS install.
Go to your language file and make sure all email messages have
\r\n
and not jut
\r
as the new line characters.
The absence of \n (line-feed character) will cuase qmail to reject your messages permanently

Alan

[neung11]

I try to use Mambo in my Windows 2000 Server with Microsoft SQL Server, can I use?

Any way to use Mambo with MS SQL Server, not MySQL?

Many thanks.

[alwarren]

Mambo OS only works with MySQL at present. Future versions may have more flexibility.

[camos]

Excellent!

Originally Posted by phardstaff

To make your system recognize index.php as a default page, do this.

Start - Settings – Control Panel – Administrative Tools – Internet Information Services
Open out to default web site
Right click default web site
Properties
Documents tab
Add
Index.php
Apply
Close everything

Although it is fairly obvious to the experienced IIS admin, for completeness I would add under index.php (Browse to where PHP is installed and select php.exe) Also move index.php to just below index.html which should first in line.

Again for the inexperienced IIS admin:
Installing Mambo in it's own dir inetpub\WWWroot\Mambo is a good plan. In order to make Mambo the default Website: on the Home Directory tab browse to the Mambo dir and select. Failing to do this will mean the URL will be http://yourdomain.com/Mambo instead of http://yourdomain.com.

For information purposes, after installing Inetpub, NTFS file permissions by default are set to Full Control/Everyone This should be removed and Administrators (group) and System should be added with Full Control beside the already installed Internet Guest account (IUSR_machinename). Removing the Everyone account should be done as a matter of course when installing an configuring Windows but is often overlooked.

Additionally, for a little more security anonymous access can be removed from the /Mambo/administrator dir. To do this in the mmc, Default Web Site, rt/clk on the administrator folder - select Properties | Directory Security - Edit | uncheck Anonymous access, check Integrated Windows authentication. A Windows administrator account can be used to log in or a group account specific to IIS admins can be created. If an account other than Administrator is desired add that account with Modify to the NTFS dir permissions through Windows Explorer. The NTFS permissions must still retain the Internet Guest account.

I hope this doesn't muddy things up too much.
Cheers

[Dude]

This is wonderful. It will help me with my new client who does not want to move to another hosting company!

Do you need to change any of these permisions back after the install is complete? Does mambo take care of the security after install?

[camos]

Most of the suggestions relate more to someone who is administering their own IIS server. On a hosted server I would think you should install Mambo in the document root so, as mentioned, the URL to Mambo is yourdomain.com. The hosting company will point the DNS for the domain to the document root. This is a broad assumption but the hosting co. will already have addressed the Everyone account issue. There are no permissions that need to be altered after the install although some recommend removing write permissions from configuration.php.

Cheers

[Dude]

thanks camos for that explanation.
this post helped me revive a client that would have otherwise been lost. I thank you all and thanks to the great Mambo community.

[simmetje]

Hi, I installed Mambo on Windows 2003 with IIS 6.0.
In the Internet information Services Manager under Web Service Extensions, you need to allow CGI, ISAPI and Server Side Includes to get PHP working.

After that I created the Mambo database manually and started the install1.php script. After filling in the hostname, userid, password and database name, I clicked next and then the screen stays blank on install2.php.

Any idea what this can be?

Thanks!

[adminjim]

IIS Sucks, go with a PHP/MySql package for win32

[hobgoblin]

Originally Posted by simmetje

Hi, I installed Mambo on Windows 2003 with IIS 6.0.
In the Internet information Services Manager under Web Service Extensions, you need to allow CGI, ISAPI and Server Side Includes to get PHP working.

After that I created the Mambo database manually and started the install1.php script. After filling in the hostname, userid, password and database name, I clicked next and then the screen stays blank on install2.php.

Any idea what this can be?

Thanks!

I've got the same stupid problem, and it's stupid because it ain't outputting and error information on install2.php. It just goes blank and says "Done" in the statusbar. Did you solve this problem?

[Raydian]

Quote:
Originally Posted by simmetje
Hi, I installed Mambo on Windows 2003 with IIS 6.0.
In the Internet information Services Manager under Web Service Extensions, you need to allow CGI, ISAPI and Server Side Includes to get PHP working.

After that I created the Mambo database manually and started the install1.php script. After filling in the hostname, userid, password and database name, I clicked next and then the screen stays blank on install2.php.

Any idea what this can be?

Thanks!

I've got the same stupid problem, and it's stupid because it ain't outputting and error information on install2.php. It just goes blank and says "Done" in the statusbar. Did you solve this problem?

Start by reducing your security setting in your browser, then check that you (the DB user) have permissions to do everything on the DB. Also, make sure you have your DB host set to localhost.

Just a few other suggestions...

[Paul Kalbach]

Just a note on installation. I had the problem that I have seen posted else where about the second install screen coming up blank. I turns out that I had the wrong version of PHP. I was using the newest one and needed to back up to 4.3X. Everything works fine now.