Installation Instructions

NOTE: these instructions are specific to operating with MySQL.
If you're going to use a different database, substitute your database
server's setup procedure where necessary.

1. Unpack phpgiftreg website
2. Create MySQL database
3. Create MySQL tables
4. Create MySQL user (optional)
5. Configure db.php
6. Configure config.php (optional)
7. Create Apache alias
8. Set up the initial family and user using setup.php

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1. Unpack phpgiftreg website

Change to the directory where you're going to run the website from and 
extract the pages.  The tarball contains the phpgiftreg/ directory itself.

user@host $ tar -xvzf phpgiftreg-x.x.x.tar.gz
<output>

Then give everything the proper permissions (thanks to Paul Hubbard for
pointing this out).  An example would be owner-writable, world-readable:

user@host $ cd phpgiftreg-x.x.x
user@host $ chmod 644 *.php *.css images/*

As of 1.6.0, there is a subdirectory called item_images/ that must be 
writeable by the webserver.  The phpgiftreg scripts will be writing files
to this directory.  Don't worry, the setup.php script described below
will test if you got this right.

As of 2.0.0, there are subdirectories called cache/ and templates_c/
that must also be writeable by the webserver.  setup.php will also test
if those have the correct permissions.

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2. Create MySQL database

Login to the MySQL server with a user capable of creating databases.  If 
you're running a trusted system, simply executing `mysql' should be adequate.
Otherwise, do something like this:

user@host $ mysql -u username -h host -p
Enter password: <enter password here>
Welcome to the MySQL monitor.  Commands end with ; or \g.
Your MySQL connection id is 626 to server version: 3.23.58-log

Type 'help;' or '\h' for help. Type '\c' to clear the buffer.

mysql>

Once inside, create the phpgiftreg database:

mysql> create database phpgiftreg;
Database phpgiftreg created.

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3. Create MySQL tables

You can examine the area where the `ranks' table is populated and 
modify that.  There's a column for the rank's description and how it 
should look when rendered in HTML.  By default, it shows between 1 and 5 
stars, which should be suitable for most installations.

Change to the phpgiftreg database like this:

mysql> use phpgiftreg;
Reading table information for completion of table and column names
You can turn off this feature to get a quicker startup with -A

Database changed

Run the create-phpgiftregdb.sql script like this:

mysql> source /path/to/create-phpgiftregdb.sql
<lots of activity>

mysql>

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4. Create MySQL user (optional)

You should have a separate user for the database.  If you choose to, create 
the new user like so:

mysql> GRANT ALL ON phpgiftreg.* TO username@host IDENTIFIED BY 'password';
mysql> FLUSH PRIVILEGES;

This creates a user called `username' that can connect from `host'.

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5. Configure includes/config.php

You MUST edit includes/config.php to define your database connection.
It is required to set the `pdo_connection_string', `pdo_username'
and `pdo_password' settings.  See 
http://www.php.net/manual/en/pdo.construct.php for more information, 
especially if you are going to use a database other than MySQL.

NOTE: phpgiftreg is only tested on MySQL, though other databases should
(in theory) work with little modification.

There are some options to change in config.php if you wish.  Their functions
are described in that file.

NOTE: older versions of phpgiftreg defined database parameters in a
file called db.php.  That file is no longer used, and connection information
belongs in includes/config.php.

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6. Create Apache alias

Edit your httpd.conf and add an Alias like so:

Alias /phpgiftreg/ "/path/to/phpgiftreg/"

The trailing slashes are important.  Restart the web server and you should
be good to go.

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7. Set up the initial family and user using setup.php

Point your browser to http://yourserver/phpgiftreg/setup.php or wherever you
installed it.  It will check your confirmation, and then you'll be prompted 
to enter some details for an initial administrator user and the default 
family.  If everything goes well, you'll be ready to begin!

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If you have any problems with these instructions, or if they weren't clear
or just didn't plain work, please let me know at generalpf@gmail.com.

Ryan Walberg
generalpf@gmail.com
@GeneralPF