Error When Trying to Install Wordpress

When I try to install wordpress using the one-click-install to the root of my domain it is telling me that it could not install because it is not empty, when it actually is empty. I've logged in with my ftp client and there is nothing else in the directory.

What am I doing wrong? I want it installed to mydomain.com and not a subdirectory. Any help is appreciated!

Xanthan,

In reply to:

---

When I try to install wordpress using the one-click-install to the root of my domain it is telling me that it could not install because it is not empty, when it actually is empty. I've logged in with my ftp client and there is nothing else in the directory.

---

What is most likely happening is that actually *are* files still in that directory, but you just can't see them.

The most common reason that people experience this is the presence of "hidden" files in the directory. These often include ".something" ("dot files", like ".htaccess)) that *many* ftp clients *do not show* with their default settings. You can generally cause the files to be displayed by setting an "option" or "preference" on your ftp program to see the files; the exact method will vary from program to program (just check your ftp client's "help" or documentation).

Occasionally someone will forget that their web accessible directory is the "yourdomain.com", which is a *sub-directory* of their main "user" directory, and try to install a "one-click" in their "user" directory (which has a *lot* of hidden files in it!) Of course, this is *not* what they want to do, as the directory is not even accessible to the web, and they certainly do not want to delete the "hidden" files they have there.

You can also check the *actual* contents of *any* directory you own by logging into the shell with an ssh or telnet client and executing the command:

ls -la

which will show you *all* the files that are in the directory, including "hidden" files. You can then delete those files using the *nix rm command

--rlparker

Thanks for the help rlpaker, but I figured out that if I installed wordpress to a sub-dir and then edited its index.php file to point at the sub-dir and placed it in my root, it would redirect.

Thanks for the help again.

No problem, and your method also works well. Frankly, the WordPress install is so simple to accomplish that, for those that are comfortable in the shell, I always recommend they just install it themselves, without using "one-click", in order to have greater flexibility

--rlparker