opening a forum

i am interested in starting a forum on my site but i do not know how to set up the database and give the information to the php setup. if someone has a forum, could they give me step by step instructions what to do? if not, the forum setup asks for

"Database Server Hostname / DSN:
Your Database Name:
Database Username:
Database Password:
Prefix for tables in database: "

I've set up a few forums. First, create a database using the goodies tab of the control panel. I usually do something like the following:

Add the database ...
Database Name: forumXX (just some name)
Hostname: forumXX.mydomain.org
User: whatever
Password: S0meth1ngS3cuR3

You can then use those names for your forum config file. As far as table prefix goes, you can usually leave that as default (blank) since at Dreamhost you will tend to set up a brand-new database for each application and will seldom have table prefix conflicts.

Expect it to take a day or more for the database hostname to propagate enough to complete your install.

thanks alot but how do i fill out this:

Admin Email Address:
Domain Name:
Server Port:
Script path:
Administrator Username:
Administrator Password:
Administrator Password [ Confirm ]:

Admin Email Address: whatever your email address is - where do you want mail from the system sent? If people want to contact you as adminstrator, where should they send mail?
Domain Name: whatever domain is hosting the forum
Server Port: 80 works for me
Script path: / <--slash if the forum script is in the 'top level' of your domain; if it's in a subdirectory called 'forum' you'd try something like /forum/ (or possibly just forum/ if /forum/ didn't work
Administrator Username: whatever name you choose for yourself as administrator. Many folks use admin
Administrator Password: pick something
Confirm: it just wants to know if you can type it the same twice in a row :-)

i dont understand why im getting errors-


Warning: Unknown MySQL Server Host 'hebronix.addsalt.org' (1) in /home/.grier/meggypie/addsalt.org/hebronix/phpBB2/db/mysql4.php on line 48

Warning: MySQL Connection Failed: Unknown MySQL Server Host 'hebronix.addsalt.org' (1) in /home/.grier/meggypie/addsalt.org/hebronix/phpBB2/db/mysql4.php on line 48

Warning: mysql_error(): supplied argument is not a valid MySQL-Link resource in /home/.grier/meggypie/addsalt.org/hebronix/phpBB2/db/mysql4.php on line 330

Warning: mysql_errno(): supplied argument is not a valid MySQL-Link resource in /home/.grier/meggypie/addsalt.org/hebronix/phpBB2/db/mysql4.php on line 331
phpBB : Critical Error

Could not connect to the database



am i supposed to fill out the install.php first or the config?

You have to create a hostname (under Goodies => MySQL) as well as creating the database. Currently you have the database, but it doesn't have a MySQL hostname associated with it.

What Will said. Also, phpBB installs always give me a 'can't write config.php' error because I always forget to make it writable. The error will provide workaround instructions. If you give config.php 777 permissions just while you do the install you might not get that error. I use my FTP program to change config.php to 644 after install completes.

Another very common install experience is (when) you get partially through an install and it fails for some reason, you will get an error that tells you an auth table already exists. This kb article at phpBB explains three ways to fix it (personally, I use phpMyAdmin and drop (delete) all tables and then rerun the install fresh).

http://www.phpbb.com/kb/article.php?article_id=75

http://www.phpb.com/phpBB is probably your best bet for in-depth troubleshooting. You'll have to learn to use the Search function and sort through a lot of junk, though :-) Every problem I have ever encountered had already been dealt with there (or at least experienced by others) so it's saved my bacon many times.

Good luck.

thanks guys. i finally got it installed thursday. im still figuring out how to edit it fully but im getting there. http://addsalt.org/hebronix/phpBB2/index.php

thanks again