Setting up the MySQL database

7. Choose a username and password for your database, enter them in
the Username and Password text boxes, and then click the Create
User button.
A confirmation message appears stating that the username was created with the password you specified.
For security reasons, make sure that your password isn’t something that
sneaky hackers can easily guess. Give your database a name that you’ll
remember later. This practice is especially helpful if you run more than
one MySQL database in your account. For instance, if you name a data-
base WordPress or wpblog, you can be reasonably certain a year from
now when you want to access your database to make some configura-
tion changes that you know exactly which credentials to use.
Make sure that you note the database name, username, and password
that you set up during this process. You need them in the section
“Running the installation script” later in this chapter before officially
installing WordPress on your Web server. Jot them down on a piece of paper, or copy and paste them into a text editor window; either way, make sure that you have them handy.

Read More

Setting up the MySQL database

3. Enter a name for your database in the Name text box.

Be sure to make note of the database name because you need it to install WordPress.
4. Click the Create Database button.
A message appears confirming that the database was created.
5. Click the Go Back link or the Back button on your browser toolbar.
The MySQL Databases page displays in your browser window.
6. Locate MySQL Users on the MySQL Databases page.

Scroll to the approximate middle of the page to locate this section.

Read More

Setting up the MySQL database

1. Log in to the cPanel for your hosting account:
a. Browse to http://yourdomain.com/cpanel (where yourdomain.
com is your actual domain name) to bring up the login screen for
your cPanel.
b. Enter your specific hosting account username and password in the login
fields, and then click OK. The page refreshes and displays the cPanel
for your account.
2. Locate the MySQL Databases icon.
Click the MySQL Databases icon to load the MySQL Databases page in your cPanel.

Read More

Setting up the MySQL database

Every Web host is different in how it gives you access to set up and manage your MySQL database(s) for your account. In this section, we use the popular hosting cPanel interface. If your host provides a different interface, the same basic steps apply; however, the setup in the interface that your Web host provides may be different.
To set up the MySQL database for your WordPress site with cPanel, follow these steps:

Read More

Setting up the MySQL database

The WordPress software is a personal publishing system that uses a PHP/

MySQL platform, which provides everything you need to create your own blog
and publish your own content dynamically without knowing how to program
those pages. In short, all your content (options, posts, comments, and other
pertinent data) is stored in a MySQL database in your hosting account.

Every time visitors go to your blog to read your content, they make a request that’s sent to your server. The PHP programming language receives that request, obtains the requested information from the MySQL database, and then presents the requested information to your visitors through their Web browsers.

Read More

Installing WordPress manually

If you install WordPress manually, here’s where the rubber meets the

road — that is, you’re putting WordPress’s famous five-minute installation
to the test. Set your watch and see whether you can meet that deadline.

The famous five-minute installation includes only the time it takes to install the software. This doesn’t include the time to register a domain name; the time to obtain and set up your Web hosting service; or the time to download, install, configure, and figure out how to use the FTP software.

Read More

Click the Install WordPress button

9. Click the Install WordPress button.

The Install WordPress (2/3) page displays with several messages. The
Fantastico script installer creates the MySQL database for you and dis-
plays the name of the database. This page also displays a confirmation
message on the domain and directory that WordPress is installed into.

10. Click the Finish Installation button.

The page refreshes in your browser and Fantastico displays a message confirming the success of the WordPress installation and displays the login URL, username, and password.

If you enter your own e-mail address in the Email the Details of This

Installation To text field and then click the Send E-mail button, the URL, username, and password are sent to your inbox for safe storage. (This is an optional feature, but we strongly recommend doing this in case your browser crashes and you lose the information.)

Your WordPress installation via Fantastico is complete, and you’re ready to start using WordPress on your Web server. If you installed WordPress by using the Fantastico method and don’t want to review the steps to install WordPress manually, flip to Chapter 5 in this minibook to optimize your WordPress installation for performance and security.

Read More

Installing the WordPress Files

  8. Provide the Base Configuration info for WordPress.

The information you enter in this section can be changed later in the general settings of the WordPress Dashboard (after it’s installed and you’ve logged in). Enter the info as follows:

a. Type your desired nickname in the Admin Nickname text field.

This name displays on your Web site after you start publishing to your WordPress blog.

b. Type your e-mail address in the Admin E-Mail text field.

This e-mail address is used for your administrator user account

in WordPress, after it’s installed on your Web server in Step 9.

c. Type your site name in the Site Name text field.

The site name displays on your site, and can be changed later, if
you want.

d. Type a short description of your site in the Description text field.

The description displays on your site, and can be changed later, if you want.

Read More

Installing the WordPress Files

4. Click the New Installation link.

The Install WordPress (1/3) page, shown in Figure 4-3, displays.

5. Select the WordPress installation location by choosing the domain
you want to install WordPress on from the Install on Domain
drop-down list.

6. Type the directory name for installation in the Install in Directory
text field.

Leave this text field empty to install WordPress in the root directory
(http://yourdomain.com), or enter the name of the directory you
want to install WordPress into, such as http://yourdomain.com/
wordpress. If you type in this text field, the directory should not exist
on your Web server; if it does, Fantastico tells you that WordPress can’t
be installed.

7. Provide the Admin Access Data info by typing the desired username
in the Administrator Username text field and then typing your desired
password in the Password text field.

These two items are the username and password for the WordPress

administrator, and you use them to log in to the WordPress Dashboard after it’s installed (See Book III, Chapter 1).

 

Read More

Installing the WordPress Files

Using Fantastico to install WordPress

Fantastico is a very popular script installer that several Web hosting providers make available to their clients. Fantastico contains different types of scripts and programs that you can install on your hosting account, notably, the WordPress software.

Here we make a few assumptions about your hosting environment:

✦ Your hosting provider has Fantastico available for your use.

✦ Your hosting account has the cPanel account management interface.

If your hosting provider doesn’t give you access to an installation script, such as Fantastico, skip to the next section in this chapter for the steps to install WordPress manually, via FTP.

 

Follow these steps to install WordPress with Fantastico:

1. Log in to the cPanel for your hosting account:

a. Browse to http://yourdomain.com/cpanel (where yourdomain.
com is your actual domain name) to bring up the cPanel login screen.

b. Enter your specific hosting account username and password in the login
fields and then click OK. The page refreshes and displays the cPanel for
your account.

2. Click the Fantastico icon.

The Fantastico page loads in your browser window and displays a list of
available scripts on the left side of the page, as shown in Figure 4-1.

3. Click the WordPress link in the Blogs heading.

The WordPress page loads, displaying a short description of WordPress and the version that’s available with Fantastico. (See Figure 4-2.)

Fantastico is a third-party script that exists as an add-on to cPanel.

Web hosts subscribe to Fantastico and add it to your cPanel as an extra
service for you to take advantage of; however, Web hosting providers
do not control which scripts, or which versions of scripts, are avail-
able within Fantastico. Web hosts are completely dependent upon the
makers of Fantastico as to what scripts and script versions are available.
Fantastico is usually about a month or so behind the game when updat-
ing the programs in its script installer.

Read More

Installing WordPress on Your Web Server

Installing the WordPress Files

 

Before you’re ready to install WordPress, the following needs to be done:

 

✦ Purchase the domain name registration for your account (Chapter 1
of this minibook).

✦ Obtain a hosting service on a Web server for your blog (Chapter 1
of this minibook).

✦ Establish your hosting account username, password, and File Transfer
Protocol (FTP) address (Chapters 1 and 2 of this minibook).

✦ Acquire an FTP client for transferring files to your hosting account
(Chapter 2 of this minibook).

If you omitted any of the preceding items, flip to the chapter listed to complete the step.

Read More

Installing WordPress on Your Web Server

 The chapter takes you through two installation methods for WordPress —

an automatic, one-click installation with the Fantastico script installer,

which is available from your Web hosting provider, and manual installation.

I also show you how to set up a MySQL database by using the cPanel

Web hosting management interface. By the time you’re done reading this chapter, you’ll be logged in to and looking at your brand-spanking-new WordPress Dashboard, ready to start publishing content right away (if you already have WordPress installed, go ahead and skip to Chapter 5 in this minibook, which contains great information about configuring WordPress for optimum performance and security).

Read More

Managing Your MySQL Database

✦ wp_signups: This table stores information about user sign-ups that

includes all the information from the wp_registration_log table, the date the user account was activated, and the unique activation key the user accessed during the sign-up process.

✦ wp_site: This table stores information about your main installation site
including the site ID, domain, and server path.

✦ wp_sitemeta: This table stores all the information about the Multisite
configurations set after you install the Multisite feature. See Book VIII.

Read More

Managing Your MySQL Database

✦ wp_blogs: This table stores information about each blog created in
your network, including

•  A unique blog numerical ID

•  A unique site ID number (determines the ID of the site the blog
belongs to)

•  The blog domain

•  The blog server path

•  The date the blog was registered

•  The date the blog was updated

•  The blog status (public, private, archived, spam; see Book VIII for
more information on blog status)

✦ wp_blog_versions: This table stores general information about each
network blog ID, database version, and date of last update.

✦ wp_registration_log: This table stores information about registered
users, including

•  Unique user numerical ID

•  User e-mail address

•  Users IP address

•  Users Blog ID

•  The date the user registered

Read More

✦ wp_users: The list of users with an account on your WordPress Web
site is maintained within this table and includes

•  The username, first name, last name, and nickname

•  The user login

•  The user password

•  The user e-mail

•  The registration date

•  The user status and role (subscriber, contributor, author, editor, or
administrator)

Most Web hosting providers give you a utility, or an interface, to view your
MySQL database, and the most common one is phpMyAdmin (as shown in
Figure 3-2). If you’re unsure how you can view your database on your host-
ing account, get in touch with your hosting provider to find out.

 When the Multisite feature in WordPress is activated (check out Book VIII for information about the Multisite feature), WordPress adds six additional tables in the database:

 

Read More