pLog Tutorial and Installation How To

This tutorial describes how to use the pLog weblog software with your NEXCESS.NET web hosting account. NEXCESS.NET specializes in hosting pLog blogs and this tutorial is meant to help you quickly setup your site with our web hosting service.

pLog is open source, meaning that you can use and distribute it as you'd like as long as you don't change it.

For the sake of this tutorial we'll assume that you own the domain 'johnsmith.com' and are setting up pLog at http://johnsmith.com/plog/.

Follow these steps to complete the tutorial:

1. The first thing to do is to run through the SiteWorx MySQL tutorial and create a database for pLog to use to store the information it needs.

   Create a database called 'plog' with a user named 'plog'. When you do this SiteWorx will prefix the database and user names with some text resembling your domain name.

   With our example domain of 'johnsmith.com' the database name is 'johnsmit_plog' and the username is the same 'johnsmit_plog'.
2. Download the latest version of pLog from the pLog website and unzip the contents of the zip file to your desktop using http://winzip.com. You should now have a folder which contains all the files and folders you need to install and run pLog. Rename the 'plog-0.3.1-beta1' folder to 'plog'.
3. Upload the 'plog' folder to your web hosting account. You should do this using an FTP Program. If you need help with FTPing files, you can check out the FTP tutorials on our tutorials page. Once all the pLog files have finished uploading, we need to change the permissions on two of the folders so that the script can write to them. You can do this using the CHMOD command in your FTP program. If you don't know how to do this, check out the FTP tutorials on our tutorials page. You need to CHMOD the 'tmp' and gallery' folders to 777. We also need to CHMOD 'config/config.properties.php' to 666 so the script can write to it.
4. Now we can access the install wizard. In this example, we'll point to 'http://www.johnsmith.com/plog/wizard.php'. You should now be on the first page of the pLog installation. Enter the information for the database you created in step #1 into the fields. For this example, we'll enter the following values:
   • Database server: 'localhost'
   • Database user: 'johnsmit_plog'
   • Database password: 'mypassword'
   • Name of the database: 'johnsmit_plog'
   • Database prefix: 'plog_' - Stays the same.

   Your screen should look like this:

   

   Click the 'Next' button to continue. You should now be on the 'Confirm Information' page. Look over the information you just entered to make sure it's correct. Leave the checkbox blank because we already created a database in step #1. Your screen should look like this:

   

   Click the 'Next' button to continue. All the tables should have been created successfully. If you receive any errors, go back and make sure you entered the correct information for your database. Your screen should look like this:

   

   Click the 'Next' button to continue. You now need to create an account used to manage your pLog. Fill out the fields according to your preferences. In this example, we're going to create an admin account. Your screen should look like this:

   

   Click the 'Next' button to create the account. You will now be on the pLog registration page. Give your blog a descriptive name. For this example, we're going to use 'My brand new blog.'. Your screen should look like this:

   

   Click the 'Next' button to continue. The pLog wizard is now complete. For security reasons, you should delete the 'wizard.php' file from your webspace. Also, if you're not going to be adding any more users to your pLog, you should delete the 'register.php' file as well. You can do this with your FTP program. If you don't know how to do this, check out the FTP tutorials on our tutorials page. Make sure you also set the CHMOD for 'config/config.properties.php' back to 644 so nothing can write to it anymore. Your screen should look like this:

   

   Click the 'Administration interface' link to continue. You should now be at the pLog login screen. Enter the username and password for the account you created to manage your pLog. Your screen should look like this:

   

   Click the 'Login' button to log into your pLog control panel. From here you can make new posts, edit old posts and change settings for your pLog. The pLog tutorial is now complete. Your screen should look like this:

   

   For more information on how to use pLog once it's installed, check out the pLog Documentation.

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