Step-By-Step User Guide
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In part one of this tutorial we set up a new MySQL database, set up a user for that database and gave that user permissions to access that database.
In part two, we're going to import the database table information, set up a configuration file in the script itself, and upload the membership script and get it operating.
Setting Up The Database Tables
OK, now I want you to head back to the databases list again, only this time I want you to scroll all the way to the bottom of that page, and find a link that says: phpMyAdmin. Now click that link, and a new window should open up so we can access and update any databases we have in our system.
To the left you should see a menu window or frame with a drop-down selection menu. Open that menu and find the database you created for this script, and choose that database name.
After choosing the database name, a new screen should appear in the right hand window or frame on your screen. Look to the top of that window and find the tab above that says "SQL". Click on that link and you will see a window that says "Run SQL query/queries on database username_members" or whatever you named your database.
There will be another area below that says "Or Location of the text file:". This is the section we will use to set up your tables in this database.
Make sure to put a dot in the box that says: "gzipped", then click the browse button, and find the "database.sql.gz" that was supplied with this membership script in the "docs" folder.
Select the "database.sql.gz" file, then click the "Go" button on the bottom right hand corner, and it will be added to our database we created earlier. One it is finished, it should show you that it was successful in adding your tables to the database. There will be a bunch of code show up, don't worry about that, all we care about is that you DO NOT see an error message anywhere on that screen.
OK, now that your tables have been added to your MySQL database, we're all finished with this part of the installation, and you can now log out of your hosting account and relax for a few minutes. You Did Great!.. See, there was nothing to it was there? :)
Getting The Script Ready For Upload
OK, now before we can upload your script to your server, there is one thing that we need to do first, and that is to edit the configuration file first, and add in our MySQL database information from earlier.
Locate the file "conn.php" located in the inc folder that came with your membership script.
Now open that file in a plain text editor such as Windows NotePad, and change the information in it to the information we saved earlier to the text file... Remember? The one that you saved your MySQL username, password, and database name in? You did do that part, right?
Locate the line that looks like this: $db_host = "localhost";
If your hosting provider supplies you with something other than this for connecting to your database server, enter that there now in between the quotes. Make sure there is no whitespace between the quotes as this will create errors when trying to access your site later.
In 98% of the cases, you will NOT have to change this line, so if you're not sure if your hosting provider is using something other than localhost, just leave that line there for now.
Next, locate the lines that look like this:
$db_username = "USERNAME";
$db_password = "PASSWORD";
$db_name = "DATABASE_NAME";
Replace each line between the quotes with the information we saved to our text file earlier, so you
should end up with something that now looks like this when finished:
$db_username = "username_mradmin";
$db_password = "admin123";
$db_name = "username_members";
...again where username is the username you use to login to your hosting account with. Also, make
that there is no whitespace left between the quotes or this will cause errors when trying to access your
site.
OK, now save that file and we're now ready to upload your script to your server...
Uploading Your Script And CHMODing (Changing file permissions)
OK, now using your favorite FTP program, upload the script to your server. The easiest way to do this is to simply select the "msm" folder, and upload it including all contents in the folder.
There are many different FTP programs on the market, our favorite one is Filezilla, and you can download a free copy of it by click here.
I cannot go into a tutorial on using an FTP program here, there are to many, and it would be outside the scope of this tutorial on installing the membership script. Please read the documentation provided with your FTP program to be sure you know how to use it properly.
Make sure that you upload your script to your public_html folder, some hosting providers name these folders differently, if in doubt, please contact your hosting provider for details regarding which folder is your public folder.
You may also upload this script into a folder on your server if you do not want it in your root directory. Remember that it is already contained in a folder named msm as to not interfere with any documents you may have in your root directory.
Once you have uploaded the script to your server, we need to CHMOD a few files to get everything ready and so it will operate successfully for you.
Open the folder "manager" and find the file hack.log, and CHMOD this file to 777. Next, navigate to the "members" folder, and CHMOD the hack.log to 777 there as well. Finally, navigate to the "registration" folder, and CHMOD the file named purchase.php to 777.
I highly recommend that when you're happy with your purchase.php file, and it fits your business model to CHMOD this file back to 644. We will get into this discussion a little later...
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