How to install Simple Machines Forum 1.1.2
Are you thinking of starting a new forum with Simple Machines but don’t know where to start? Fortunately SMF has a very easy installation process. The most time consuming task for this tutorial was actually downloading the file and writing out the steps. The installation itself only took about 15 minutes.
Download the files
SMF is available in 3 different formats; zip, gz, and bz2. Unless you already know what a gz or bz2 file is and know that’s what you need go with the zip.
You also have 3 options for packages; full, large upgrade, and small upgrade. For this tutorial we’re going to assume you’re starting from scratch and need the full package. There is also a Webinstall which may be the topic for another tutorial.
Go go the Simple Machines download page and download the zip file from under Full Install.
After you’ve downloaded the file you’ll need to unzip it and FTP it to your webspace. Windows XP has unzipping built in, but if you need a program to uncompress the SMF download WinZip is a good choice for a commercial product and 7-Zip is an excellent free unzipping program.
Creating your MySQL database
SMF needs a MySQL database to store your settings and messages. If you’ve never created a MySQL database I have a tutorial on how to make a MySQL database in cPanel.
Start the installation
Now you’re going to use your web browser and go to where you installed SMF. For example, if your domain is www.example.com and you installed Simple Machines in the /forum/ folder you’ll fire up FireFox or Internet Explorer and go to www.example.com/forum/.
You’ll need to enter several settings here before continuing.
First enter a name for your forum. The default “My Community” probably doesn’t say enough about what you’re planning so come up with something more fitting. Forum URL should be already set for you, but double check to make sure it’s correct. The 4 checkboxes following typically can be left at the defaults.
For the MySQL settings enter your server name. This is almost always localhost, but on some larger hosts - notably GoDaddy.com - it may be different. If in doubt, check with your host. Now enter the username and password you created when adding your database and the database name. The table prefix can usually be left at smf_ unless you’re running more than one SMF forum on the same database (most people aren’t).
Click on Proceed to go on.
Creating the Admin Account
Assuming your database settings were correct, the next screen you see should look like the following.
Enter the username and password you want to login to your new forum with along with an email address. You’ll also need to enter the MySQL password from the previous page for a little extra security.
And we’re done!
Assuming all went well you should now have a functioning forum. Follow the link to login and start your forum! You’re also going to want to check the box to allow the installer to delete the install.php file as this file can present a major security risk if it’s left on your server.
Problems? Need help?
I’ve installed several SMF forums so if you’re needing help feel free to post in the comments and I’ll see what I can do to help. SMF also has a great online community that’s typically very helpful.
Question, Comments...
Do you have more questions. Please either leave a comment below or join us in our new forum.
i have problems installing smf, it keeps giving this error:
You’re on a windows server, and some crucial files are not writable. Please ask your host to give write permissions to the user PHP is running under for the files in your SMF installation. The following files or directories need to be writable:
attachments
avatars
Packages
Packages/installed.list
Smileys
Themes
agreement.txt
Settings.php
Settings_bak.php
Some servers will let you change permissions through FTP . Try logging on with an FTP client and clicking either properties or file permissions for each of the files or folders listed and make sure they’re writable by everybody.
Failing that, you’ll have to ask your host to do it for you.
Hey, i need help creating my forum. I bought a website domain (www.waterpoloforums.com) from godaddy.com, and they said it would have 10 mySQL.
I downloaded SMF, and used fetch (i run on a mac) to upload it to the website. And then when i go to it, it gives me the screen where i can name the forum, say its URL, and enter my mySQL username and password. But I dont know my mySQL username! I think i created one on godaddy.com, but im not sure. I filled out something about mySQL, and now i have a password/username for that.
But when i press on the mySQL manager, it brings me to a page where i have to like upload a database or something. Can you help? thanks!
That’s probably something you should check with GoDaddy on. I have very limited experience with their hosting, although I use GoDaddy for all of my registrations. Clients that use a PHP / MySQL package of mine have had issues with GoDaddy. Normally it’s a problem of the database host not being localhost like it is on 99% of other web hosts. If I remember correctly GoDaddy uses something like mysql#.secureserver.net for the MySQL server name.
Thank you a lot. I´ve already launch my forum, but i leave the default URL, i need to change the Forum URL. I have already deleted the instal.php file. How can i change the URL. Thanks again.
If you open the Settings.php file in your forum root you’ll see a series of settings that you can change to match your forum paths and URLs.
I have just recently installed smf forum on a website i am creating locally I am having one problem that I cant seem to find an answer to. I am using windows vista with iis7, php5, mysql5.1 and smf 1.1.4. the following is the problem i am having when i try to upload a picture in a post.
the following is the error i get.
(Your attachment couldn’t be saved. This might happen because it took too long to upload or the file is bigger than the server will allow.
Please consult your server administrator for more information. ) any help would be very much appreciated.
How big is the file you’re trying to upload? There is a setting in PHP.ini that dictates how large of a file can be uploaded, and I think it defaults to 2 meg. HTML forms also implement some type of limit but I can’t remember off hand what they default to if no value is given.
I would check the PHP.ini first followed by checking the settings in the SMF admin on how large of a file it’ll allow.
If neither of those clear it up, make sure that the web server can write to the attachments folder. I haven’t used IIS enough to know how to do that, but I’m sure Google will turn up a lot of information on it.
RE: Installing SMF on Godaddy.com - I came across this site while searching for help with installing SMF on my Godaddy.com account. I ran into the issue where “localhost” is not the appropriate MySQL server name. I called them, found my answer, and figured I’d post it in case it helps anyone else.
In your Godaddy account under “My Hosting Account”, open the Control Panel for the domain you are setting SMF up on. From there, scroll down to “Databases”. I had an icon called MySQL - click it. That opens up the database manager. My database was called “testdatabase”. After that was set up, to the right of the database name, there is a pencil icon under “Action”.
When you click that icon, you see info about your database. Of importance, you see your host name. Mine was something like xnnmysqlnn.secureserver.net. When I used that for the MySQL server name under the install.php screen, it worked great.
I hope this helps more than it confuses anyone.
Ron - I’m sure someone will find that very useful information. I’ve never used GoDaddy for hosting, but I have had a lot of clients for a web application of mine that use GoDaddy. One of them let me use their login and create a tutorial on creating a MySQL database in GoDaddy, which I suppose I probably should post here as well.
Hi, I was reading this post of yours about this smf installation I followed all the steps and done with mysql and now I am currently stuck in the part where the thing I need ftp the files. I really don’t get it would you be able to help me with ftp please.
I’ve posted a short tutorial on FileZilla on another site of mine. How ’bout you start with that and if you still need help we’ll move on from there.
I finish uploading the files through filezilla but this thing is at the bottom of my page.
Some files need to be writable for SMF to work properly. This step allows you to let the installer make them writable for you. However, in some cases it won’t work - in that case, please make the following files 777 (writable, 755 on some hosts):
* attachments
* avatars
* Packages
* Packages/installed.list
* Smileys
* Themes
* agreement.txt
* Settings.php
* Settings_bak.php
how do i do these sir?
I think I have done it, and installed it at last. Thank you so much for the help.
I have saved your site on my bookmarks. You are a great guy sir ryan, for helping newbies like me…
Again thank you.
I installed the SMF forum with no problem. I then tried to install a Header And Footer Mod so that I can link to the other pages of my web site from within the forum. The message said that it installed successfully, but the link,”Headers and Footers”, that is supposed to be placed in the Configuration area did not show. I then decided to insert the header & footer manually. I created the header and footer in Dreamweaver, copied the codes and pasted them in the smfheader.php & smffooter.php files using cpanel. Everything worked & I was able to view the header and footer, but the links are not working properly.
For example, I program it to go to: /about.html, but it insists on going to /forum/about.html.
It will not leave the forum folder and automatically redirects the path or something.
How can I make it link to folders outside of the forum folder?
I would like to make it link to files in the public_html folder.
Right now I have inserted the pages into the forum folder just so the links will work, but I know there must be another way. Right now it’s like having double of almost every page!
I’ve created this whole web site, design & all from scratch and now I’m stumped! I’m no expert on building web sites, everything I know was self taught or learned through friends. I feel like I’m overlooking something so simple & obvious ..however it doesn’t make any sense to me at all. Please help me! Thanks a bunch, Tina
Tina - My guess is that you’re linking to about.html instead of /about.html in the href of the anchor tag. Without the leading slash it’s treating it like a file in the /forum/ folder so it’s /forum/about.html where with the slash it would treat it like it’s in the site root at /about.html.
Sweet, It worked! Thank you SO very much! You’ve totally made my day & saved me hours of pulling my hair out ;)
Hello again, I’ve run into another problem. I created a few new boards in the forum and now my header and footer will not show up on them. When the page is loading you can see for a moment that the images try to load, but then they disappear as fast as they try to load.
It’s so painfully obvious that I’ve never installed a forum before ..lol.
Let’s do this. I just added a forum to FBW. Why don’t you start up a thread there? This looks like it may be a somewhat lengthy discussion and that way we can get you up and running in your own thread.
edit…
I went ahead and started a thread to discuss this over on the forum.