Step 4: Run Drupal's installation script

Run the installer script

To run the Drupal install script, point your browser to the base URL of your Web site.
"The base URL" means the document root where you placed your Drupal files (and is defined in your Web server configuration file). If you have installed Drupal on a Web server this will likely be a domain name such as http://www.example.com. If you installed Drupal in a subfolder, then you should point your browser to the subfolder (e.g. http://example.com/subfolder). If you have installed Drupal on your desktop machine this URL might be http://localhost.

If the installation process does not simply appear by entering the base URL of your Web site or test site, add the file name "install.php" (for example http://www.example.com/install.php).

[What is this invisible image about, that seems to be hiding here?]

You will be guided through several screens to:

1. Choose profile (standard or minimal): Most of you will want to leave the default "Standard" option selected. The Standard option comes with content types already enabled, such as article (story prior to Drupal 7) and page and with appropriate publishing options already set. (Of course you can still edit these default content types or add additional ones.)
   The Standard profile also has a useful collection of modules pre-enabled for you.

   The "Minimal" option might be more appropriate for more experienced Drupal administrators who wish to set up their own content types with associated publishing options. The Minimal profile has only three modules enabled: Block, Database logging, and Update status.

2. Select a language: If you want to install not using the default English but in another language, then you can follow the links on this page.
3. Verify requirements: If your installation directory does not conform to Drupal's requirements then you will be informed at this step. You can correct them individually and either refresh the bowser screen or click 'Try again' to see whether there are any errors left.
   Possible errors include:
   • Missing directories and/or incorrect permissions:The installer tries to automatically set up a number of directories, but this might fail due to permission settings. In this case you will find the missing directories listed. [LST OF TYPICALLY MISSING DIRECTORIES? sites/defaut/files, sites/default/private, sites/defaut/private/temp, sites/default/private/files.] These directories should be set to the following permissions [WHICH ONES?}
   • Missing settings.php or incorrect permissions: If settings.php is missing or not accessible, then follow the instructions in Step 2: Modify file permission. Note that you will need both files.
4. Set up database: Enter the database name as well as the username and password for the database that you created in Step 3: Create Drupal's database. This user name and password information is for accessing your database so the install script can create tables. Note that this it is not the user name and password for administering Drupal. These will be created in the next step.

   The advanced option will give you access to change the database host. (localhost is usually used in this entry: wamp/bin/apache/Apache2.2.11/bin/php.ini as an example of the location on a windows box running wamp.)
   You can also change the port and the table prefix. You only need to change the port if you are using a non-standard port number. The table prefix is useful if you are installing multiple instances of Drupal tables that share the same database.

   When you click the "Save and continue" button at the bottom of this page and if your entries were correct, your installation process will move along to the next step.

5. Install profile: A "busy bar" will display and the installer will display notes regarding the progress of the installation. If no errors are encountered the next page will automatically load in your browser.
6. Configure site: After the databases got created successfully, you get a configuration screen where you will need to add the first user account and provide basic web site settings.
   • Enter the site name that you wish your site to be known as. This field is populated by the base URL for your site, so you will probably wish to edit it. You can also edit it later at any point when you administer your site.
   • Enter the email address that will be used by Drupal when it sends out notifications such as registration information. You may need to make a short detour here to create an email account for this purpose. If you have a web-based control panel for managing email accounts, be sure to open a separate browser window or tab for that task; then come back to your Drupal installation window.
   • Under Administrator account (Drupal 7), enter a user name, email address and password for logging into your site as the overall Drupal administrator. Note that there is a distinction, as of Drupal 7, between the Drupal administrator that you set up on this page, and the "Administrator" site administrator role that you will see when you visit the "Roles" and "Permissions" pages in the administration interface. The account you set up in the "Administrator" fields during installation is a super-user who has overall control over every aspect of the management and configuration of the site. (This will be "/user/1", for those of you familiar with that account from earlier versions of Drupal.)
   • Under Server settings select a default country and timezone.
   • Under Update notifications you will likely wish to leave both boxes checked so that your Drupal server will alert you when updates are required. Often updates relate to security issues and are important to perform. However, if you have restricted Internet connectivity you may want to uncheck this for now and test and enable it later.

   Click "Save and continue" and, on success, you will see the Drupal installation complete screen. If there are any error message, review and correct them now.

Once you change the time or memory allocation you have to stop and restart your server - should already be a page on this somewhere in drupal 6+++++I don't see anywhere to set memory allocation on this page, does this belong here? --kazar 2009-09-02+++++

********* fix the two (invisible) screenshots below - need to add it to install faqs as well

Notes

• If your site is not configured for clean urls you can troubleshoot this later.
• The install script will attempt to create a files storage directory in the default location at sites/default/files (the location of the files directory may be changed after Drupal is installed). In some cases, you may need to create the directory and
  modify its permissions manually. Use your ftp client to create the directory and apply "777" permissions, or use the following commands (from the root of your Drupal installation
  directory) to create the files directory and grant the web server write privileges to it:

  mkdir sites/default/files

  chmod o+w sites/default/files

• ++++isn't this part of a post-installation checklist? has anyone worked one up? --kazar 2009-09-05++++ The install script will attempt to write-protect the sites/default directory after creating the settings.php file. If you make manual changes to that file later, be sure to protect it again after making your modifications. Failure to remove write permissions to that file is a security risk. Although the default location for the settings.php file is at sites/default/settings.php, it may be in another location if you use the multi-site setup, as explained below.
  ++++WHERE "below"? I think we need a link to info on multi-site installs here, do not get into multi-site installs on these pages, too complex and not necessary for most people -- kazar 2009-09-92 +++++

  Notes for Specific Operating Systems:

  +++++DO WE REALLY WANT ALL THIS INFO ON THIS PAGE? WOULD IT BE BETTER ON SEPARATE OS-SPECIFIC PAGES? It seems odd to single out Fedora and OS X, but if we add every peculiarity on this page for every OS it will get way too long, complicated, unfriendly (IMO) -- kazar 2009-09-02)+++++

  Fedora Users

  You will need to put selinux in permissive mode to do have the permissions work from a web browser. Even if you have the permissions set correctly for settings.php the install script will think you don't if selinux is active.

  You should strongly consider shutting selinux off during your Drupal install and turning it on after the install is complete.

  Remember that permissions must be set to allow writing to the default folder as well so the startup script can create the files folder inside it.

  OS X

  1) Install Drupal 7.0 as /Users/xxx/Sites/drupal, user xxx is in the "_www" group
  and make the entire installation is group writable. Create a soft link from
  /Library/WebServer/Documents/xxx -> /Users/xxx/Sites (This is purely a test installation
  so I didn't want this in my system document root.).

  2) Re-writing seems to be enabled by default in Apache2 on Leopard. Enable PHP5 and virtual
  hosts in Apache2, i.e. by uncommenting these lines in /etc/apache2/httpd.conf:
  

  #
# Dynamic Shared Object (DSO) Support
#
...
LoadModule libexec/apache2/libphp5.so

...

# Virtual hosts
Include /private/etc/apache2/extra/httpd-vhosts.conf

  3) Add a virtual host stanza to the /private/etc/apache2/extra/httpd-vhosts.conf
  file that has at least this in it:
  

  <VirtualHost *:80>
    DocumentRoot /Library/WebServer/Documents
    ServerName localhost
   
    <Directory "/Library/WebServer/Documents">
        Options FollowSymLinks Indexes MultiViews
        AllowOverride All
        Order allow,deny
        Allow from all
    </Directory>
</VirtualHost>

  4) Add a variant of the RewriteBase /drupal line in the stock /Users/xxx/Sites/drupal/.htaccess file:
  

  <IfModule mod_rewrite.c>
RewriteEngine on

...

# Modify the RewriteBase if you are using Drupal in a subdirectory or in a
# VirtualDocumentRoot and the rewrite rules are not working properly.
# For example if your site is at http://example.com/drupal uncomment and
# modify the following line:
# RewriteBase /drupal
RewriteBase /xxx/drupal

...

# Rewrite URLs of the form 'x' to the form 'index.php?q=x'.
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI} !=/favicon.ico
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ index.php?q=$1 [L,QSA]
</IfModule>

  5) Make a copy of the /Users/xxx/Sites/drupal/sites/default directory tree as
  /Users/xxx/Sites/drupal/sites/localhost. Make sure this directory is writable by the _www group.

  6) Manually create the database in MySQL. Make a copy of
  /Users/xxx/Sites/drupal/sites/localhost/default.settings.php file as
  /Users/xxx/Sites/drupal/sites/settings.php and make this file writable by the _www group.
  Configure the database in /Users/xxx/Sites/drupal/sites/settings.php
  

  /**
* Database settings:
*
...
*/
#$db_url = 'mysql://username:password@localhost/databasename';

  7) Rebuild PHP5 to include the GD tools according to the instructions
  here.

  8) Point a browser manually at http://localhost/xxx/drupal/install.php. The pages came up as shown on the Run the install script.
  ----