Wordpress

Wordpress is an extremely popular open source blogging package. It is written in PHP, and uses MySQL for storing the blog and comment data. It is quite simple to install and configure.

To install it on your Bravenet account, you need to have a FTP Hosting package.

Note that we don't provide support for third party products - these directions are purely self-directed installs.

Automatically Installing Wordpress on Your Bravenet Account

Wordpress can be installed automatically to your account via the Software Manager. It will create a database, and preconfigure it to work with our services.

Manually Installing Wordpress on Your Bravenet Account

First, make sure that you are prepared:

1. Download the latest version of Wordpress (See http://wordpress.org for download links).
2. Unzip the Wordpress file. It should unzip into a Wordpress directory.
3. Make sure you have an SFTP account set up with Bravenet.
4. Optional: If you would like to register a domain for your forum, you would do this now.
5. Build a website to put your install of Wordpress on:
   1. Log into your Bravenet account and click the FTP Hosting tab.
   2. click on the Websites tab, and then select the Build a new website option.
   3. If your blog is an addition to an existing site, you may want to choose Use a subdomain for your blog. For example, blog.example.com.
   4. If the blog is the focus of your site, you may want to choose Use an existing domain or Register a domain instead - your blog will then be on example.com

Next, set up a database for use with Wordpress:

1. Log into your Bravenet account and click on the FTP Hosting tab and then the databases tab.
2. Select New MySQL Database
3. Enter a relevant name, and chose a unique username and password.
4. Click Create Database. If you get any errors, resolve them, and try again.
5. Write down the username, the password, the server (for example sql##.bravehost.com), and the database name (don't forget the number at the end of the database name!). You will need all this information when installing Wordpress. If you forget this information, you can access the Databases tab of your account at any time. You do need to memorize your password though - it will not be displayed anywhere.

Now, upload Wordpress to your Bravenet website:

1. Log into your SFTP account.
2. Navigate in your FTP program to the website you just created.
3. Upload the contents of your Wordpress directory from your computer to your selected directory. Note that you don't want to upload the actual Wordpress directory - just everything inside it.

Next step is to configure Wordpress to work with your database:

1. In your web browser, visit the website that you just uploaded the software to. For example, http://blog.example.com/ or http://example.com/
2. You should see the installation page of Wordpress. If not, double-check the address you typed in, and use your FTP program to double-check where you put the software.
3. Press the "Install" button when ready to go on.
4. The next page asks about database settings. Use the following options:
   1. Database name: Enter the name you chose for your database, including the numbers after it. For example, wordpress_123456
   2. Username: Enter the username you chose. For example, wp_user
   3. Password: Enter the password you chose for your database.
   4. Database Host: This is another name for the database server. Enter the database server you wrote down earlier, for example sql1.bravehost.com
   5. Table Prefix: Leave this as default unless you have reason to change it.
5. When done entering database information, chose Submit
6. Next, you will be asked to choose a site name and create an administrator user. This user will have FULL access to your blog, and will be used to do any blog managment tasks you need - so chose a secure password!
7. When done, click the Install Wordpress button and the script will finish the installation.
8. You should now be able to login with the administrator user you created. Congratulations! Wordpress is installed!

Next, you should configure your blog to your tastes. Instructions for that can be found in the Wordpress manual, available online at http://codex.wordpress.org

As a reminder, we don't provide Wordpress-specific support, but if you do run into technical problems during the install, you can open a support ticket with us.