Can anyone show me step by step how to install Epiware on SME server 7.3?
It's pretty easy, but there was one infuriating item that I couldn't solve until I tricked it to work. The way the program is set up by its install script, with the storage area in a folder called '/storage,' with 'binaries' and 'document_area' subfolders, produces an error when you first log in which says 'Either the directory '/storage/document_area' doesn't exist or the httpd user doesn't have permission to write to it. No matter what I did I couldn't solve this. Then it dawned on me that I should move the document storage area into the 'files' area of the ibay and the problem simply went away. Program looks very nice! Here's how to do it.
Because my server does lots of stuff, I couldn't place the php code in the primary ibay which would give a straightforward URL for the program in the form
http://www.myserver.com/epi. Instead I had to place the code in a new ibay which I called 'epiware', and this gives the URL:
http://www.myserver.com/epiware/epi - a bit clumsy. So I altered the install to get round this...
First create an ibay called 'epiware' with the kind of access you want and allow it to run CGI etc. For my trial I just chose to make it accessible on the local network with no password, but you could make it face the internet and protect it with a password - make it really strong.
Now log in to your server console and download the program with...
wget
http://downloads.sourceforge.net/epiware/Epiware_4.8.6.tar.gzOnce the download is complete run...
tar -xvzf Epiware_4.8.6.tar.gz
...and you'll see the archive decompress with a long stream of filenames scrolling up the screen.
Now do...
cd Epiware_4.8.6
and then run...
./install
You'll get a set of instructions on the screen telling you to run...
mysql -u root -p < epi/project_db.sql
...do so. Then it says you should move the program's 'epi' folder to your htdocs directory. This is the first thing you need to vary. To avoid the clumsy URL problem described above, we don't want the 'epi' folder, only it's contents, so run...
cp -r epi/* /home/e-smith/files/ibays/epiware/html
When that's done we need to change the ownership of the files...
chown -R www:www /home/e-smith/files/ibays/epiware/html
Now for the second variation from their way of doing things: the install routine created a folder '/storage' which contains subfolders 'binaries' and 'document_area'; leave the 'binaries' folder alone but delete the 'document_area' folder...
rm -r /storage/document_area
Now we need to tell the program where it's going to store it's files, and one or two other items of configuration information, so we need to edit the file 'config.inc.php'...
cd /home/e-smith/files/ibays/epiware/html
[I've assumed you are a linux newby, so slap my wrist for the next command if you are a time-seved maven who swims about in the editor vi for fun - I *hate* it.]
mcedit config.inc.php
This gets you a nice text editor with the configuration file loaded. You need to make the following changes...
On the first two lines with a pink 'define' at the beginning, change '
www.mycompany.com' to your own domain URL and change the email address to something like 'doc-admin@yourdomain.com'.
Skip down to the series of lines at the bottom...
define("DOCUMENT_DIRECTORY","/storage/document_area");
define("CALENDAR_ATTACHMENT_DIRECTORY","/storage/attachments");
define("IMAGE_GALLERY_PATH","/storage/document_area");
define("ERROR_LOG_PATH", "/storage/document_area");
//a document area for wiki-group banners - unlike document area, this cannot be changed w/o moving all files at a later date
define("EPI_BANNER_DIRECTORY","/storage/document_area");
...and change all the directory settings to '/home/e-smith/files/ibays/epiware/files' - that's 4 '/storage/document_area' settings and 1 '/storage/attachment' setting.
When you've done all the editing check it carefully to be sure you haven't mistyped anything, then hit F2 and confirm you want to save the file and hit F10 to leave the editor. You can log out of the server console also.
Now go to a workstation and type
http://www.yourserver.com/epiware into the browser and you should get your first login prompt - you need to enter a bunch of stuff about yourself and give a username and password and the next time you go in you'll only get asked for username and password.
Enjoy.
Ed Form
23 Replies
12806 Views