How to Install Joomla 1.6

Incantation Professional for WordPress

incantation-professional Incantation Professional is a clean minimalist concept that is designed for a wide range of uses. With over 120 theme settings, you have the flexibility to customize the overall look and feel that best suits your website needs including the ability to create unlimited colour combinations to help give you something unique.

Free Incantation WordPress Theme

incantation-intro-screenshot Not only is this a Free theme for WordPress users, it's also a quick look at what the Incantation Pro version looks like. But of course, this is about my Incantation, the free version which is ready to use. With a minimalist design concept, it still packs a lot of features, enough for any business website or professional blogger wanting to get a great looking website by using Incantation.

4 comments

A Fresh Change with New Features

new-site-changes You might notice some changes with my website here because I've been a little busy for the last while. Of course, the changes I made are actually very good for everyone because of the additional features that have been added will greatly enhance the user experience when visiting Gradient Pixels. So let's get right into what has changed and what is still yet to come!

2 comments

How to Install Joomla 1.6

Published on Sunday, 08 May 2011

Category: Joomla

installing-joomla-16 Installing Joomla 1.6 is not as difficult as some people may think, but the trick is to know the "best way" to install Joomla and be organized with a step-by-step guide. Installing Joomla is going to be very similar to version 1.5, unless you are new to this cms, then you still follow the method I use for myself when creating sites. Please note that this installation process will depend on your server and to ensure Joomla 1.6 will be compatible with your website host provider.

Step 1 - Download Joomla, Unzip, and Upload via FTP

Simple enough...download the most recent version of Joomla from www.joomla.org and then unzip the file to your desktop. Open your FTP program and upload the files and directories - as they are - to the location you want to install Joomla. This will take several minutes, depending on your internet connection, but on average, it should take about 8 minutes because of the amount of files and sub-folder structure the package has (see the screenshot below).

joomla-files

NOTE: Some hosts provides a service which lets you auto install scripts, normally this is called Fantastico, but I recommend installing Joomla yourself to ensure it's done correctly. Some people have found problems when doing a host auto installation.

Step 2 - Create Your Database

Next step is to create your MySQL database because without one, your website won't function. You will want to make sure your host has at least the following:

Apache: v2.x recommended
PHP: v5.2.4
MySQL: v5.0.4

When making your database, please use a unique name and password for it. For the password, I RECOMMEND at least 12 characters with symbols included, like !@#$%^&*() etc...although, make sure your host provider allows symbols because this makes your password a lot stronger. If you find you cannot think of a good password, try http://www.pctools.com/guides/password/ which is what I use.

Step 3 - Setup Joomla with your Browser

Setting up Joomla is fairly easy and does not take very long, in fact, it takes me less than 2 minutes! First thing you will want to do is open your favourite browser and go to the url location where you uploaded your Joomla files. For example, it might be this:

http://www.yourwebsite.com (or) http://www.yourwebsite.com/joomla/

From this point on, you will follow the online instructions for installing Joomla 1.6 through each step of its process.

Choose Language - This is where you will select the language choice.

install-joomla-1

Pre-Installation Check - This is where the installer will review your system setup. If you see any red warnings, you may want to look into them, but in some cases, your host may need to configure your server php settings. In the screenshot below, you will see the red On next to Display Errors, this is ok so you can move on to the next step as this was just my own system displaying this.

install-joomla-2

License Acceptance - I know most do not read these but you may want to at least once. To continue, read through the license terms and if you are ok with it, you can move on to the next step.

install-joomla-3

Database Configuration - The next step is where you tell the installer about your database. There are 7 settings to configure:

Database Type: The most common is MySQL, but your host might be using MySQLi
Host Name - This is going to be the address location and will depend on your host's MySQL server setup. Sometimes it might be localhost, an IP address, or even something like this: mysql.hostname.com
Username - This is the unique username for your database.
Password - This is the unique password for your database (always make it difficult)
Database Name - This is the name of your database you created
Table Prefix - By default, when the installer creates your database tables, it will put a jos_ in front of each table name. I like to add more security by changing this to something different, but don't forget to keep the _ underscore there.
Old Database Process - If you are replacing an existing database with this installation, you can backup the original first or you can have it totally remove it for a clean install. Removing it would prevent any potential of having something stay behind from a previous database setup.

install-joomla-4

FTP Configuration - Setting up your FTP configuration was generally a needed function to allow a smoother installation of extensions once your site was up online. However, this is usually not required anymore which is why this step of the install process makes it optional for you. Try it without this information being filled in and see if it works for you; you can always fill this in from the admin global configuration section later.

NOTE: If you do fill in this information, make sure you also use the FTP host address that is associated with your host account...it's best not to use the default settings that you see in the screenshot for this.

install-joomla-5

Main Configuration - Almost done! Now you can title your website and setup your administration access credentials (username, password, email). For the "Install Sample Data", I recommend ignoring this because I personally feel this is more of a distraction when it comes time to begin creating your website content categories, menus, and articles; I like a nice clean install.

NOTE: For your username, make sure you use something unique and not something common like "admin' or anything that would diminish security. The same goes for your password, make it difficult!

install-joomla-6

Finish - You are all done with the installation and all you need to do now is click "Remove Installation Folder" from your site files. Leaving this in becomes a security risk, so it's best to remove it. Once you removed it, you can then click on the upper right button "Administrator" to log into your admin area, or you can choose to view the "Site" front-end.

install-joomla-7

Installing Joomla 1.7

Since writing this article, I see Joomla is still developing and moving ahead with the next step in the latest version of Joomla, but I know it won't stop at just 1.7, so I will keep you up to date. However, now that Joomla 1.7 is pretty much out, the installation process, as far as I can see, is still the same as Joomla 1.6 and information provided here will still apply.