
How to install PHPlist

If you've been using the previous public release, make sure to read UPGRADE. If you did, but
you don't mind losing all your data, you can use the methods below.

To install:

(this assumes your webfiles reside in "public_html", and you have created a Mysql database already)

* Take the archive file and unpack it in a temporary directory using "tar zxf phplist-x.y.z.tgz"
* Move the contents of the directory "public_html" to your HTML area. (mv public_html/* ~/public_html)

* You may want to password protect the "admin" directory in the lists directory.
That's up to you. Check your webserver documentation. An example htaccess file for Apache is included
(rename the "htaccess" file to ".htaccess":
  - mv ~/public_html/lists/admin/htaccess ~/public_html/lists/admin/.htaccess).

* Change the stuff in lists/config/config.php, you certainly will want to change the
database location, username and password and the domain.

* Use your browser to go to the admin index on your site (http://www.yoursite.com/lists/admin/)
and choose the toplink (Setup PHPlist).

* Choose the link "Configure Attributes" to identify the things you want to know from your
users and the attributes that the system will offer you to make a selection on when sending messages.

* Add some lists and you're up and running.

* Sending messages
It's useful to make this automatic, so you don't need to think about it, but if that's not possible
you can do it manually, by using the "Process Message Queue" link in the admin page.

If you want to automate it, you may want to use the perl script which you find in the cgi-bin directory.
This script is still experimental, so use with care. Don't use the perl script if you want to send
HTML messages. It won't work.

The "public" pages are in the "lists" directory. You can edit the index.php file to make them look
the way you want, and change footer.inc and header.inc. For the pages to work off the directory
you need to have "index.php" as your default document (normally index.html) and the .htaccess file
make sure of that. This may not work if you don't have permissions from your ISP to change
the apache configuration. Consult your ISP if you're not sure.

The "trick" to post to the directory will not always work. Particularly users with Windows have
found that they get "Method not allowed" errors, when using PHPlist. If you get this, you should
try to tell your webserver to allow the "POST" method to any URL in the PHPlist tree, particularly
the directories (/lists and /lists/admin by default) themselves. If that doesn't work, you can
set the option in the bottom of the config file, but that's not that neat :-)

The current version will not work with an out-of-the-box PHP4.2.0 This is because 4.2.0 sets
"register_globals" to be "Off". I will work on this for next versions, but for now, the only
solution will be to set "register_globals" to "On". Sorry if that causes problems.

If you want to use the FCKeditor (WYSISYG) for your messages, you can do so, by installing it 
in a directory called FCKeditor in the admin directory of PHPlist. 
Check out http://www.fredck.com/FCKeditor/

That's it.
