Making a website with a forum. Complete beginner

[timmyb]

I am trying to make a website for my sports team. It needs to have a main news page, a few information pages and a forum, (with some threads that anyone can post in and some that only registered users can post in.)

I am in the process of getting space on my university's server so there is no 'real' server to load it on to at the moment.

The big problem is that i have NO IDEA what i'm doing.

Is there a way to build a website that can only be viewed on my laptop and then transfer it over when the server space become available? What (free) software should I use to build the website?

I have plenty of time to follow tutorials/walkthroughs so a program which had good ones would be a requirment.

Thanks in advance for any help.

 

[BeefUK]

I've recently learnt php using Lynda.com's PHP Essential Training, I found it really good.

http://movielibrary.lynda.com/html/modPage.asp?ID=145

It doesn't show you much about MySQL although enough to get you started. It doesn't however show you how to built a forum. But if you haven't a clue what u're doing and have the time, i'd go through this first before starting a forum. It will give you a good basis.

As for the software try using MAMP ( MAC, APACHE, MYSQL, PHP), it installs all the stuff you need to run a pages locally for development.

http://www.mamp.info/

I've not used it on a mac, but i used the windows version (WAMP) and its great. Simple to install, although the tutorial I mentioned above shows you how to configure it.

If you need software to develop HTML or PHP using dreamweaver is pretty good, but there are loads of good free text editors out there such as Jedit

Here's a link I found with info on developing a forum:

http://www.adobe.com/devnet/dreamweaver/articles/forum_pt1.html

Hope that helps

 

[motherduce]

Well, there's a lot of options.

If you want a nice simple set of forums though, I have been very happy with Vanilla.

http://getvanilla.com/

PM me if you have any questions, I've done a few different rugby sites with forums and other features.

Cheers.

 

[timmyb]

Thanks for that. I've downloaded the MAMP program. I've also found a forum template which i've downloaded - phpBB. Now I have a file with all the phpBB stuff in it, (lots of .php files and more in sub folders.) How do I run this on the MAMP program?

 

[motherduce]

PHPBB is VERY bulky - you may want to mess with vanilla or punbb or bbpress instead - they are easier.

PHPBB is also a chore to keep updated and secure, just from previous experience.

http://bbpress.org/

 

[BeefUK]

Thanks for that. I've downloaded the MAMP program. I've also found a forum template which i've downloaded - phpBB. Now I have a file with all the phpBB stuff in it, (lots of .php files and more in sub folders.) How do I run this on the MAMP program?

When installing mamp you should have set a directory where you wanted you files to go in. The default is a folder called www.

Copy them in there and then load them through ur browser.

Thats how wamp works anyway unfortunately I can't comment on the mac side of things. If apple will hurry up and release merom then I might be able to help you more!!

 

[timmyb]

Welcome to MAMP
If you can see this page, MAMP is installed on your Mac and everything is working!

To see the PHP configuration, you can watch the output of phpinfo.

Here you can manage eAccelerator.

The MySQL Database can be administrated with phpMyAdmin.

To connect to the MySQL Server from your own scripts use the following connection parameters:

Host: localhost
[Port: 8889]
User: root
Password: root

Example:

$link = mysql_connect('localhost:8889', 'root', 'root');

or you can connect using an UNIX Socket:

Socket: /Applications/MAMP/tmp/mysql/mysql.sock
User: root
Password: root

Example:

$link = mysql_connect(':/Applications/MAMP/tmp/mysql/mysql.sock', 'root', 'root');

Have fun and enjoy,

Your MAMP-Team

I have this message from MAMP. I've put the phpBB2, (it was the one i had already, i'm not planning to put this online anytime soon, just TRYING to understand his it works,) file in the htdocs sub-folder, (which is the 'document route',) but i've no idea what the above stuff refers to. Where do I enter these parameters?

I'm all of these things!

 

[Skeeball236]

del

 

[clevin]

if he were to upload his site to school's server, better asking first if the server supports asp, php, etc. otherwise, no point to use them, simply html is good enough

 

[johnniewalker]

If you want a very nice looking site with the ability to add a forum and the option of getting help if you get stuck then I would recommend www.siteground.com ! I recently setup a site using joomla with an smf forum, I even got a domain name for free when I purchased the hosting.

At one point I got in a mess with my smf forum installation and asked for help from the siteground support and they got everything running properly again, you can even pay them to do all the installation stuff for you.

Joomla allows your members to post news on your site very easily and once registered they also have access to the forums.