WordPress MU

I have been reading through this forum for several hours trying to get wordpress MU installed.

I'm a Linux admin and have installed, configured, and customized several popular open source software packages.

I took on a project to install wordpress MU for a customer. I figured that it would be a 5 minute job.

Several hours later, and several modifications to both .htaccess and httpd.conf, I've finally got it figured out.

Here are some given variables in my setup:
domain name = domain.com
We will use subdomain install (blog1.domain.com)

I chose the subdomain install because it seemed too difficult to use subdirectories.

Install directory= /home/username/public_html/wpmu
or http://www.domain.com/wpmu/

First file modified (after the initial install):
/home/username/public_htmll/wpmu/.htaccess

======here's what it looks like===================
RewriteEngine On
RewriteBase /wpmu/ <----changed this to wpmu

==ADD THESE 3 LINES TO ENSURE THAT TRAILING SLASH IS ADDED=
==The reason is that if someone does not use a trailing slassh, they will get a 404, these lines append the / automatically
===========================================================
# Add trailing slash on directory request
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} -d
RewriteRule ^/home/username/public_html/(.*[^/])$ $1/ [R,L]
==================================================================

===========only modified the third line in this section==
# Rewrite http://www.domain.com to domain.com
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^www\.(.*)
RewriteRule ^(.*) http://domain.com/wpmu/$1 [R,L]
====original line is below. notice the change above====
RewriteRule ^(.*) http://%1/$1 [R,L]
========================================================

=======didn't modify anything below=====================
#uploaded files
RewriteRule ^(.*)?/?files/(.*) wp-content/blogs.php?file=$2 [L]

RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} -f [OR]
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} -d
RewriteRule . - [L]
RewriteRule ^([_0-9a-zA-Z-]+/)?(wp-.*) $2 [L]
RewriteRule ^([_0-9a-zA-Z-]+/)?(.*\.php)$ $2 [L]
RewriteRule . index.php [L]

end of .htaccess file.

Now, the instruction in the readme.txt say that you must
modify the httpd.conf file. This is a pretty drastric modification for an user friendly open source blog.

Not many people will have access to modify this file.

If you do modify it, make this modification to the virtual server section.

<VirtualHost 111.111.111.111>
========the next line is the important one=====
========make sure and append to, don't replace
========the original domain.com with the *.domain.com
========the WPMU instruction were wrong========
ServerAlias domain.com *.domain.com
ServerAdmin webmaster@domain.com
DocumentRoot /home/usernam/public_html
BytesLog domlogs/domain.com-bytes_log
ServerName http://www.domain.com

User username
Group username
CustomLog /usr/local/apache/domlogs/domain.com combined
ScriptAlias /cgi-bin/ /home/username/public_html/cgi-bin/
</VirtualHost>

I found these instructions which aided in my successful install.

http://www.blogopreneur.com/2006/11/06/installing-wordpress-mu-on-a-cpanelwhm-server/#comment-4521

Not everyone has a WHM/Cpanel server, but the instructions were much more clear than the original WPMU instructions were and that's where I realized that I should append the serveralias in the virtual server section instead of replace it.

Overall, I would say that this is a very difficult open source package install.

Redirects, httpd.conf, server aliasing, and .htaccess are all fairly complex issues.

I hope this helps someone and save them the 8 hours it took me to get it working.

Funny, it took me no more than 5 - 10 minutes to install WPMU, and I used the instructions that came with it. And I have a subdomain install (and I've done the subdirectory install -- it's /easier/!).

Wow 8 hours. Maybe you should have just installed 100 copies of regular wordpress.

I installed it on my plesk server in about 20 minutes after a few google searches.

Well.. it's blog FARM software, not just blogging software. not for the average user, no, and meant for someone who knows what they are doing.

an user friendly open source blog.

That was your first mistake. It's not just a blog. As Andrea states it's server software.

Not sure why you're rewriting the htaccess file. My guess is that you didn't follow the install instructions to set the install directory to 777, the install failed, and you had to fix the issue without understanding why it failed.

I do note that nowhere in your write up you discuss the file and directory permissions.

I just think you didn't read the instructions closely enough. It was a simple five minute install for most of us. I have two soccar moms running the software and they installed it themselves. (They did ask questions though and we had to do the wildcards for them of course.)

Oh, and please don't shout.

[Please note that the poster has had a WordPress account for a total of two hours as of this writing - drmike]

I just think you didn't read the instructions closely enough. It was a simple five minute install for most of us.

Well said.

If it took you "8 hours" to get this installed, I think you give yourself too much credit as a "Linux admin".

If you truly possessed the skills of a true Linux admin, you wouldn't have needed more than 10 minutes to get this working. Also, you wouldn't have installed it in public_html/wpmu, either.

Why is it so difficult to simply read, and pay attention, to the FM???

Of course, it's the software's fault for a users shortcomings.

<roll eyes>

Oh well, back to the sauce and the 2nd race of the day! woot!

If it took you "8 hours" to get this installed, I think you give yourself too much credit as a "Linux admin".

Well, I wouldn't go that far. We are all capable of making mistakes. Heck, I've sat here for three hours hacking away at code trying to get it to work as well and figured out it was a bloodly typo.

We probably should do some sort of install checklist.

The other issue I see which makes me think that the poster didn't read the install instructions is that they installed the files into WPMu but yet are doing subdomains. The install instructions say to upload the files within the zipped subdirectory, doesn't say upload the directory.

I'm still looking that that short time period of an account and more wondering if they've ever installed regular Wordpress outside of an autoinstaller. That and the poster is doing the redirect of a redirect of a redirect but placing teh files within a subdirectory and doing subdomains on top of that. That is not a correct setup and will put a fair amount of load on the server. We regularly tell folks not to do that around here.

Regards,
-drmike

If you truly knew the powers of the force, you would not be one to fear, young Skywalker...

regarding this:

The install instructions say to upload the files within the zipped subdirectory, doesn't say upload the directory.

I have read that several times in this forum and I think now its about time to give my 2 cents regarding this.

Imho that instruction needs to get updated, I have not downloaded and uploaded stuff in the last years because I have had problems in earlier times - there is much that can go wrong, during unpacking, i.e. extracting without the directory structure, during upload, i.e. accidently upload using the wrong transfer mode, whatever...
Thats why I always get the packages with a

wget packageurl/filename

Like I said, just my 2 cents.

True doc, but still.

8 hours? That's a little excessive, IMHO, for someone coming in bragging about being a "Linux admin".

The particular install instructions aren't the "best" they could be, but then again a savvy user can get it going without much headache.

And code typo's... that's a whole different ballgame all together.

Again, I agree with you so much. :)

What this really says to me is he took one look at it, went, "Pfft! I have Mad Tech Skilz! I don't need no stinkin' instructions! how on eather coudl two extra letter son the end make it that much harder than the 5 min WP install?" He went and tried to install from ufzzy familiarity & it didn't work right away. OH NOES! (see: not reading instructions beforehand) So after much fixing it does finally work , but it *must* be the program's fault. Yes. Always.

And he gets -10,000 points for all caps in the thread title. drmike gets + 1 million points for fixing it.

Well I guess I'll rephrase my comment from another thread, where I said there's one in every crowd, and we're so lucky to have 3 around here.

Yep, make that 4. :D

"If the education in my derrière could be used in an job interview, I'd be someone's CEO."
-- Me

Yep indeed. :D

Couldn't have been an easier install for me, guys. I'm even on Dreamhost and they warn about how difficult it is, but for me it was slick and clean. Thanks.

The Dreamhost article just got rewritten. :)

The new wording is much more appropriate. Guess I could've done that... Sorry. :/

I think it's appropriate. Although the last line of the first section could use about a 48px font size, besides the bold.

Gotta disagree on the 48px font.

To be honest, the hardest part of the software is the install. If they can get by that and figure out a method of upgrading correctly, it's really not that much harder than regular wordpress.

I was being a smart ass. :D

I wouldn't say install is the only difficulty though.

If they get a lot of users, it gets much more difficult if they can't afford to hire the right person/people. Shared hosting only goes so far, and while the odds are against someone getting thousands and thousands of users, if it were to happen someone could be in quite a jam if they aren't a savvy admin, or at least prepared to become one very quickly.

Agreed, you are a smart ass. :)

I'm wondering how many folks installing the software are dreaming about having thousands of users.

Confucius once said, "Man who live in glass house, change clothes in basement."

Or was it something to do with stones... Bah, oh well.

At least I seem to be in good company. :D

I do wonder the same thing though.

I am a bit dim and after i figured out my host would not change my http.conf it took about 10 mins to create mu with subdirectories. All problems I had were sorted by searching the forums.

Thank you for searching.

Please note that I don't mind folks asking questions around here. It's just when they ask them in such a way or on a topic where you can tell that they didn't search first.