I installed the calendar tonight. Actually, after talking it over with a couple of the database administrators at work and then going up and talking it over with a programmer it was much easier than I thought. Here is what I went through:
- I sifted through a ton of calendaring systems. (I had been planning this for some time) I went to HotScripts to their PHP section and found a very nice calendar that seemed to do all I want called Datenator
. It also had one key ingredient: it was open source . I do all I can to use and support open source software. - Probably the most important step for my peace of mind, I backed up my web space. This is easy to do as the web space control panel has an archive link that will automatically back up my web space. It only took a few minutes and I had an up to the minute backup.
- I found that my web space allows only one MySQL database, but five users within that database. Armed with this information, I set up a new user on the database that will be the calendaring system for Datenator.
- I checked the configuration of Datenator and found the configuration file. In it I set the MySQL database name and the user/password combination for Datenator that I had set up in my web space control panel for MySQL.
- I used TopStyle Lite to edit the CSS file. I like TopStyle Lite because not only does it give you an easy way to edit a CSS file, it also gives you a nice view of all the element s that are created/edited within the CSS file. I highly recommend it for anyone editing CSS files.
- I uploaded the files, including structure, to a new folder on my web space. I used FileZilla to upload, although any FTP software would do. FileZilla is open source and as I mentioned earlier, I like to use and support open source software.
- I ran the installer script in my browser; according the the Datenator documentation, this script will perform all installation tasks. I had to select the choice that my database already existed and then clicked a button. It performed all installation tasks without a hitch.
- I logged in to the calendar system, changed the default admin password, then set up myself as a user in the calendaring system. Added an event and checked it out. It was all too easy!
For those of you who have a LAMP (Linux , Apache, MySQL and PHP ) compliant web space, I highly recommend using Datenator. It was easy to set up and is very easy to use. My next task is to figure out how to use the .htaccess in order to limit who can and cannot enter the calendar web site and finally put a link on my blog to the calendar. No links here until all this is in place.
